BISMARCK – Since the governor is managing an entire state, he appoints assistants. However, sometimes those assistants also need assistance.
Lori Sondag is the executive assistant to Joe Morrissette, director of the Office of Management and Budget for the cabinet of Republican Governor Doug Burgum. Sondag works on the fourth floor of the Capitol building in Bismarck. The governor’s office is on the first floor, the floor where the legislative assembly meets.
“I support him in whatever he needs,” Sondag explained. “Travel arrangements, or calendaring, and sometimes I help him facilitate scheduling meetings with the Governor's office. I’ll contact my counterparts down there and we’ll try to figure out something that will work.”
Sondag described Morrissette’s job as being the Chief Financial Officer for the State of North Dakota.
“He does the state’s executive budget. He helps prep that, and works with the governor on that,” said Sondag.
Morrissette’s office has five analysts who work with different agencies in North Dakota.
“They have a portfolio of so many agencies, and they work directly with them to prepare their budgets for the biennium,” said Sondag. “I just support them. That’s the executive budget that we do for the governor’s office.”
The governor’s budget, worked on by the analysts behind the scenes, is presented to the legislature during the organizational session the December before session is scheduled to begin.
“That’s the governor’s budget,” said Sondag. “They collaborate. They have policy folks down in their office that also have portfolios of different agencies, so our analysts work with them and the governor. They come to some consensus about what the governor wants to support for each agency budget. It is a process.”
Sondag will be retiring this year, having worked for the state of North Dakota for 40 years as an administrative assistant for several agencies, starting in Williston at the Job Service Office. She went to college for two years at UND Williston, now called Williston State College, to be a legal secretary.
“I employ some of those legal aspects in this because we work a lot with the state century code,” said Sondag.
Sondag and her husband live in Bismarck, though she is originally from Parshall, North Dakota. For fun, Sondag enjoys traveling, reading, gardening, and spending time with her 13 grandchildren.
Sondag’s current position also includes content managing of OMB's website and assisting with maintaining the statewide intranet.
Web pages relating to OMB can be found below:
Governor Burgum’s Cabinet https://www.governor.nd.gov/cabinet-members
