Friday, September 27, 2002
|
Friday, September 27, 2002 |
|
PTC ethics board rules mayor should repay city for secretary's time on trip By JOHN
MUNFORD
Peachtree City Mayor Steve Brown must repay the city for the estimated 30 minutes a secretary spent to drop off his daughter at a golf camp this summer, the city's ethics board ruled Wednesday night. Although the board ruled Brown violated the city's ethics ordinance, it decided only to admonish Brown not to violate the ordinance again. Brown had specially requested the hearing, although he was the only one to file a complaint about the incident. In reading a written statement to the board, Brown said he assumed the secretary was going to use her break time to drive his daughter to the Braelinn Golf Club while he attended an important sales tax meeting in Fayetteville. "Please note that I never asked, requested or ordered a city employee to care for my child," Brown said. Brown didn't present any witnesses during the 30-minute hearing. He fielded several brief questions after his statement. Several board members said they considered the infraction so minor, they wondered why a hearing was convened. Board member Frances Meaders suggested Brown could have repaid the money "without going to a full-blown hearing." "It could have been handled administratively," Meaders said. "It could have saved a lot of time and money." "I question why we are here," said board member Terry Garlock. "We have a very minor matter and we have a prompt voluntary disclosure." Brown said one reason he requested the hearing was because he felt the matter would be blown out of proportion by others. He pointed to the efforts of former Mayor Bob Lenox, who sought to file criminal charges against Brown relating to the incident for theft of services. A Fayette County magistrate ruled there was not probable cause for the criminal charges to be lodged. Garlock said he would also like to see the ethics ordinance changed to create a "front-end" screening process for ethics complaints and the creation of a penalty for those who file trivial or frivolous complaints. After the hearing, Brown said he didn't like the idea of creating a screening process. He said a provision in the ordinance that doesn't allow ethics complaints to be dropped is effective instead. The ethics board members were selected at random from a pool of 10 eligible persons that was created by the City Council in January, with each council member appointing two individuals to the pool. Several weeks ago, council drew five members at random to serve on the board. But several members recused themselves for different reasons and they had to be replaced by other members from the pool. Garlock, who was appointed to the ethics board pool by Brown, originally planned to withdraw his name, but after several others recused themselves he agreed to sit on the board for the hearing. The other board members for the hearing included Meaders (who was appointed by councilman Murray Weed), Alison Moore and Steve Fraas (both appointed by councilman Steve Rapson), and Bill Webster (appointed by councilman Dan Tennant). According to city spokesperson Betsy Tyler, the following ethics board candidates bowed out from serving on the board for this hearing: Rob Rothly, because he was appointed to the pool by Brown; Ann Matwick, who served as the treasurer for Brown's campaign; Barry Amos, who works with Brown in his role as Tyrone town manager; Iola Snow, who was to be out of town when the hearing was originally slated to take place; and Rob Williams, who declined because his firm is applying for the city attorney position.
|
||