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With council silence, F’ville May 19 meeting may get noisy

By BEN NELMS
bnelms@TheCitizenNews.com

If citizens’ stated intentions are any measure of their desire to be heard, the Thursday meeting of the Fayetteville City Council will be a more vocal version of the May 5 council meeting.

Having nothing to do with rezoning requests or proposed ordinances, the large volume of communications from residents after the May 5 meeting and in the days that followed clearly called for an explanation and action on the part of the council in the escalating controversy surrounding the Fayetteville Police Department.

At issue are the numerous claims that surfaced in April by former Officer Harold Simmons and a host of others that attended the packed house meeting on May 5. In the wake of it all, rumors of the status of Chief Johnny Roberts and Maj. Steve Ledbetter, compounded by the silence from city leaders, has swept the streets, now unabated for more than two weeks.

The unfolding controversy came after a series of events that began in April. That was when former Officer Harold Simmons filed complaints with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) alleging racial discrimination as the motivating factor in his termination April 14 for insubordination.

The termination came when Simmons refused to apologize to two fellow officers he had taped without their knowledge. His taping of the officers, said Simmons, was an activity that other officers had participated in as a result of what Simmons characterized as an environment of hostility and retribution in the department.

Responding to questions related to Simmons’ firing, the city issued a statement April 21 disputing charges of discrimination, stating that an independent hearing officer had determined that no discrimination existed in the city’s requirement that Simmons apologize.

Responding May 3 to questions related to overall morale in the police department and to officers taping each other, Roberts was emphatic that his department did not suffer from morale problems. His comments appeared in a front-page story in The Citizen.

Contrary to statements made by Simmons, Roberts insisted that he maintained an open-door policy for officers to surface issues and concerns without fear of retribution. Addressing Simmons’ claim that other officers taped each other, Roberts said, “I have no knowledge of it. The only one I know of that did that is Harold Simmons.”

Roberts acknowledged that he had taped Simmons during during a previous meeting, adding that he did so as a matter of official police business.

The brewing conflict intensified at the May 5 council meeting, when the chamber filled with Simmons’ supporters burst into cheers and applause amid a standing ovation after the former officer finished his remarks to the council.

“He (Roberts) runs that place like a tyrant,” Simmons told the council. “He’s got people afraid to say the truth. He’s got people afraid for their jobs and for their lives. Y’all see one side of Johnny Roberts, but you don’t see the side we see every day. You don’t see the side of Steve Ledbetter we see every day.”

A May 12 called council meeting included only a personnel matter and a filed legal claim as the sole topics. The public was excluded from the closed meeting. It was unknown if either of the topics dealt with allegations brought by Simmons or formal complaints he issued last month.