City Commission - Special Meeting

Call this city commission workshop special meeting Tuesday, February 17, 2026 at 604 p.m. 46 p.m. It's a special meeting, Mr. Mayor. Just for the record. Special meeting. Just for the record, we have two workshops and a special meeting. Yeah, the first one is a special meeting. The first one is special meeting. Okay. I'm sorry.

I call it special meeting of the city of Bokei, Tuesday, February the 17, 2006. order at 4:07 p.m. May we please stand for the invocation provided by Commissioner McDonald followed by the pledge of allegiance.

Dear Lord, we come before you once again to conduct the city of Hoki's um business. We pray that we're informed and that we govern ourselves according to our processes. Um the laws that govern what we do here as a municipality. We ask that we are able to be receptive to each and everyone that speaks today. that we do as you would have us to do as we address the issues that are brought before us in this special meeting and in the workshops to follow. We ask that you continue to lead guide and direct us and that we are able to do as it is required of us as officials of this city. We ask all these bless To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Roll call. Madame clerk. Mayor Bab. Present. Vice Mayor Cowan Williams. Present. Commissioner McDonald present. Commissioner McFersonson present. Commissioner Scott present. Interim city manager present. City attorney here. City clerk is present.

Thank you city clerk. Thank you commissioners. Thank you staff and most importantly thank our audience for being here to participate and witness our deliberation for our special call meeting of Tuesday. February the 17th. This particular meeting has one purpose and it is to entertain a resolution. Resolution 20265.

Excuse me, mayor. You will have to um take a vote to allow vice mayor to attend by phone. At this time, I would ask the commission uh approval to have Vice Mayor Kowis Williams uh participate by form. So move, second. It has been moved by Commissioner Mike Donna and properly second by Commissioner Mike Fearson to allow the vice mayor uh Williams to participate by phone. Call for questions hearing none. Are you ready for a vote? Roll call. Madame clerk.

Commissioner McDonald. Yes. Commissioner Scott. Yes. Commissioner McFerson. Yes. Vice Mayor Calvin Williams. Yes. Mayor B.

Yes. So, we have one item on our agenda. It's resolution 2026-05. And I'll have our city attorney reading it to the record. A resolution of the city commission of the city of Pokei, Florida, authorizing an agreement between the city of Pokei and Angela Reyes LLC for the provision of finance services, accounting services, and for assistance with OIG compliance responses responses, corrective action plans, and related services in an amount not to exceed $85,000 in the contract form attached here to as exhibit A. providing for adoption of representations, providing for conflict, and providing for an effective date.

Thank you, madame city attorney. Entrance city manager, could you give us a brief explanation?

Yes, Mayor can. Um, as we seek for a financial service consultant, uh, we're following the IG recommendations that the city hire an outside consultant to address our concerns. Um, we are looking to bring our city into compliance. As you all know, the last three audits in the last three years were late and we need a new consultant. The city's had the same consultant doing all of these audits. The OIG says in the recommendations to get an outside consultant and someone new to the organization. And so, we're asking for this resolution to be approved. Um, and looking into it. We need a clean slate. We've been getting the same results for years and we are looking for change. Um this firm has done this type of cleanup for uh for other cities and Pokei needs the same as well. Uh some of the urgent matters that we have is that this firm will process our payroll until we hire the finance director which takes time but we are in the process of doing that. um you don't have a financial consultant at this time. So that's why we're seeking to have this resolution approved. Um today is February and the findings of the OIG has not been addressed. Um the report shows that the OIG will return for a status check in March and so we need to also start preparing for the audit. Um March as well we must start our internal preparation for 2026 and 27. uh the finance director will come in once they're hired to work with this financial consultant to ensure that we come into compliance. Um as far as the benefits that we're getting from this particular firm, um it's a reputable accounting firm with verifiable experience. The goal is to balance the budget on time, bring our city into compliance. We can't afford to keep being late as we have been in the past.

Um, the last consultant was asking $120 an hour for one person. This particular new group is asking $150 and we're getting an entire team. Okay? And they specialize in exactly what we need. Now, this is a LLC team professional, great background. Um, they're going to do in a short time, in six months, what it normally takes in a year. And so we're just asking for you all to approve this resolution so we can move forward um with coming into compliance and fixing the areas of concern that has been pointed out by the report here. And if you will allow Mayor um Miss Reyes Santana is here today and if you allow her to come up to the podium to address the um commission. Miss Reyes Santana.

Good afternoon mayor and council. I don't know if this is on for the record. Angela Rehea Santana. I am here in response to uh the contract of completing the IG findings and trying to get back into compliance and also for lack of better terms just cleaning up some of do some housekeeping in the finance area with your budget and accounting team for six months and then transition that over to whoever your finance director is. Could you give me elaborate on some of your experiences in handling these type of uh issues?

Yes, I have been in the government uh sector for o over 15 years. I've gone to different cities. I go in I do business process reviews. I do assessments and then I provide management um suggestions of how to become more efficient and compliant. Uh specifically with state audits, I have been involved with that as well. Just bringing certain practices back into compliance and getting hopefully trying to keep the state out of the city or out of that particular agency so that they can continue on and move forward with their daily operations. the interim city manager mentioned that uh not only would you be working on it primarily but you have an entire team who is part of your team and their experience in this

I have I have two CPAs and I have two attorneys as part of my team. Um they have extensive background in uh government specifically the government sector and agencies. um they will be a part of my team in my back office as well of course because I have you know the the administrators that come in and do some of the leg work but the real core of the team will be two other attorneys and two other CPAs that can get this done in a matter of six months and hopefully reply to the state. the state can reply back to us, give us some feedback, and then we can close this out and kind of keep it moving. That is the goal. I will need cooperation from city administration and the commission as well. It takes a team to get this done in such a short period of time. But I think if we all work together and uh you know answer the questions, provide some of the technicalities that the IG is asking for, we can get it done. So we can expect that um once you've completed your audit that a lot of the system systemic issues that we're facing right now uh will be addressed and adjustments will be made and hopefully going forward we can avoid ending up in this situation again.

Yes. because we will be putting in policy in place that you it will be brought forth to you all to vote on as well. But there will be policy there will be procedures there'll be administrative regulations that are put in place that um will sustain hopefully and guide whoever comes in after to continue on in compliance. And will that include the um banking shortfalls that we have currently um had to uh contend with um so that again um we don't have a repeat yes of um yes

are you I'm not sure why you're talking right now though no I'm saying what what was your question I was asking Oh, okay. I'm sorry. I didn't understand you. Uh, no. At this time, this is totally deliberation by the commission. I'm sorry. Thank you, Mayor B. I have a question. Yes, Vice Mayor.

Um, I would like to know the 80 up to $85,000 figure that um they have here. How would that um how did they come about with that figure based on the work that's going to be performed? It is industry standard for the hourly rate with the the team that I do have in place to get this done in a short period of time. So my hourly rate for the firm is $150 an hour. That is not just myself. That is myself and my executive team. I don't know if that answered your question. So you said that you should be able to get through everything within six months.

Yes, ma'am.

Um what kind of um provisions do you have in place to ensure that you keep it within that time frame? I understand sometimes um it takes longer than we initially uh anticipate, but um potentially it could extend beyond that. The only provision that I do have that is not in the contract is that what I need a point of contact at the city so that when I do request documents and any other type of information that I do get that back in a reasonable time frame and if we just don't have it then someone can say we just don't have it and we're not making things up. I need to be as open and transparent with the OIG and the state as as possible and if we don't then we don't and we'll say we don't have it but this is what we're implementing moving forward. They'll see the corrective actions and we can go ahead and move forward from that finding. That's really the my my provision is that I get a a reasonable response time from administration and sometimes the commission so that I can move forward with my work. I I do do think that we're able to accommodate that request. I don't foresee that you will have any issues with our administration, but certainly if you do, um you can reach out to the commission so that we can do what we need to do to ensure that there are no slowdowns and issues in that regard. If I do run into that where I'm seeing that it's cutting into my time, then I'll make more aggressive requests like access to some IT softwares and such that normally contractors don't have access to. But in order to move this forward in the time frame that I'm um providing, then I will come forth and ask for that. I will be more aggressive in my ask.

Okay. Any other questions so far? Mayor Bab, I have several questions, but it's not for uh Miss Ryad. So, do I need to wait for us to put a motion on the floor first or do I ask those questions now? You're able once the uh there's a motion and a second, we can go into questions at that time. Yes. Okay. Okay. And what other cities did Miss Reyes says that she has worked with?

I've worked with um City of Hollandale, City of North Miami Beach, City of North Miami, which I'm currently at, City of Miami, um just to name a few. I don't have that on me right now. I also have good reference in working with the county in Miami date county over there as well. So I would ask one question. It has been for OIG reports the same type of work that's listed here for the city of B. It has been to bring in their situation into compliance just to not go into detail.

And just for public records, are you have any past relationship with the intern city manager?

No, I do not have any relationship notified of this uh proposal or request. Um I was actually contacted through a third party. She's not even here. Um her name is Rasha Kimo and she asked she told me that Pokei was having issues in their finance department. Um later on I was connected with Miss Kamitra and then put in contact with the interim city manager. So I have no uh relationships now. hoping to build some but not right now. In addition,

you say she was contacted Mayor B by you. I was contacted through uh an an outside party. Um her name is Rasha Kimo. She contacted me and told me that the city of Pokei was having issues with their finance in their finance area. Um later on she asked me if I was available for some work. I told her yes and then she put me in contact with Miss Kamitra and um then that's how the rel the the relationship started or the request came forward. She said she said an outside party. Who was the outside party? Uh her name is Rasha Kamo.

Her name is who? Rasha Kamo. who Russia Camo and does she work for the city of Pokei? I'm just saying how would she know about the city of Poki finances? Well, there's a it's an OIG report out there, so I think that's public record. I'm not sure how she find out how she found out. Any additional question from the commission? Hearing none. Uh, we have resolution before us. What would be your pleasure? Mr. Mayor, yes.

I just need a little bit of clean up for the contract. There's um an area in it that is highlighted. Um, I'm not sure if it's under under your on your version or not, but it is 4.3B. and we need to know the payment schedule. Should you approve this for how the firm is going to be paid? Um the proposal that was submitted was on um was $150 an hour and I guess it would be up to the $85,000 but I wasn't but it's for a six-month period. So, I wasn't sure if that was supposed to be in, you know, in installments and the 150 was kind of a guide or if it was um a straight 150 billing that you that you would be um doing.

I'll be billing 150 um and it'll probably be bi-weekly just to keep everything uh in order. And through your billing process, would it be something like a billing of a lawyer where you kind of have an itemized list of what you done and who worked on it? Yes, it will. And you'll um it's required for auditing purposes anyway. It can't be big. It has to be actually itemized. So, yeah, you'll get the itemized invoice.

And so, mainly all of the work is pretty much is going to be for the OIG report. Um, no. I that's 50% of the work. Uh, 50 the other 50% is going to be um assessing your finance and budget department and making sure that they're in compliance. I got to make sure that the dayto day when I leave remains compliant as reported to the state through the IG report. And with the majority of your work, if not all, be done primarily at the city hall.

Um the m there will be touching points at the city hall because I have to come in and assess um to be able to see really see the operations that happen on a daily basis. Um some of it is virtual, some of it is onsite. I will coordinate with city administration on those on-site visit days. So, it's pretty half and half. You'll be seeing me around until this is over. Hopefully, not as much. If I'm here more than that, then then we got to come back to the table. So, the only thing I want to just make sure I'm putting it on the um on the record or whatever is there are finance director services that are u required by the city's code. And so, this um is not to conflict with those things. And so, the city will still need to determine how it's going to deal with the finance director

position position issues, those things that are in the city code that are required. Um I wrote you all a memo on it and so those are I pulled it from the code so that you see it. Um but um you probably want to have some discussion about that since what they put in their proposal is that they are not going to be doing those things. So the question is, are those things going to continue with the current staff that you have right now so that you make sure that from the jump you're not getting into a situation where you could be in any kind of a conflict with the um with the code or with your proposal. Okay.

Mayor, if I may speak, um this firm is going to do this, uh the same duties that the prior consultant was doing in addition to more cleanup. Um, we had a consultant that didn't conflict with the past financial director. So, she'll be performing those duties. She'll be billing like the previous consultant. Um, the previous consultant would do their work, their hours, and would send us an invoice. She'll be doing the same thing. So, it wouldn't be a conflict because we've had a finance director working with the previous consultant. So, we're going to move forward. And the difference also is with our finance director, our assistant finance director and our accounts payable. I have streamlined those duties where we know more about what's going on and she'll be that person to come in to clean up. So we don't have the audits, but every year there's an issue. So, I'm I'm asking for this approval because we have budget coming up. We have audits coming up and we need to have someone in place that's qualified to get these things done. And she is doing she'll be doing what our previous consultant was doing and everyone has to work together as a team. She'll be working with our finance director. She'll be working with our assistant director. She'll be working with accounts payable. But she'll have her duties that she'll be, you know, billing us for just as before.

Okay. Quick, just for clarification too, and I don't want to speak to the city attorney, but it was a statement made that some of the uh outlines in her agreement don't coincide with some of the things that need to be done. Are we going to do the remaining part inhouse or how would that be bridged where there's no gap between what is requested and what they're going to be responsible for? What things are you referring to?

Could you mention I think in her email she did mention and outline some of those things. So there is a in the the powers and duties of the finance director as um in section 2-293 of the code have to do with and it's a long list but um planning, assigning, directing, supervising, coordinating various citywide accounting and related fiscal activities. Make recommendations with respect to implementation of improvements needed to effect more efficient use of personnel and equipment. make recommendations and decisions regarding operational policies, expenditures, plans, and other administrative matters as they affect the department. Prepare and administer the department budget. Play plan and direct the overall development and operational controls and techniques for the maintenance of the central accounting system. Participate in the preparation of the annual citywide budget making forecasts on the revenues, expenditures, and debt is interest etc for the upcoming year. supervise and direct gathering, interpreting, recording, and distributing financial data. Prepare and supervise, prepare and financial records and reports, monitor fiscal activities, and ensure compliance with the applicable federal, state, county, and municipal requirements. Uh, coordinate fiscal services and other municipal departments. Exercise supervision over special funds. Negotiate safe investments for special funds and recordkeeping of the funds. Invest temporarily idle funds to ensure maximum return consistent with sound investment policies. Compile, prepare, and prevent. Present financial records and reports on regular schedule or upon request supply specific information to investment firms, administrative officials, the city commission, the general public, and individuals requesting financial data. Participate in the analysis of city financial policies. Interpret financial and accounting data. Formulate recommendations for action by the city manager and the city commission. Review

results of auditors and responsibility for corrective action if necessary. Prepare annual financial report as required by the charter. Prepare prescribe accounting forms and procedures. Supervise continuous audit of units handling cash and maintaining accounting records. Make recommendation in the interest of the city that eligible applicants be hired to fill department vacancies. and that subordinate employees be res reassigned, transferred, disciplined, suspended, terminated, promoted, or commended, participate in the adjustment of grievances, confer with the and and advise subordinates concerning difficult work problems or regarding the development and installation of new work procedures and policies. Conduct staff studies, recommend policy and management systems that affect the overall sis city to ensure proper accountability to control operations. Work closely with the city manager and other department heads concerning the automated accounting systems and developing new data processing applications for financial management and control. Set priorities and give direction to financial data processing activities. responsibility for the preparation of bonds of indebtness and for the collection of revenues through association with the national technical societies, trade and professional associations, other governmental jurisdictions and private businesses. Keep informed of current developments in the field of purchasing, pricing, market conditions, and new products. Receive and verify requisitions and determine propriety and property proposed purchases. Consolidate departmental requisitions and possible develop the consult list of appropriate vendors and prepare formal or informal bids, invitations and appropriate uh receive and analyze quotations and bids for relative prices and consistency with specifications. Select best bid and prepare and award contracts to vendors to for purchases or prepare

recommendations for action by the city manager or city commission. Supervise the preparation of speci specifications for the purchase of equipment, materials and services. Keep currently informed of laws, rules, and regulations affecting the relationship of principal and agent as well as those affecting contracts and delivery material and conduct studies for the improvement of procurement and supply policies and practices. It it's um it goes on but basically um these are some of the duties and there are like I guess about seven more paragraphs. So these are some of the things that would be done. I can read the rest of it if you want me. Mr. Love out of order sir. We in a meeting. Thank you sir.

Yeah I can read the rest if you want me to but um those are the kind of things if if I may. Normally when the and some of these are in that I heard you read or some of these are in the scope of work that the consultant would be doing

well in the scope of work as a matter of technical guide or assistance in normally when you have an absence of a finance director but you have an assistant finance director that assistant finance director steps in as an interim finance director and takes on those duties to make those decisions. I'm not co coming in to make those final decisions on behalf of the city of Pokei in that capacity as a finance director, but I can assist and guide and prep the individual in that seat until you get a actual finance director to make those decisions. If we

and as I stated, we are in the process of hiring a financial director. What's what's the status of of the um the finance position finance director position? what's the current status of it as far as have we set up interviews or yes HR has reached out to the candidate and interviews are being set up and so um whatever time it takes to pass background and the things um we're hoping a couple of weeks but we are per uh planning interviews for the finance director

and in the interim have you named or planning on appointing an interim finance director someone who who would be responsible for the dayto day and can be trained along during that time. We have uh Angela here for six months. So, it would be great if and and you're starting the process of hiring interviewing. That's great. But it would be great if we have the actual finance director here on board that they can benefit from some of her experience and knowledge and moving our finance department forward.

Okay. Correct. And as stated, we have an assistant finance director who has moved into assisting with the finance director's responsibilities because we don't have one. So, we have someone that's been here and they're filling in. Thus, the reason to get someone in here to take care of those things that will keep us from having issues as we prepare to hire a finance director. So, that uh is already being done. We have someone who has has stepped in, but we don't want the duties to cross. And that's why we're trying to get someone in to get us on the right track until we hire the finance director, which will be soon. and mayor Bab looking at the u information that the city attorney sent us um and I know this is something that needs to be done but looking at the recommendations from the city attorney are we going to um take those into consideration or are we going to ignore what the attorney is saying that we need to propose for the city commission consideration a resolution that would not conflict with the current responsibilities because some of those responsibilities that I just heard read off is also in that contract for Miss Red. And um so are we going to ignore what the the the what the uh recommendations of the attorney is and just move forward with voting on this or are we going to be in compliance

um and look at the recommendations that was proposed to us?

Vi Vice Mayor. Yeah. Um so what I proposed is not this was written before we got the update of the new proposal from Miss Reyes. So the memorandum was done when we had the first proposal which was to be the finance director. So since then they gave another Miss Reyes gave another proposal and that proposal um I believe would be in line with um our code. So, as long as what the the manager the um the inter manager is saying is she has someone who is in place who is doing all of these other things that are required by the code in an assistant finance director position pending her hiring someone. So, so one of the recommendations I made was making all efforts to hire a qualified finance director for the city who is familiar with municipal finance matters. And that is what she said she is doing. Another thing that I um uh recommended was if you are seeking consulting support services for a finance director position, consider developing a scope of services that does not conflict with the current code of ordinances. And so I believe they've done that. And then the third thing and I've also written the contract so that that's clear. And then the third thing is um after clarifying a scope of services which has been done um provide resumeumés and references for consideration by the city commission for a financial consultant that will support the finance finance director's responsibilities. And so um she has stated Miss Reyes has stated on the record her uh her qualifications other cities that she's represented um and um and the team that she will have to work with the city. So it looks like

were we provided those documents or that's just something that she just just stood up to tell us. So did we get the documentation? Well, one of the things that you did get was a recommendation when she did send back the revised proposal. There was a recommendation letter from a ton um uh Tony Brunson who is a who is a CPA. Um and it looks like she is she has some other recommendations perhaps with her at this time to give to the clerk.

If I may. Um I read here in the uh resolution that um the consultant uh does not intend to replace uh the finance director position. So I would say that um if they're here to ensure that we are in compliance with those u requirements I identified by the IG report that everything has to be looked at. But that's not necessarily um to say that you know everything will need to be um changed or amended or or what have you. But um for sure you cannot ensure that everything is in compliance if you don't look at everything. But if we have a finance director here working alongside her, then of course those duties that are the responsibility of the finance director uh will be taken care of by the finance director uh and not the consultant. So, um again, she's here to um oversee and ensure that there's given uh attention to those areas that need uh correcting, but not to step in and do the job of the finance director. Uh so, we're all here to uh work with her and ensure that she has access to the records that she's going to need uh to assist her in doing so.

And through the mayor, um Commissioner McDonald, you're absolutely right. Um and it and it's written in a way that does not conflict. Um in addition to that, I think that um what they have said is that what one of the things that you said was that everything may not have to be done. You're right because some of the things in the OIG report were things that you all actually had rules and policies and procedures on, but they just weren't followed. And so, you know, they may have recommendations to tighten things up or make it easier to follow or or whatever the case may be, but um they may not necessarily have to touch everything. And then there's also been a few policies that have been given to me that I've reviewed and um and I will certainly give them the benefit of um whatever the review is and they can, you know,

Thank you. decide what they like to do with those as well. Thank you. Question, attorney. this this resolution and this contract that we have before us. Have you reviewed everything in here and that is is not in conflict with any of our ordinances say other than the uh issue that you point outed in 4.3.

Yes, that's correct. Um in fact what you see under exhibit A is um is all I did was I took their proposal and I made their proposal a a um the things that were listed in their proposal I put it in the scope of services. Um the only added thing was since the since in when they when we got the re um revised proposal it had oi um activities and so I took that from the last when it came to you you you all had you were considering another Miss Busy was going to bring somebody back before but then they decided to take it in house but I had already done a bunch of work and I p I actually went through all of the lines to see what was required by that and I put those things in there and so um and so the contract is fine. I did take out um from the standard contract some of the um things that uh I didn't think applied like there were the insurance requirements you will see that struck stricken through on some of them you know I'm sure they have basic insurance if they represent governmental entities but some of the things like um the the bodily injury of a hund of a million dollars and I removed um um I think some vehicle insurance or something like that but for the most part it's a it's a standard contract track that um that I'm sure they're used to seeing in uh in their uh other work with governmental entities.

Yes, that's correct.

May, may I speak? This is my concern. I'm just trying to um determine and I know um this was put on the last agenda by Commissioner McPear and he said he wanted this to be something that we look into on a future agenda item. We just voted on that at the last meeting. But then I see here we're having a special meeting on it today. But my concern is it's up to $85,000 and we're not putting anything out for bid. So here's my concern. Um interim manager told us she had a strategic planner. She changed the position from the grant writer and she said she was going to have someone from the inside to do a lot of this work. So here it is. Now, we want to pay up to $85,000 for someone to do this work. We changed the position from a grant writer to a strategic planner who was supposed to be working on, she specifically said the OIG. So, now we're going to be paying three people to do this, the manager, the uh strategic planner, and now we're going to pay 85 up to $85,000 for a consultant to do this work. when um we were told that that's why the position of the grant writer was changed. I don't know what the strategic plan and job description is, but this is what was said in the meeting. So, my concern is where is all of what line item is this money coming from? And why are we playing paying three people to do the OIG work? That that's my concern. And we're not even putting the job out for be. And my other concern is we went all the way to another county. We're saying we want to build our relationships back in Palm Beach County, but we skipped over Palm Beach County, not even put the bid out at all. So, I guess we don't have anybody qualified in Palm Beach County to even do this scope of work because we didn't put it out for a bid and we're just choosing people and

that's a concern of mine. We had someone uh Susan and I know the interim manager said Susan wanted a contract. Susan has done work for the city. Do we have a contract to look at from Susan so we can see how we get more bang for our buck? We only just have one contract that has been brought before us. I get it and understand the work need to be done. But we skip and you know we say we want to hire you for hosting but we skipped all over Palm Beach County and going to another county and we didn't even put the job out in Palm Beach County for a bit to see if we can even get more bang for our buck. And so that's a concern of mine that we're just voting on it and I know the commission can vote to approve it. But again, why is it not going out for RFP? Okay. The reason this one didn't go out, it does not have to go out for bid. The accounting services according to our city ordinance section 2-2725 says under the city's purchasing code, this particular position does not have to go out for bid. As for the strategic planner, that position was submitted to you all with job duties along with the resolution. So, she is uh working and taking care of the duties that she was assigned to do. And with this particular, this is not the one that Mr. McFersonson recommended. Mr. McFersonson recommended investigation to pursue litigation as far as the misappropriated funds. This does not have this does not have okay at the last

mitigation. My recommendation at the last commit at the last commission meeting was for us to hire uh to look at uh hiring a consultant to make sure that we're in compliance with the OIG finding preparing the proper responses as far as the uh corrective action plan. that was mine in the last uh in the last meeting and uh and I think we did mention uh it going out for bid but um if we have an ordinance that that don't have to be that I'm for long as we're in compliance with our ordinances and our uh

but I I'll say this also just because it doesn't have to go out of bid don't mean that's not a good practice to perform and to do. So that's it's okay to do it because it don't have to but that shouldn't be the question answered. Maybe you know because of the time restraint need to make it. That was my concern in addition to not having to go out. So with the time

other than just not have to my future agenda item at the last meeting was recommending that we get a consultant to come in uh agency to come in and assist us with preparing the corrective action plan for that OG finding that they're supposed to be following up on. This doesn't have anything to do with our state audits and our annual audits. Those are taken care of. Yeah, and in I would would ask this also just out of curiosity. Did you speak with Miss Susan because she's actually I don't know how often she work but she's still doing work for the city of Oak. I'm just asking did that you look at that and see if she's able to do any or most of it or all of it. Just curious. I did speak to Miss Susan and the last invoice that Miss Susan has submitted was in July 2025 and I spoke with her a reference to um what she was, you know, about to do to assist us. Miss Susan sent me an email saying that she because her contract wasn't brought to the commission meeting, which again I'm looking at the fact that we failed three audits in the last three years. And so I'm looking at uh her email that said that she was not going to she was not long no longer work with us and she would be uh would send us an invoice for January the 26th and January 29th. when she did come into the office and we spoke and she build us for that and all we had was a conversation and so with me looking to fix where we are mayor we can't keep delaying the they're coming back next month according to the instruction that we have I'm trying to do something to clean up our city to make all of us look better to our citizens because you know we're having

issues and this firm is capable their experience as she's explained will help us get back on track to clean it up. And as far as the 85, we always put up to an amount up to. This young lady is not saying that it's going to cost $85,000. We always put an up to amount. She stated that she is charging $150 an hour for her team. Susan was charging $120 an hour just for her. And and and to be honest with you all, I barely saw her

when I came in in October. And so we have to look to do better. We keep saying that we want to do better. We want to, you know, protect ourselves. We want to pass our audits, but we can't do it without the proper people in place. So that's my my opinion on it. I respect everybody on what you're saying, but let's just keep it real. How are we going to do better if we don't bring people in to to help us do it? And I didn't have to put this out for bid. And that's why I'm here now for your approval. you know, um, that's where, you know, where we are with it. Looking for the experienced people to get it done. And that's all I'm asking.

I have a question, Mary. I see she said the interim manager saying we need experienced people to do it, but we have we've hired her. I haven't heard her say from her job description. She has a part in this, too. And she hired the strategic planner. So, I'm thinking with her and the strategic planner that she hired, she said that that's what the strategic planner was going to work on. If we keep finding money to do it look like administrative duties that some of these this responsibility goes on to we're paying our manager $10,000 a month, but seem like we keep hiring people to do the job. I mean, we got to be honest, too. The manager has a responsibility to this city as well for $10,000 a month. The manager is the manager.

Action plan is what we're asking to be done. A corrective action plan um that manager I think should be responsible for along with the strategic plan that she is hired. I'm responsible. That's manager and not finance director. Two different things. I do get it.

Now, I think too to to bring out and I'm not trying to interpret what uh the vice mayor is saying. What she's saying is that earlier we had put out or had a resolution to hire consultant and for some reason the manager did indicate that they would do it inhouse. And it may been a change between now and then. You looking at me. Y'all change every week. I'm just talking. I'm not just looking at you. Y'all change every week. Miss Susa been here three years and y'all still behind. Y'all still want Miss Sus? You still want Miss?

I'm not I'm asking you not to talk right now. Okay. I'm looking at you, but I'm asking you not to talk. I I I didn't ask you a question. I won't say nothing, but I want you to understood what I just said. Mr. Love, you can't interrupting this meeting. If you've interrupted one more time, I'm going ask you to leave. You can't keep jumping in talking in a city commission meeting. No one do that in other cities. Commission M.

So, she uh referenced the ordinance that um gives her the discretion not to do a request for proposal. And so if we need to put it on the screen so everybody can see it, I would say that let's do that so we can move on.

It's it's actually not her. This is you all's hire, right? So it's the discretion that you all have, but it's it's in the code. And so for professional certain types of professional services, you don't have to take it out for bid. You can, you know, rely on expertise and resumes and, you know, background and testimony and whatever else. You can rely on other things. But, um, I think what the mayor was saying is just, you know, it's best practice. But it sounds like um and you know I'm not your manager but it sounds like time is of the essence in terms of trying to you know correct some of the things that you all have pending and and if you could either you know choose to go with this firm or or not but you have a process that is proper in front of you. So I just wanted to you know be clear that what's in front of you is proper. It's not violating your code or anything like that. question. I just want to know where where is the money coming from?

I I didn't understand what she said. It's a question for the manager. I think she was saying where is the money coming from? the funding coming from. Okay, for the consultant, it's coming from the same place the former consultants paid was coming from. As for the finance director, there's a finance director salary in the budget as well.

So, what was again? The financial consultant, Miss Susan, Miss Reyes, will be paid out of the same line item out of the same budget amount that's been that's already budgeted for. And how much was Miss Susan budgeted for? She was being paid 120 an hour. I can What was the total amount though in the budget for

Let me get that information for you. It was $40,000. So, where would the additional 45 come from? It's not said that you're going to need 45. It said up to 85,000. Well, I think if someone sees 85, I think if they know it's there, they're going to use it. But I'm just asking in case where would it come from?

We have other areas that we could get it from. Vice Mayor, I'm just I'm just asking where I can look at the budget and get back with you on that. So, we're going to approve something and we don't know exactly where the money is coming from. We have areas to get the money. I just can't give you specifics right now. That's not I just think if this was something he was bringing to the commission, I just think that's something you I would have brought that if you know thinking that's a question that could be asked that they're going to ask where's the money coming from and I would be able to let them know this is where the money is going to come from. Vice Mayor and then you get back with us.

Okay. Vice Mayor, you had a consultant that sent an email saying that she no longer will be working with us. Now we have a consultant that we attempting. She was not working with us, but we didn't ask her. Did you ask her if she would provide services for this job? We spoke about it and it's the same position she was already in. I just don't understand why we're having a special meeting on it and we just put it on the agenda last week

and we're having a special meeting on it. I mean, we've been having all these meetings. We had a meeting Tuesday. If this was of essence, it was it I mean, we I didn't see really anything of substance on the um agenda Tuesday. This could have been on the agenda Tuesday. How do we go from having a meeting Tuesday to Friday and all of a sudden we need a special meeting on this? We didn't realize this Tuesday you left

when we had the meeting. When we had the meeting it just I'm not understanding. It's like we're finding money, but we can't find money to fix the roads and we complain about the roads and everything else in the city, but we can't find money for that. I I just don't think this would be a good decision and being good stewards over the city's money when we're paying. We have staff that we that we've hired that's supposed to know how to do this type of work. We're we've hired these people, paying them, and we still got to go outside and get someone else to do the job. I I'm not understanding that. Are there any?

We have paid staff. The general manager told us that the strategic planner she hired was going to be taking care of this and now we're asking for up to $85,000. Not true. Are there any additional questions from the commission? I would just say just as a point of clarification um this is an independent auditor uh which would not um fit the description of anyone that is already working for the city. So, um, just a point of clarification

and just a point to notice too for future reference that if we do as a commission hire a construction or staff or whatever our role would be in the hiring process, we do need from the city manager a little more background information. and we was able to get and ask some questions about her her experience and her firm experience. Uh but we didn't get a a package with that because we are making a decision and we're making it, you know, pretty quickly uh just based on verbal information that we received. I know we can get it at a later date, but there's nothing like having that forehand because we got to put everybody on the same standard. the previous city manager, you look for additional information prior to making decision. So, I'm just saying in the future, that's the kind of information we would need to have to be able to make an informed decision.

I do uh totally agree with that, but um consistency is key. Yes. And um if we're going to do it in this instance, then roll the cameras back. and uh identify all those other times that we haven't followed a certain standard with regards to a decision that's being made. Um yeah, we we should have gotten a packet. I I can agree with that. But we have the young lady here answering any questions that we need and I'm not advocating for her or anyone else. All I'm saying is that let's be consistent. Yeah. If you listen closely to me, I say based on what you

don't tell me what to listen or how to listen. Well, I'll make the statement again. I say in the future, what would help the commission if we had a package? I say also that we did was able to ask about her experience in things that we would help us make a more informed decision. But just for future reference, that's all the reason I made that. All right. Are there are there any additional question from the commission?

If not, I'd entertain a motion if it's a desire of this commission to hide this consultant firm. I'll entertain a motion and possible second to move forward. I'll make a motion that we have. Second.

Okay. It has been moved by Commissioner Scott and properly second by Commissioner Mike Fearson that we hire this consultant firm to be our consultant firm on this particular resolution. Call for questions. So Mayor B for clarity is approval of resolution 2026-5. approval of resolution 202605. Yes. Okay.

Yes. Just a comment and I agree with the mayor. Um we got to start doing best practices and it's best if we have all information upfront before we make our our decisions on these issues. We can't go by what happened in the past. and we are a new commission and if we're going to move forward, we just need to do things according to the procedure. Um, and I know this is one of my recommendations as far as getting a firm to come in and help with the correction act action forms, but we still have to do things according to policy. With the resolution being reviewed and uh the contract being uh in compliance to our ordinances according to the attorney, um I recommend that we still go ahead and move forward with this particular um

just for the record. I do believe that that's what I said that we should have had the packet. Now, this this me speaking. And I ain't got nothing to do with nobody else comment cuz I I'm the one always say I stand on rules and policies and and that kind of stuff. This this don't have anything to do with what you said. I did say that we should have had the packet and so just just for the record.

Any additional comments or questions? I just want to say again, Mayor Bear, I um don't think that, you know, we have staff um aboard that we are already paying um a salary for. I just don't think this would be a good idea and a good way to spend the city's money. We're supposed to be making decisions that are best for the city. And these um this I report corrective action plans. I believe we've hired a interim manager and she's hired a strategic um manager and everyone is supposed to be working together. I still believe that they should be able to do the work. We should not have to go out and be paying three people. Now, we're going to be paying three people to do the IG report. Three people and one person is going to do the job. I I just don't think that's I just don't think that's a good decision that, you know, we voting pass this for the city. I I don't think it's a good Any additional question or comments? Hearing none, are you ready for a vote? Roll call. Madame clerk.

Commissioner Scott? Yes. Commissioner McFerson? Yes. Commissioner McDonald? Yes. Vice Mayor Calvin Williams? No. Mayor Bab, yes. Motion passed by majority for one vote. Next we'll have uh public comments. City clerk at this time. Do we have any public comments cards completed by our resident?

Yes sir. We have two public comments. Um and the first one will be Mr. Tomarcus Porter. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Good afternoon.

Um, I got a quick question. Um, is there any type of action or recourse or corrective action for a commissioner who just walks out of a meeting? Are y'all just allowed to do that and then just return back to the seat and just bark out different crazy questions and act like nothing's wrong with that? Or is there some type of workshop y'all can do to kind of hold each other accountable for stuff like that? or if Vice Mayor Cohen wants to speak on her behavior, that's fine. Or I just want to know if that's uh appropriate or acceptable by the commission for somebody to act like that. That's supposed to be a vice mayor.

So that's cool. I mean, I'm just asking the question. That's cool, Mayor B, for somebody to act like that? No. What I'm trying to do now is just allow residents to express their comments and some point.

All right. So, I just want y'all to think about that. Let's let's just think about it. I ain't going to say too much. I'm going to chill today and uh let y'all have it. But I just want y'all to think about that. Somebody walks out and then comes back and then acts a fool. Holds up to me for a whole hour. This is a 10 meeting, 10-minute meeting. She holds up for an hour. And y'all okay with that? At some point, we got to start holding y'all. Y'all are supposed to be held to a higher standard up there. Y'all supposed to be the the example. Y'all supposed to be leading the city. And we got people that once they they say something somebody was even speaking to her. Somebody says something to you, Mayor Bab. She interjects. And then when they respond to her, she gets up and walks out like a little baby. This ain't this ain't elementary school. She trying to act like y'all are third graders like she teaching her school. No, this is not that. Y'all are all grown people up there with fine minds. Y'all should be able to work together and without somebody micromanaging like like like and just holding us up for no reason. Like this stuff like come on man. Like like like come on. This is stuff is right in our view. It's in plain view. Let's stop acting like we crazy. Like let's just please I'm going leave it at that.

The last comment is Mr. Robert Love.

Every time I come here I get the dumbest stuff I ever seen. And then they may have a statement to say they don't act like that in other commissions. You all, you need me to put up some commission commission meetings where they act worse than this. I'm being nice compared to way some people act. And then like I said, I called you on the phone and I wanted to say well wishes to you cuz I know you were sick. But I see you wouldn't answer my call and you wouldn't call me back. But that's good. I won't call you no more. And the other thing, every time Miss Busy open her mouth about doing anything in this community, Miss Coward, Miss don't like a coward is going to have something to say about it. She done sat her behind on the phone and heard their attorney say this was proper and this was right. But I know she don't want nobody going to the OIG because she part of that problem that was before. And just like I'm saying now, have y'all looked at the video that that we pulled up yesterday from where y'all sat up there with Michael Jackson, Mr. Mike Fson, y'all sat up there and y'all didn't go through none of the process that y'all going through now. Y'all skipped over everything and then y'all did what y'all wanted to do. But now every time it look up, oh, we got to have these proper procedures. We got to do this and we got to do that. And each one of y'all seem like y'all done been in cahoots talking. The way y'all sit up there in the meetings and the way everything be going on. I'm 69 years old. I ain't n years old. I done seen this unjunk before. I done been coming to these meetings 20 something years. And people going to try to tell me what I don't see. YOU SEE MISS COWAN TALKING. ALL Y'ALL ON A WHOLE DIFFERENT LEVEL. She up there trying to STOP IT. SHE AIN'T ONLY ONE VOTE. She done forgot about that. SHE USED TO CALL EVERYBODY IN here every day, all night. She used to call them 20 times a day sometime. Now she can't call me because she know I can't be manipulated. I don't know where the manipulation come in and where y'all be part of something with somebody that when they get through talking you see how dumb they are.

That's what with with Miss McCauen which Miss Macauen Miss Cowan Williams or whatever. She just as ignorant as a puppy when the attorney set up here and say this what we need. The OIG done said this what we need. And I'm looking at this young lady. She look like she just as intelligent than anyone who we done had. Y'all say y'all have Miss Souza. She been here three years and ain't done nothing toward the OIG. I done sat here and seen the finance director and everybody ain't did nothing towards the OG report. I done SAT UP HERE AND WATCHED Y'ALL. Y'all won't say nothing about the money that's missing. Cuz here somebody will tell y'all ain't no money missing. This just been mismanagement. The OIG ain't telling nobody the money been mismanagement. They say TWO OR THREE MILLION DOLLAR MISSING. I can't get y'all to talk about that for nothing because time to say something. Oh, we don't want to talk about that. That's Miss Cowan deal right now. Don't nobody want to go into this about the OIG cuz y'all know we're going to dig up some old bones and some of them bones going to be some of y'alls. And you can sit there and act like you don't understand what's being said when it's being said. Y'ALL Y'ALL NEED TO STOP BEING ACTING LIKE YOU'RE ignorant and when you know you got some sex. I could understand if I thought you were some dummies, but y'all

your time is up, Mr. Love. I'm going to sit down, too. Okay. Having entertained and taken care of our special meeting business and having had public comments, complete with our agenda. I'll entertain a motion for the uh journment of the meeting. Made a motion that we adjourn the meeting. Second. It has been moved by Commissioner McFerson and probably second by Commissioner Mcdana for the German of the meeting. Call for question hearing none. Roll call. Madam cler. Commissioner McFersonson.

Commissioner McFersonson. Yes. Commissioner McDonald. Yes. Commissioner Scott. Yes. Vice Mayor Cowin Williams. Vice Mayor Cowin Williams. Yes. Mayor Bab. Yes. Thank you. Motion passed. Young vote. Meeting adjourn at 5:15 p.m.

I call this workshop to order. It's in reference to discussing any proposed litigation as it resulted in the OIG finding. Mayor, Mr. Mayor, uh, Mayor, we're just going to do roll call here just for the record. Roll call. Madam clerk, Mayor Bab, present. Vice Mayor Calvin Williams here. Commissioner McDonald, yes. Commissioner McFersonson, present. Commissioner Scott, present. Interimm city manager present. City attorney

here. City clerk is present.

And we'll allow the city attorney to make some comments. Since this relates to litigation issues, um I wanted to um open up by saying I know that this had been a concern for um at least one of the commissioners um in terms of pursuing people who previously um would be I guess implicated by the IG findings. And I wanted to just, you know, kind of, um, I did send you all an email not long ago, um, which just sort of laid out the differences between civil actions and criminal actions and and I tried to give you some framework for discussion of this meeting so that you would um, you know, you would understand that the two are not really merged. The city the things that the city would be doing have to do with civil actions, right? Not criminal actions. That's the state attorney's office. And so, um, the state the IG report deals with, um, findings that are, um, from some time ago, and I was looking for the exact um, period of time, and I'll find it in just a second, but it's from it's from years ago, basically. Here it is. Um, the audit was conducted on the city's accounts payable, expenditures, and cash dispersements process. The audit focused on accounts payable and cash dispersement activities from 101 um 2017 through um uh 6272022 and credit and and credit card transactions from 104 2017 through um 110 2023. In short, the OIG found that the city had written guidance in place which established controls over the accounts payable expenditures and cash dispersements process. However, there was a lack of knowledge of the

responsibilities. This is from their reports and requirements for at all levels of personnel. So, a part of that and a part of their recommendations was also dealing with training issues. So, the the issues that are what what people do in civil cases and I've um I'm a trial lawyer. I've tried a lot of cases in my 35 almost 35 year career. And I would tell you what in cases like this, what you would want to see is something from the state attorney's office saying that this is a criminal issue and therefore, you know, we're going to take action or even if they didn't, this is a criminal issue and these are things that we found wrong, but we're not prosecuting here. We don't have any of that. the the the biggest thing that you have um that points to any kind of anything that you would be looking at would be uh something dealing with Mr. Williamson for which the statute of limitations has run. And so um and I I understand he's paid back the money already. So I don't even know what the damages would be in that case. There's really I I so when people are saying and I know there may be public outcry to do something in particular but for the um for the things that are mentioned in this last report um there's there's not really a issue that you would be pursuing. You know what I mean? There's not there's not an issue there. So, um, in terms that the one that the city would be civily pursuing because again, we don't have the option of prosecuting anyone from a criminal, um, standpoint. That's the state attorney's job. And so, you know, I just wanted to what, you know, whatever you all decide to do, I just want to kind of properly frame it in a way because I think the motion was made to just have somebody contacted and, you know, start doing some work and

suing. But I, you know, an attorney would be happy to have a field day to go out and, you know, try to find something and bill you for it. But I'm as your city attorney, I feel that it is my responsibility to let you know that that really would not be an appropriate action on the part of the city because you have to have a cause of action before you go and you know kind of file lawsuits against people. And if you don't have a cause of action that allows for folks to then come back and sue you all for um uh for you know it could be issues of slander or liable or issues of um it's a uh what they call a bad faith um lawsuit which allows for attorney's fees when there's no real um you know it may be it may make you feel good to say we're just going to you know slap a lawsuit on somebody But here the statute of limitations is a big issue because there you know I don't know what the claims would would be. But um uh having said that, you know, I just wanted to kind of put that on the record so that you at least had the benefit of my um thoughts on the issue. Thank you.

Thank you. And I'll say this also that the report was submitted to the state attorney's office. the full report and there was no prosecution in that. We and some have suggested that we try to sue who we feel were the defendants or who was at fault in that lawsuit. And then we don't have any definite amount of money that we can say for sure that they took or totally mismanaged themsel and it was intent of taking from the city. And unlike Mrs. Weeks, you can find a lawyer willing to say, "I'll sue anybody you want me to sue. You're paying for it." and we could be counter sued on top of that if we not successfully. So, I'm not in favor of it. I was in favor of at least having the workshop because if any commissioner asks for anything and we get a majority of this commission in favor of doing it, we do it. Whether it's a meeting, whether whatever it may be, and it's the same thing here. If the majority of three commissioners as a majority say we want to go out and just start suing folks and this who we're going to sue and we're going to sue them for a h 100,000 hundred million dollars. We can do some crazy things if we choose to do that. But we got to look at the rationale behind what would be the success rate. What are we trying to accomplish? And if we did was successful in accomplishing anything. Anything we probably get, if

we got anything, would be owed probably back to the state. And we're not investigating. I don't know who's going to go out and do the investigation. We already got an OIG report and it's already out there for the record. I don't think that's going to be enough to award us any type of damage. So, I'mma just say it off the top of my head in the beginning that I'm not favor of going out and suing. We need to it happen and I'm not saying we just wash our hands of it. Ain't much we can do. I'll put it that way. I don't see much we can do but probably get sued oursel and continue to have a negative image in the public because we continue to bring it up. We're trying to fix things that we can fix. We're trying to correct things that we say we're going to work on and correcting. And those are things we should have our focus on and move it forward from that day on.

Anybody can chime in. We just got open as a workshop. Anyone else have anything that they like to say to me before I um ask the attorney a question? Is it your job to defend and prosecute for the city? Is it actually your job? That's what I'm asking. When when there are lawsuits? Yes, sir. Okay.

And when you say prosecute, I'm not I don't pro Yeah. I don't prosecute criminally. If you're talking about municipal code actions, sometimes there are sometimes, right? Sometimes there are and let me explain sometimes there are municipal code issues that uh you may have an open container case or something like that where the state attorney's office will because they no longer do that for the cities. They'll call and they'll say do you want this um do you want to prosecute this or whatever and then we will call the the city u manager and say do you want to prosecute this and nine times out of 10 they don't because it was not worth it but it may be something like that. That's what it means. It doesn't mean it's it's things dealing with your municipal code. It's not um you know criminal prosecution. That's not what that means.

Uh and it's in all codes, just so you know. Okay. And I do defend the city in cases that are not represented by the League of Cities. And I've done that consistently and we've been successful in um in in many of those cases. But that's a very different issue. That's those are civil cases. Um and you know there are cases that are you know where the value is not um anything major in dispute. Okay. I wasn't questioning that. Um but I do have one question. We have a we had one um city manager did that the city took to court. How did that happen? I'm not sure what case you're talking about.

Uh Mr. Greg Thompson. I don't know. I didn't handle that issue and I don't I'm not I'm not I mean we had a uh OG report on him about some four-wheelers but it made it to court and I'm just wondering how did that make it to court and none of the other things make the court I asked the uh the mayor well I filed a complaint right and I wasn't notified he went to court or was prosecuted or was attempted to be prosecuted. I know there was an OIG finding on it and they did concur. Whatever he did was improper. So the city didn't take the court.

We didn't initiate anything. I'm the mayor and if we had a lawsuit, my name would have been on it some way or the other and I probably would have been called in as a witness one way or the other and I didn't have that happen. So, so the city didn't I'm not aware of it. The city I'm just asking. I'm just asking. No, not not not to my knowledge.

Oh, okay. But because I know before I became a commissioner, I was sitting there and I and I heard um um Commissioner McFersonson, Mc William, um Bab, and Balden and Mvin all ask you about um pursuing money from the what those guys up on the pier on the dyke that had that and they voted and he said yes, but that never happens.

Yeah. I I don't know that that was a vote, but what what they said was to look at the contract. And so I did meet, although this is not the issue that's before us, but I did meet with the um the city manager. The city manager gave the information that he gave and it had to do with storage of vehicles and different other things that are not a part of the contract and things that did not present a cause of action. So, but it was not a vote to sue. Um, it was a it was a to look at, you know, to look at the issue, which we did. So, um, I'm not, you know, again, I'd have to pull out the documents or whatever to look at that, but that's not the issue before us. So, I won't u go into that anymore, but I'm happy to talk with you. I'll find

But it's a problem because here's the thing. I'm glad we're on this this live stream, right? Let make sure we record this because the first time I brought this up about going at the $3.7 million, you and Mayor Bab ask me to go civil and steal the criminal. We don't do criminal. Okay. Hold on. Okay. Okay. I know I didn't misunderstand you. I know I understood exactly what you said. But but that's not what we do. We don't we don't Okay. All right. I understand that. Okay. I got you. I got you. But here's the thing. I understand that. saying that. Okay. No, I'm saying what you said.

No, I didn't say go. Well, what I said was it should be it should go through the state attorney's office. Yes. Meaning when you say go criminal, we don't we don't go criminal. It's not us. It's that it goes through the state attorney's office because it is a criminal action. That's what that's what I would have been trying to communicate to allow the state attorney's office to first look at the issue. That would have been what I was would have been convicted because when the O when OJ when they do a report they can't accuse anyone of doing anything. They just lay out the facts of what the foundings are. That's all they do. It's up to the city.

No. No, it's not. It's that's not true. Okay. So, if you if you say I you know you can say it, but it's not true. what what would come what had happened was the the the OIG did a uh did some findings and the OIG's job is that if at the end of whatever investigation they do if they believe that there is an um you know something that they want to send over uh to the the state attorney's office to determine whether intent can be proved or whatever else but it's not the city the city is not doing anything and Mr. But anyway, I'll try to ignore people in the audience because I'm telling you what I'm telling you what the facts are. I have no it's not about me. I don't have any reason to not want you to process attorneys. I'm just going to put it this way.

I personally would feel a little bit more better if another attorney um looked at this case and tell me that. But what case are you talking about? I mean the for the what IG report about the $3.7 million say it's not saying anybody stole money though. No no it don't it's never going to say that. Although people although people keep saying that that's not true. No nobody said that. No one said from the das who said who says that somebody stole money. No one here publicly dies but out in the public that's what they're public information. They go there and put it up.

Anybody can not worried about them right now. I'm not worried about what what no one else feel or what anything about what they think. That's on them. They can do that. They they have a right to think whatever they want to think. I don't I'm not saying that. But go after what what would be your what what would you think a cause of action would be because that's the issue. What what you believe a cause of action would be. What do you think a cause of action would be?

I did think I had I think I'm just telling y'all. about this thing. If we consult another attorney that have no connection to this, no whatsoever and they tell her say, "Look, you don't have a case, blah, da da, it's over with." I I would take that more cuz right now I can understand Mayor Bab sitting over there defending this to and I tell everybody this every day. I understand him. I do. And and I'm not here to bash him or say nothing about it, but I do understand him. I understand where he's standing and I and I'm not disagreeing with him at all and I understand where you stand and so that's why I just say I feel better if it came from someone else. I just and I just and I hope I'm wishing that y'all give that give the city that one opportunity to pursue a different attorney to just look at this. Well, you know what I will say? The city commission obviously can spend their money any way they want to, but I would say this, Commissioner Scott,

you told me personally personally out of your own mouth that you trusted my opinion. I did. You did. I did. And it was on and it was on this issue, right? So, what I what I told you I would do was I told you I would look at it very carefully. I did that. I don't if there was anything, trust me, I would want to I would want you to have your day in court. whatever it was, I don't see it right. And so, you know, as a professional, you know, if you're telling me you just don't trust my opinion.

No, no, no, no. I I wait when I first said that, I said I knew that I said that you wouldn't do it. I said they told me you wouldn't do it. Then you told me say, you say, you say I am a professional. You say I am a professional. And I and I, you know, and so I said, okay, I trust you. 6 months you did nothing because there was nothing for me to do. Okay, then. what you said but I think but I think but I think you misunder but I think you misunderstood because if you tell me that you thought that you told me or you you thought I said go criminal I never told you that what I said was the state attorney's office I didn't say you said go you said go you just said but anyway I'm not going to go back and forth

okay we done with that we done we done with that let's move on let's move on let's move because this the thing right You told I when you said go silver then you said I didn't even say go silver. Okay. It recorded so I mean I'm not going I already know this ain't going to work with you.

All I'm asking is that we allow a different attorney to look at this. This have nothing to do this not personal to uh attorney weeks or anything. It's not me and her cuz I for believe it or not I have nothing personal against her. Not nothing. But I just feel like we should give I mean just give another attorney to look at it. It's because if she take the case, we have to pay her. It doesn't matter. And even with that, Bab, I'm not going to take it from you. I'm just be real with you. So, I'm just I'm not trying to disrespect you or anything, but I understand where you stand and I and I already know what you gonna say, right?

So, I I I would really like to hear from the other commissioners because I understand where you stand and I'm not here to disagree with you or but I was going to make a point on the point you just made. You may be able to find an attorney to be willing to look at it, but you're going to be paying him to do that. Okay? And I'm just saying I think nine out of 10 would say there's no case for civil suit here. Okay, I'm just saying that. But even if they decide to say 10 out of 10, you got a case

and you and this commission say, "Let's hire this attorney, but we're going to pay him up to $60,000." I'm just using that as just hypothetical. No, any attorney out there will probably take that and charge you up to that 60,000 and we still not going to have a winnable case that we can collect money. That's exactly what would happen. And we going to get counter sued. That's exactly what I expect you to say. Okay. Um anyone um but I definitely

any other commissioners if if y'all have any I mean if you don't have nothing to say then you don't have nothing to say. It doesn't matter. But I think we owe it to the community to um at least check into it because that's a I mean when I read it, it's a whole lot of stuff in there that just don't make sense to me. What I'll say is um I'm in the process of going through the OIG report myself and I've gotten about halfway through it and up to that point there's no one that you can point the finger at with regards to um saying that they took money. Um what I'm getting is that, you know, some processes and some systems need to be approved upon um greatly. I'm not all the way through it yet, but up to the point where I've um been able to get to. Um so far, I don't I don't see um anyone that we can say that has taken some money. Um it's it's all mismanagement and um you know some processes that need to be improved upon and tightened. Um that that's just my take on it up to the point that I can uh speak to. And I also would say that Chandler Williamson, I'mma call his name,

did repay questionable cost those trips he took to his mother saying that he was recruiting uh students to come to Poki for employment. I question that as soon as I heard that. I said, "Channel, what is your documentation on that?" Did the president get submit a letter to you saying he's inviting you to do that? I didn't buy that at all. But anyway, he was encouraged to pay that money back. I think it was the tune of $5,800 and he repaid that. So the questionable cost that was repaid, I'll put it that way on that particular uh item. I never questioned it. I never questioned nothing about Chandler Williams whether he paid 150,000 bike or 50,000. I never questioned it. I say all four city managers. Was it I I didn't just particularly pick him out. I mean, yeah, there's a whole lot of stuff in there with his name on it. But my thing is I didn't go through there and just pick pick and choose whomsever. I said all of them. And I and I wouldn't question him whether he paid back some money or not. It's like when the attorney center put a letter or had the clerk send us a letter stating about some money being re like this don't make sense that I didn't have the clerk send any letter just correcting I didn't

where where that come from which letter you referring to the first one that you sent that was we it before we had the meeting tonight when I got got we didn't we never talked about it you sent it to us said from the from the attorney is that you talking about the one from the state audit No, no, it was from the state attorney. State attorney. So that was from the city attorney. That wasn't about money. Different whole different. Yeah, that wasn't same issue. I know cuz that's I know. We didn't ask for that. I didn't ask we didn't ask nothing about that. And that that's what came in.

Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, it was it was in response to a public records request and I used it as an opportunity to um let you all know here is the issue. But I I wanted to bring one other thing um up for you all which will make it a little bit easier. I spent like a bunch of time um back in December writing uh when I thought that the issue was going to come up with approval of an audit um a person to do audit services. So, and I wrote an email. I wrote a a memorandum on December 15th. It's entitled audit report outstanding matters and it outlines succinctly all of the issues in both of the audit findings. And so, this may help you um Commissioner McDonald as you go through the rest of it. It was kind of a cheat sheet in a way because I put actually the areas in red and you know I tried to make it very clear what the issues were that it related to purchase orders and not following procedures and so I pretty much went through them all and it took a long time to do it. So, I hope you'll take advantage um take a look at it and you know hopefully it will be helpful with helping them, you know, understand that what some of this stuff is and it's not um just somebody came and took a bunch of money from the city and let a lot of it has to do with with not following your policies. I have a question. I have a question. So, when the city sell vehicles and They get paid but the money never get deposited to the city. What you call it?

I I don't know anything about that and I don't think that was and I don't I'm not sure if that was a part of this report but I don't know anything about the city selling vehicles and the money not coming back from the you know from the I don't know what report that's not in this last one. Yeah, it wasn't in Okay. No, because no cooperation from the city. Okay. They would still they would have still put it in the report. Yeah, but it's a lot of thing wasn't in there because they intentionally not cooperate with the people. They knew what they was doing. It was always an excuse. We don't have enough staff. We don't have this, we don't have that. I That's what I get when I read it. So, I don't know what y'all get.

Yeah. Well, listen, this is what I'm saying. The OIG, they don't care whether you cooperate or not. if they found that there was a sale of a of an auction of vehicles and somehow those vehicles were not uh accounted for in your budget or in your finances, they're going to cite that as a finding. They're not going to um not do it because nobody was quote unquote cooperating. Okay, this is a workshop and certainly I think uh Commissioner Scott Scott did say they wanted to kind of hear from the commission as a whole. So, Commissioner Mike Pearson, you have any input you want to chime in on? I I've read the OG report also. There's uh I don't know how you can tie the misappropriation and then some of the things to just come up come up missing, but um a lot of the things as Commissioner McDonald stated, it doesn't implement a particular person on those particular items. It just shows that the money wasn't didn't go where it was supposed to go. Um, how do you tie that to some individuals? Uh, of course there was some things that all of those things are questionable, but how do you tie that to a particular individual or to anybody in in person? Um, and that's the logistic what what have I what I've read through the OG report. Matter of fact, I'm going to go back

through it again and um and see if there's anything that that stands out, but you know, misappropriation and your interpretation of that is is is you know what I mean? Yeah, but you the money is the money is not accounted for is the bottom line.

Even if you conclude that there's been a misappropriation, then you got to have some proof. You can't just say that this that or the other has happened and this one is taking money or what have you. You got to have proof. I keep coming back to the same little theme too. I would also say this to our one of our biggest and top priorities, our roads and streets. Personally, it was me. If I had to spend some money, whether it was 10,000 or 50,000, it'll go towards paving some of our streets, fixing some of the potholes, fixing some of the sidewalks and things. If I was spending money, I had a choice of spending money. That's the focus I would be focusing in on. Sometime you have to wash your hand and say, you know, we looked at it, we tried, and it's not a whole lot we can do. But again, if uh the consensus would say that they want to take up to 5,000, have an independent person do it. You know, you're spending 5,000 that you can use in a more appropriate way. I feel Vice Mayor Williams just didn't want to leave out. You can see there.

Vice Mayor Calvin Williams. I hear you. Yes. Just wanted to give you an opportunity to kind of at least make a comment or churn in on the conversation of the possibility of having a uh firm outside firm at least look at the audit report to tell us whether or not this is something we should pursue. Uh civil manners. I don't have any comments, member B. Okay.

Any final comment from the commission as a whole? Any last observations?

Hearing none, we will adjourn this where the public comments how you this a workshop. We don't have we didn't have public comment for the workshop since when I didn't see agenda so I'm not uh typically you don't have public comments for a workshop because you're not making any um taking action items on your public I didn't see yeah I didn't see agenda so I I was assuming it wasn't but I'll check with the clerk it's listed on there it's listed she has it listed okay public comments We only have one and it's Mr. Tomarcus Porter. You only have one. Did you bring me yours, sir? I left it up there.

You have to do a different card. Why? Why? I had to do a different card. It's a different meeting. I told you that before you walked out. I informed you of that when you walked out. After the last meeting. Um, so I understand that we can't crimally prosecute anybody, but is there any explanation or does anybody is the city attorney versed enough to explain to us why the OIG says there's $3.1 million missing and another $2.1 million missing from the marina? Is there like this is your opportunity to to speak, but that's I know, but you be responding to me. The OIG report says

Okay, that's what I was asking. Okay. That's what I was asking you. They don't respond to that. Okay.

All right. So, that's that's the thing. Y'all keep saying we can't do this. We can't do that. But if a $100,000 comes missing, okay, I'm going to scratch my head a little bit. $500,000 come missing, I'mma start looking into it. $5 million come missing, that's stealing. That ain't mismanagement. That ain't no mistake. Like, how you mismanage $5 million and then say ain't nothing we can do about it. Like, come on. I keep telling y'all this stuff is right in y'all face. It's common sense. And this lady and this guy over here is trying to do all this hoopla and rigor to make it look like this and that, but that's not the case. It's real simple. If this if she cuz she talks when she wants when it when it benefits her, she talks for five minutes, right? But now I ask her a question and she don't want to talk. Why is that? Hold on. Hold on. I'm talking. I'm talking. I'm talking. You're not supposed to talk. You're not supposed to talk.

What do you want from me? You're not supposed to talk. I thought she's not talking.

All right. So, so, so when when it's her chance to talk, she she she she wants to jump in and inter interrupt the city manager and do this and come and uh project her personal feelings on everything without giving any legal advice. I haven't s her heard her say this is against the law. This is the law we need to follow to make sure, hey, we can do this. We can provide this service to the community, but we got to make sure we just uh provide disclaimers in it so we protect oursel in the city, but we gonna help oursel. No, it's always, hey, let's not do that. Let's not do that. sold this. So, but her and saying quitter, you know what? I'm going just say this right here. $5 million missing is not mismanagement. That's uh that's thievery. Like that's it's it's easy. Like that's it's not that hard to understand that. If I said $10 is missing, okay, somebody went and bought lunch when they weren't supposed to. That's different than saying a roof that's been leaking since 2016 is still leaking.

I would make a comment on that. No, not yet. I'm not done. Okay.

Okay. So, a roof been leaking since 2016, it's still leaking, but y'all said, "Y'all spent the money to fix it." That's not right. So, let me tell you another story. If you pay me to do a job, pay me $100 to do a job. I say, "Okay, I'm going to do that job." But you know what? I'm going to do half that job. I'm going to give you $50 back. You get to keep your $50, I'm going to take my little $30 and everybody's happy. Don't Don't that sound like something that could happen with $5 million mismanaged? I'm going to pay you more than what you really supposed to get. Then you only going to do half the job and then we going to split the rest of the money. It's real easy to figure out. This stuff not hard. It's Yeah. You going to look at OG say they paid for this and this happened. But it didn't happen. We still got messed up roads. We still got a marina that nobody can use. You got tenants that's been kicked out of the marina for not paying stuff. But y'all not doing y'all due diligence or y'all do that y'all y'all y'all responsibility of fixing it for them. Y'all like some slum lords. Y'all got y'all block people from bringing business to me. Then you got I'm I ain't going I ain't going. I don't want anybody in here to remember when Rick Rosnham came here and they said there was two or three million dollars missing. Keith, you said you didn't see no evidence. I had a lady was set up in here called herself her attorney. She looked at y'all and kept on telling y'all y'all in trouble. Why was y'all in trouble if nothing was wrong? She said, "Oh, y'all in trouble. I MIGHT NOT BE HERE two or three more months." She been here two years. Cuz she know when she leave, everybody going to get to the bottom of this. Laugh till you get tired. Laugh till you get tired. AND THAT LIE. SHE SAT UP HERE AND TOLD him about they don't the OIG going to send something to the state attorney. Y'ALL DON'T FORGOT. I SAT UP and talked to the state attorney and everybody and the and the state attorney told me they can't do nothing because the OIG put something in a paper on a piece of paper. It's y'all job to go to the to the state attorney's office. It

ain't the job. The IG job is to make y'all aware of what the hell is going on and then y'all get y'all attorney to go see about it. When Scott ASKED HER ABOUT GOING SEEING ABOUT SOMETHING, SHE HE ASKED ABOUT THE TWO OR THREE MILLION DOLLAR. SHE WENT AND PULLED UP SOMETHING ABOUT THE ABOUT THE CREDIT CARD, SOMETHING THAT I HAD DONE BEEN FOUND OUT. I WENT AND SAT DOWN WITH THE WITH THE STATE ATTORNEY. I WENT AND SAT DOWN WITH THE DEPARTMENT OF CORRUPTION. I WENT AND SAT DOWN WITH THE SHERIFF DEPARTMENT. SO DON'T Y'ALL COME TELLING ME ALL THIS HOOPLA LIKE YOU. I I DON'T GIVE I DON'T CARE CUZ SOMEBODY CAN BE THE HE COULD BE PERRY MASON IN HERE. PER MASON CAN TELL A LIE. Not just cuz he's the attorney. HE CAN TELL A LIE TO make it look good. WHEN SHE SAID, "OH, Y'ALL IN TROUBLE." BUT NOW all of A SUDDEN AIN'T NOBODY IN TROUBLE. NOW ALL OF A SUDDEN THE TWO OR THREE MILLION DOLLARS THAT'S MISSING. AIN'T NOBODY GOT NOTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT. Oh the OG. We But I'm going to send y'all A LETTER AND TALK ABOUT SOME credit cards. We didn't ask about no CREDIT CARDS. WE ASKED ABOUT $2.7 MILLION THAT CAME OUT OF APRIL TO APRIL THE 15, 2025. WE DIDN'T ASK FOR NOTHING from 17 to 21. SHE SENT Y'ALL A LETTER. OH, I WENT OVER this and that's what it was. doing credit cards and you sit right there, Keith, and let her keep on telling THIS JUNK ABOUT SOME CREDIT CARDS. WE GOING TO GET TO THE BOTTOM OF THE TRUTH ABOUT LUCAS AND ALL OF THAT WHICH I mean all that junk what y'all WERE DOING WITH LUCAS THAT NOBODY WANTS TO TALK ABOUT.

Y'ALL DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. CAN CAN I SPEAK, MA'AM? CAN I SPEAK WITHOUT YOU interrupting me? I wasn't INTERRUPTING YOU. YOU WAS TALKING TO THE MAYOR WHILE I'M SPEAKING. YOU ARE CURSING in the microphone. That's against our rules.

Yeah. Nah, no, no, no. You give some legal advice cuz you sure don't get no and you don't do nothing. Set up here and read a re resolution. That's all you do. When we say go check somebody, check what channel did with $3.4 million. Check what Lucas them did up on the lake for a million dollar. YOU DON'T CHECK NOTHING. CHECK WHAT THEM BOYS did when they left old in the city OVER $100,000. YOU DON'T CHECK WITH NOTHING. YOU SIT UP THERE AND THEN TELL THESE SOME PEOPLE ALL THESE STORIES ABOUT, "OH, I can't do this." WHAT YOU UP THERE FOR? Do I need to pull it out and READ WHAT THE DUTIES OF THE CITY ATTORNEY IS? CUZ I GOT ALL OF THAT. I DON'T COME UP HERE HALF SECOND. You show it 3 minutes cuz I see you just tapping that bell. You want to check? It's right here. No, I ain't got to check.

Okay. Y'all playing this so junk like this cool or something. Do we have any additional comments? Card completed. Uh, city attorney city clerk. That is all. Mayor, thank you. I'll entertain a motion to adjourn this workshop. No motion is necessary for the workshop. Okay. I'll open the meeting for the second workshop dealing with criterias for hiring a city manager. So the role will have the workshop,

huh? No, no motion was necessary for the workshop. Okay. We'll have roll calls to identify who's present at this particular workshop. Roll call. Madam clerk, Mayor Bab, present. Vice Mayor Calvin Williams, present. Commissioner McDonald, present. Commissioner McFersonson, present. Commissioner Scott present. Interim city manager present. City attorney here. City clerk is present.

I'll start off by saying that we have criterias for hiring the city manager. We have had it for years. Same criteria. Haven't changed any. The qualification, the experience, everything is there in writing. However, if we want to delete add, we can we can talk about anything that uh we need to talk about in in this particular workshop. I'm not sure who was the uh commissioner who uh proposed having it. I wanted to give them the first lead and talking about areas they wanted to look at or discuss.

That was Commissioner Cowins, I believe. That was Commissioner Cowins made me. Commissioner Cowan, since Yes. Okay. We'll have you kind of open it up and kind of look at some things you want to discuss.

I would like for us to um use the same process which was that we used before. um the questions that the um city attorney works along with the HR and um you know to make sure all the questions are for legality to um create the uh questions and that we use the pointing system that we use the same as when we hired the last city manager. We need to work something. Well, to get it to this point, we asked for a vote and at least three people voted to have it. So, could have been unanimous. I can't remember. No, it would.

I know it was at least three. That's how we got here, though. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. So, I start with uh Commissioner Scott just for comments to see if he have anything input. Start with her. She wanted to open it up. I did, but I thought that was her. She made her comment on that. Okay. Commissioner Scott.

Oh, I have a Oh, yes, I do. Because I looked at the last time that um we hired a city manager. to hire us. Um the last city manager and you guys um extended to like 180 days, 6 months and then you then you stated that you will evaluate the city manager and y'all did it in 90 days and decide whether y'all going to hire him or not. We haven't evaluated Miss Busy

not yet. Part of part of that was because there were some commissioners wanted to hire him on the spot. And I say at least for open transparency, let's do an evaluation. At least you would have some written documentation why you're choosing this individual. Prior to that, we didn't even have that. So, I believe that was the reason for the uh Well, that's the same evaluation. That's the same case we had with Miss Busy because we had commissioners that wanted to hire her on the spot, but nobody suggested that we do evaluation. I like the whole process.

And prior to Miss Buses being here, we didn't have the ordinate that we have now saying that all charter members will be interviewed. So, we had a new process put in place and that's was before we even had Miss Busy here that was there. Can you read that resolution for me, please? City clerk, you think you can be able to find that resolution? Yes, sir. One second. On the hiring of the city manager? Yes. One moment, please.

Mr. Mayor, I have it in front of me. It is resolution um 2024-32 and it is regarding the requiring public interviews and presentation of credentials for positions of city manager, city attorney and city clerk. And it um is it's not a long resolution, but the uh the basically it states that the positions of the city manager, city attorney, and city clerk are selected and terminated upon a vote of the city of Pahokei city commission. And in addition to the requirements already established by the city of Hoki's charter and code of ordinances, because there are requirements in the charter and code of ordinances, the city commission desires to impose additional requirements when considering future replacement of the city manager, city attorney, and city clerk. And more specifically, the city commission desires that prior to future selection for the offices of city manager, city attorney, city clerk, that public interviews take place and that the city commission conducts review of credentials from candidates seeking said positions. The city commission finds that requiring public interviews and presentation of credentials for the future positions um are in the best interest of the city. And um there is a section at the bottom talks about requirement for interviews and presentations of credentials and it states that the city commission of the city of Pahokei hereby establishes a requirement that prior to the selection of a future city manager, city attorney or city clerk, there should be public interviews and presentation of credentials. And so those are the um those are the requirements.

When what date was that? Sure. This was passed on um it was passed on the 27th of August 2024.

I would break this up. It probably give us some discussions and conversation. Our chart also states that the city manager of a hokei is an exclusive position. There should be no additional outside employment. And I'm just bringing this up conversation. And I know that the previous commission allowed Michael Jackson to do some consulting because he was already doing it. We went against by that vote went against that charter. So if you hire a city manager technically that person we pay on average 120,000 10,000 a month that should be exclusive position that that person should be having. That mean you need to maybe resign any other jobs you have and exclusively work fulltime as a poke city manager. Y ever do that to Michael Jackson? Did y'all ever do it?

Yeah, I believe that he um through the mayor. I believe that he um voluntarily said that he wasn't going to do that. So he basically said he he had he was withdrawing that as a part of his in fact um I think it's an administration. Yeah, he he was withdrawing that as a part of his request contract. I can I ask a question? because whatever clients he saw, he had to bring them to the commission first. Anybody that he um decided to do consulting work with, he had to bring it before the commission. That was part of the contract that he didn't like. And I think he wanted that withdrawn because it had to be approved by the commission to make sure there was not a conflict of interest. Okay. Okay. Consulting work that you

I have a I have a question and and I and I totally agree with not, you know, having all those different jobs and being a city manager. I agree. But if a city manager wanted to volunteer to work with a organization is that's a problem. That's not a paid job. I don't I'm just saying long as it's not paid job. I don't see nothing. That's what I'm saying. But I understand I agree with a paid job because city manager you see city manager 24/7. Plus it's in the charter.

Yeah, it's in the charter and I and I agree with that and and but if a person that shouldn't stop a person from volunt organization long as they are not receiving a paycheck and I don't have a problem with it. But if they you know other than that I'm going have to agree with you that you know you only can have one job when you the city manager. You got to be the city manager. What y'all trying to say? Miss Bus got two or three jobs. That what y'all trying to say? Miss Bus is a uh candidate. We're not bringing her into this making that particular statement. Yeah.

I'm just telling you what the charter I'm talking to the commissioner now. What the charter say is exclusive job for a city manager.

I know you had a reason for saying that. Okay, Mr. McDonald, I'm just going in order. I'm trying to see if you have any input on the qualifications or whatever criterias for city managers that we want to discuss or may want to address. But mayorb with the point system will the uh HR create that and um do it just as um just as it was done last time as well. Yes. Unless this commission for some reason changed

subsection there were questions that falls up under each one where they get points.

Yes. So far we're planning on doing it how we have done it in the past. So that would be the same uh unless as a majority we're not voting down but as a majority the commission wants some type of change to it but as it stand. So the criteria that is already in place, you're saying that that's what we're going to use for the selection of the permanent city manager. Um, if that's the case, I'm going ask again, why is it that we having this meeting? Because everything that's been interjected to this point, it's already in place. And you know, I I I was working real hard last week to avoid having meetings on this Tuesday, but I'm here because I signed up for it.

Okay. So, I are we are we um addressing anything with regards to the candidates or are we just speaking in general with regards to the position of city manager? We're speaking in general to what's regard to the city manager. And going back to your earlier point, we always take a vote. Even if you wanted to add on agenda item, majority have to agree. You have to get a motion and a second. So to have this workshop, my memory is not the best right now. But we had to have that process done. So you kept asking

I get that. But we haven't addressed anything outside of what's already in place. I get that. I don't mind the workshop, but

So, what you all would what you all would um through the mayor, what you all would um need to do as a part of this going forward is to um have public interviews and presentation of credentials. That's what this resolution 2024-32 requires. And so I guess the workshop would be dealing with this resolution um chaired by the clerk that of what how you would do that, what would be done next, when would these things be conducted, um when how you know to what extent um whether you use the same process you used before or not. You know, these are all things that relate to the resolution uh that you would consider in the workshop.

So, may I ask may I speak Mayor B? Yes.

So, since the job has closed, so I guess we can look at and see if we all I know we can't vote is okay. When can we get the um get we to start reviewing applications and setting up interviews? start setting up a timeline for um interviews and reviewing applications. Reviewing applications and then setting up interviews or what however we want the timeline to be since the position has closed. So, since we um have all of the um all of the um resumes and um I say we should be able to um within the next week or two start interviewing,

but we only have uh three candidates. So, we're talking about maybe one day of interviewing. It ain't going to be a whole week or so to get that done. So, I guess maybe give the clerk I mean give the HR HR person, the HR director and the attorney opportunity to um with the question and the scoring sheet before we can start doing that because I guess that needs to be done first. I have a question.

And I guess once that's complete, they could email us to let us know that it's complete and then we can start the interviewing process. So, do we want to say we want to give them a time frame to um to get the um to get the point system done and the um questions.

It took them a week to get that done. Today is the um 17th. I think probably that that should work. What what we can do as a commission is decide on the date and time frame we want to interview and we don't have to call names. We can say candidate one. We would interview on whatever said date and whatever said time and maybe have a hour gap between each interview.

So will that be the same night that we have a commission meeting? I would recommend it. Yeah. Yeah. Because we had to vote on it anyway. This this just giving us the ground work in the in the leg work where we're going to be working from as far as a vote and that will go on to uh yeah definitely be doing a commission meeting. Okay. So do we want to look at the commission meeting in March the first commission meeting or the second commission meeting in March? Are we saying that's uh we're we're we not there yet.

We're in February now. So we want to give oursel at least at least maybe 30 to 60 days to come up with a date. Maybe you got to get the person notified. You got to set up the interview. You got to make sure the questions and all in place the scoring mechanism. Uh

so the second meeting in April, will that be enough time? We're not there yet. I don't think we got two more months. She done been here five months. Five months. The second week in April.

Five months had up there. at yeah at this workshop. I'm not sure if we're ready to try to narrow down the date, but if we can, we can as a uh consensus propose one at the next uh commission meeting, but I'm not sure how we would uh at this point tonight decide when we want to have our interviewing for the city manager position. What are we interviewing for? You evaluate yet. Well, that's what you should be talking about. So, can I speak?

Sure. So, regarding um the list of candidates that we do have currently, um have we resolved all questions with regards to the timely submissions and any other um issues that were identified with regards to the ones the applications that we have such as um additional information being um submitted post submission and uh have we verified that everything is in order with regards to all of the applications that we have? Cuz there's been some questions with regards to timely submissions and also additional documents being submitted post uh submission of each application. Not that all of them have, but in at least one instance. So, are we have we resolved any um all of those um issues?

Uh Commissioner McDonald, we have our HR director here if you all wanted to hear from her. Oh, yeah. Yeah, we do. That'll be good. Yeah. Good evening. Good evening. Good evening.

There were no applicants that were submitted um after the deadline, but there was one applicant that was emailed to all the the commissioners. I brought a copy of the email. The one in particular that was emailed late will provide you with her email when she emailed it on October 20th at 3:43. You said late, right? No, sir. You said you just said it was emailed to the commissioner's slate late,

but she submit on time. What? she should be addressing the commission requests or concerns.

Um the reason why it was submitted to the commissioners late due to uh uh IT technicality um I was having problems with my email when I submitted a request to the IT director manager. He noticed that there was a problem. He went and checked and create a new email for me. when the request for all applicants um was emailed me for um I'm sorry I'm trying to fight B hiccups um for records request I submitted the three applicants when I did the search when I did the search all of my emails from my previous emails did not transfer over which is why I did a screenshot of my previous email and my newly created emails showing when I did the search it did not pull up that particular applicant. When she called the next day and reminded me that she did submit an application, I immediately emailed the city clerk, the city attorney, and I copied the city manager, which you'll see in this.

So, how long was your um female down? Um it was down for um a few days. So Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. Catch you off. But we asked you several times how many applicants do we have and several times you stated three.

I was only asked one by the email I received. I only received one email and that was from the city clerk's office. If there was additional emails sent to me from the city from any of the city commission, they were not directly to the HR. Okay. So, the day that you stood right there and they asked you how many applicants we have, I said three and you and you ran off their name. Yes. Okay. But but this particular um after name wasn't one of those.

No, sir. So I I know we can roll back the tape and see was several times that maybe you probably the clerk can state that we only had three applicants. Wasn't the clerk? It wasn't because I the applicants don't come to me. No, I'm just saying when when one of the commission asks how many applicants do we have? It been three for the last three months. It been three. Yeah. at the last meeting. Then I said three because at that time at every meeting well I would have received it prior to last meeting. So the applicants don't communicate with the clerk's office.

Oh no I'm just saying but when the commission asks how many applicants do we have everybody say three. Every time it's three and the only time when Miss I'm sorry what's your name? Prince. Miss Prince came she stated the names of the applicants. That's correct. And it's and and she only said three.

That's correct. So that wasn't my first time hearing that we we had three applicants. So that's what I'm saying. If she said I'm trying to figure out how we come up with three if your email address were down for a couple days, how did it get to the commission that it was just three? Um, in the email that I explained to the the manager, my email was I was created another email. Understand it?

From that email that was created, when I did the search, there was no search. It only searched three applicants. Okay. So I had to go to my old emails which was now up and I requested a search for all the applicants and that's when I got if you'll see on here all the four applicants and as soon as I found out I seen that I sent an email. I got a question. It was three applicants and when you pulled up you only pulled up three and

Yes, sir. She called you. Then you did another search and you came up with another name. So when did the other when did the other applicants put in their application? I can't I do not have that information right now when the other ones um put in their application. I get that information for you. Were they late or did they put them in early? They put them all of them put them in early. Okay. Well, why hers wasn't transferred over with theirs? They was put in normally the same time. The question is, the not the question, the problem is

when Miss the young lady on here submitted her application, it was not then. Well, I did not have the problems with the the computer at that time. My email, I did not have the problem then. It was after the fact. Yeah, I know what you I hear what you said. You said it was down for two days and but the records request was prior to but what I'm saying is if they all put an application in in October or November whenever they put not all of them did. Okay. So when did she when you said older person

Okay. This so she put hers in last or first? Yes. She put hers in last. And this video ain't making sense cuz if she put hers in last and they put theirs in first. So that mean they their application older than hers. That's correct. So that mean her she came over because she was more recent than theirs. The new email and the old email which is which is the glitch. I understand both of them are under the old email, right? All of them was under the old email. They had to be cuz you just Okay. The old email had all the previous applicants

when I learned of my error. Well, not the error, the computer error is when I transfer over my app, all of my emails. Well, not all of my new emails, only some of my emails from the date that I had the issue with the computer emails. So when I had that issue and I sent the emails to the IT and he learned that there was a problem where I was not all of my documents were not being saved. That's when I made that um asked him that will he please check my emails and that's when he created me another email and when I did the search you'll see one search for one set of emails pulled the three applicants the other search for emails did not pull any applicants so when the young lady brought I did not remember her name

that's okay that is my fault and I took full responsibility for that because I could not remember every single applicant that submitted the application. So when I did search for city manager applicants, only three applicants were pulled up from the old email. The new email, yes, the old email. She was the last one, so it didn't carry over to the new email until she called. When she called, I put in her name and I was able to pull her application and I submitted I immediately submitted to the city clerk, the city attorney and Miss Bus.

Miss Prince, that sound nice, but it's got a big hole in it. And my problem is if she submitted her application last and you put in and you ask your computer for city manager applicants, but the older ones came up but the new one didn't because it was the last one that was submitted. That's why it should have came up first. It did not. It would not come up first. If I'm The old emails went down and a new email is being created. Mayor, so what you saying? You had a new email in between.

Just what are you saying about why? When was the new email assigned to you? It was assigned after the records request. The reason for the applicants were being requested. There wasn't request from the commission. It was being requested for records request through the city clerk.

Well, I'mma say this right here and and this all be dump. I mean, I really do feel for the um the applicant because it's not fair to that person if they put in the application and you and and I'm going to go back and look at those tapes and I'm going to show you how many times that someone asks about how many applicants and it came with three. And and it's not the applicant's fault. No. That that that that it was so it's somebody else's fault, right? You know, it's a computer fault, too. No, they no computer. Okay. It's somebody else's fault. It's somebody's fault. So, bottom line, what you're saying, the computer could take a lot of blame for a whole lot of stuff, but they take this one.

But I'm just saying that it don't even look right for the city cuz if we said we was done taking applicants, we was we should have been done. Now what don't look right was if you try to exclude this applicant who is from Pokei. So no. Oh not about listen it was about from Pokei now. Now now it's about from Pokei. No I'm just saying I'm just saying cuz listen here's the point. Here's my point. Maybe I should my point. I don't it doesn't right now. Right now it I mean it's not a big deal. It's just it just don't look professional.

Okay. That's what I'm saying. But then it don't look fair. Fair fair to who to for for the other applicants. We got for several for several months for several months that we asked that question. How many African? It been three. Then all the at the last meeting everything closed now. Oh, we got another one. That don't that don't even sound right, man. It don't care who it is. It don't sound I don't care if they were from my house. It don't sound right. Okay, I'm done. Go ahead. Okay.

So, but that's that one application. What about the one that was allowed to submit documents in addition to what they submitted initially? How is that fair? I don't know if there was anybody there was everybody that had attachments their attachments should have been attached to their their application when they were initially submitted to the city clerks. So no, no additional documents were accepted after the initial.

Vice Mayor Cowin requested to know if there were any resumeumés or offer letters um not offer letters um letters for the applicants. She requested that which was already submitted prior to I think the same three people that interviewed with her the last time. No. One. No, sir. No. Okay. Only one of them interviewed before. All right. Thank you, Miss Prince.

So, Mr. Mayor, I kind of hesitate to bring it up, but I will because it was a part of what you all said when you interviewed um for the when you interviewed the last time. You all said that the people who interviewed before they were not going to be excluded from the process and that they could be considered is what the commission agreed to. So I throw it out there and just so you know what you said and if anybody ever went back and saw it, it wouldn't be an issue. You can um decide to deal with it differently or whatever. But um that's what you said as a part of the process. And not only that, while you brought that up, I don't even think, and I may be mistaken, whether or not HR called each of the previous applicants or who had application on and ask them to assure them that they didn't have to do a separate new application, but they could be considered for the position if they wanted to be considered. I'm not sure if that was

But they didn't have to do an application. What you're saying, huh? They don't have to redo. They wouldn't have to. Oh, I understand. I'm just saying. Just make sure that's what you But I don't even think we did that. And we probably excluded a few peoples out of that bunch. Yeah. But that would have took a little on our part to make that call to say, "Hey, we have a previous application. We're going to be interviewing for a permanent case supervisor." Are you saying there's no distinction between interim city manager and the permanent city manager? Cuz that's that was two different things.

Well, through the mayor, what you said was that everybody who interviewed for the interim city manager position would be basically automatically included a part of the permanent city manager process that they wanted to be. So my question is did anyone inform Miss Busil that before she filled out the application? I said whoever that she didn't have to fill out the application. Yeah. What I'm saying I don't think none of them was informed. That's what I'm saying.

I'm saying we didn't inform we didn't inform the candidates of the correct permanent because I think we should have done that. Yeah. So the clerk just um corrected through the mayor um the people who applied for the per permanent would be considered for considered for interim at that time. So that's that's what was stated. So yeah so basically those folks would still be considered as a part of the process is what you all said. I got a problem I just I just as I don't know I just I didn't have a problem with it. I just

because the permanent um act was out prior to the interim. So that's what it was. So you you all said they would they would be they would still be considered. So in other words, the people who applied before, if they're still available, they're still supposed to be a part of your process. It's not just the four people. It's supposed to be everybody in that pool of applicants who was available who applied at that time. They're supposed to be pursuant to what you all said interviewed or called back or you know go pursuant to that resolution. I don't think it's no more. They can come back again. I think everybody else that applied just applied for interim. So everybody should be we're trying to say

commission man or man. Okay. I guess not. All right. That's something we have to if we are trying to do things as we indicated we should but we open up a word but I don't know y confusing me butus I mean come All right.

All right. If there's no other mayor, am I allowed to speak or I can't speak? I'm not allowed to speak because you're in this process. We don't want to tent anything or give anybody any wrong impression. I respect that. Yeah, that's why I asked. I respect that one. Black prison, did you speak? Did you speak? Well, I thought this process we were just going to go with uh I was assuming that we going to have some questions that we going to go to if we wanted to change anything like that, but apparently we don't have all that information before us. That's what I thought this workshop was going to do. Other than that, if we not changing anything. Okay.

So, unless someone got some additional input, I would have a meeting to adjourn and a motion to adjurnn. I have a you have the public comment. Okay.

I have a question. I also wanted to know all um have you all decided how many questions for the interviews and how um the time frame for each candidate that you're going to be interviewing. And the last questions prior to me coming on to the city um two questions each came from the commissioners and I wanted to know if you wanted to use that same method. Of course, it' be a consensus, but I would like to see the process similar to what it was. Nothing said change. I mean, the

because it was different for the um interim interview, myself and the city attorney um went over questions. So,

and it was really just, you know, like a birds smithing. It wasn't really doing any wholesale change of As far as I'm concerned, I think we should go with the same process. We I don't see any major changes we need to do unless some commissioners see a little different and we need to consider that if that's case Michael Jackson interview that he just did this past. I think all of y'all need to take a look at that. Just did that in 2024. Everybody up there need to take a look at that. cuz you ain't even evaluating this person. Is she doing it again?

I've never seen anything with nobody evaluate nobody.

I I tried to kind of explain that earlier. The reason for even Michael Jackson was because it was a rush to kind of appoint him. In this particular instance, we have an ordinance indicating that the permanent will be interviewed. So, it's no reason for a evaluation. The reason Michael Jackson evaluation to try to give some justification why y'all appoint this individual. I didn't care if he stayed there a year. It gave us an opportunity to see if this individual can do their job or not.

They was in a rush to do it and that's why that came up. The evaluation that the resolution that the attorney read it was put in place for Michael Jackson and y'all forgive is your qualification. Mayor, can you She trying to tell you she ready to get out of here. But I got s comments. I have I have some comments. Miss Clark. Yes, sir. You have some comments. I have three comment cards.

You can start. Okay. First person is Mr. Robert Love. I couldn't wait to get up here. Huh? Did y'all see Bab? Bab, it was you, it was Balden, it was MVIN, it was Mike Pearson, and it was Squ.

Michael Jackson was hired on May the 10th, June the 25th. Y'all was in it up in here and y'all was all going through that talking about interviewing and all of this here. Mr. Mike Foll, I'm ready to hire him. Ham now. And that what from June the 10th to I know you're educated from June the 10th till June from from May the 10th to June the 25th. How many days is that? 35 if you didn't know. It's 35. Miss Bus been here going on five months. Y'all ain't stopped down there time to say, "Let me interview Miss Busy. Let's uh evaluate Miss Bus." Y'all didn't even talk about evaluating Mr. M Jackson no more. After 90 days, Y'ALL HIRED HIM WITHOUT ANY TALKING ABOUT OH all the people that he was interviewed with. Y'ALL DIDN'T GO BACK AND GET ONE OF them and say let's see if we going to hire them. And then I'm trying to figure out how y'all going to come where she been a city a intern city manager FOR 5 MONTHS NOW. Y'ALL GOING TO COME AND GET SOMEBODY OUT THE audience and say, "Oh, this is who we going to have permanent." Why they why they the next person should be your intern if they if they don't have permanent you how YOU GOING TO GET SOMEBODY PERMANENT AND YOU GOT SOMEBODY BEEN WORKING 5 MONTHS that y'all that can't nobody complain about but San Quil and and and some of y'all what's up there want to hide behind your complaints but I'm still going to try to figure out I'm still going to figure out how you get somebody that's been an intern for 5 months and then you go get somebody and put over there. Do you know you might be setting yourself up for suing

like y'all WAS TALKING ABOUT GETTING SUED? If I've BEEN WORKING FOR Y'ALL 5 MONTHS AND THEN Y'ALL COME BACK AND AIN'T NEVER DID IT.

Y'ALL JUST SAT UP HERE AND TALKING about oh we going to do it now. But when you made this resolution did y'all think about well we going to get rid of intern and hire permanent who we don't know from Adam House cat. We got SOMEBODY BEEN WORKING FIVE MONTHS THAT SHOWED US WHAT they can do. Now you gonna go get somebody to try to show you what they can do. How is that gonna happen? When do that happen? When do that come in at? I'm still trying TO FIGURE OUT Y'ALL TALKING ABOUT THIS RESOLUTION THAT YOU JUST CAME UP WITH IN 2026. I'VE BEEN COMING UP IN THIS damn place since 1998. And they ain't never heard about they had to go hire a city manager as an intern and then go back and get somebody else and hire them permanent cuz they ain't never seen an intern that y'all hire that y'all got rid of. They got rid of their self. Do you remember when we got rid of Ken Skank the first ones Keith you was up here then?

How many intern How many city manager we fired before we got commission landlord by four? Cuz every time they sign UP IN THAT CITY HALL OVER THERE and act the ignorant you know what they did the commission did fire them. See but Y'ALL GOT SOMETHING AGAINST MISS BUSTING. NOW YOU WANT TO HEAD UP there and say about Miss Miss uh Miss Angel, Miss Miss what you call it from Pok finally figured OUT THAT PEOPLE FROM YOU WANT TO WORK UP HERE. You got somebody want to work and then y'all don't want to know all y'all up there. Start damn heavy too.

Uh yes, I just like to mention that that 2024 um motion that she mentioned happened in 2024 at the meeting with Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson. The resolution was actually to give him his 180 days and after that hire him. But they actually filed a pass another motion that meeting saying that because his serving as the city manager is qualification enough he doesn't have to interview again against the same people that y'all trying to do again. Don't have to. That's that's redundant as can be. You going to go and interview against the same people. Now y'all saying that there's no new applicant. There is new applicants. I I don't know. I'm confused. But if there's no new applicants, then it should be the same thing that y'all did just 18 months ago, June 25th, 2024. Why Why are we gonna do something 18 months ago and then come now and say, "Hold up. Let's change the whole thing." No. No. You say, "All right, this is what we agreed to. I mean, we going to try it out. Michael Jackson did this. Okay, let's try it out with another one. If it don't work this time, then maybe we can change something up." But you don't come now the very second time or the second opportunity you have to practice a rule that y'all established and say no we going to just no we ain't doing that no more after one dude or actually it wasn't really his fault. It's it's still a Squa if you go read them watch them meetings it's Squeda just acting and badgering people and just just just micromanaging and just doing stuff that just is unbecoming of somebody that's trying to grow a city. So the the thing is that resolution that they trying to stand on right now, that's the one that they actually said we're not going to pay attention to and hire Michael Jackson. So it was in place when Michael Jackson was uh hired. So I I don't know why he brought that up saying it was in place or it came into place once right before Miss Busting. No, that's not true. It's been in place for two years or almost two years, I should say.

And uh that's all that's all. Can I can I state something? just finished and still ready to go. The last comment is from Miss uh Cynthia Mitchell.

Can I ask a question? I know I'm not on the thing. This this citizen comes standing. Good evening. Good evening. I don't have a money not just you know what do you all know what one two first thing she oh she must have quit cuz she ran out she

oh well she she ran out the meeting so she no longer work there right matter she got fired cuz she left the job that was a job people voted her in she ran out she got fired You are attorney, you need to file yourself in quer if you can. Okay? I know y'all this buddy buddy mess for too small. We have someone up there, Miss Busy going to Brandon City together. Come together cuz every TIME YOU DON'T COME TOGETHER WITH MISS BUSY, GOD DROPPED YOU. You all throw these rocks IN MISS BUS. MAN, BUSY DON'T NEED ANYTHING. SHE COME BACK HOME TO HELP AND YOU ALL too evil AND BREATHARTED TO SEE PUNK MOVE. POKE NEED TO MOVE. THIS IS RIDICULOUS. ALL YOU BOYS AND GIRLS SITTING OVER THERE TRYING TO THROW AT ME BUSTED.

It's crazy.

IT'S CRAZY. THIS IS CRAZY. EVERY WEEK YOU GOING TO HAVE A TIME HAUL ME. WHAT'S SO MUCH ABOUT Y'ALL STILL DOING THE SAME THING? WE AIN'T GOING NOWHERE. AND THAT ATTORNEY GOING TO TAKE EVERY LAST ONE OF Y'ALL WITH HER. EVERY LAST ONE. KEITH, I'M TELLING YOU. I'M TELLING YOU, M. YOU SICK. YOU'RE NOT going to get well mess with that attorney. SHE READ THE book just while ago. Mr. Mr. Love started talking. And Mr. Mr. uh Mayor Bear, you need to concentrate on your health. Get better up in this is not going TO MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER DEALING with that attorney over there. Get her gone. Say quitter. She don't work. She She not uh vice mayor anymore. She left cuz she quit. So you can't answer no question. She she she playing turn. They take a turn. THIS IS RIDICULOUS. YOU ALL NOT SHAME SITTING UP there and look at your hometown. Keep you the mayor of Pokei and you walking out of your house with a suit on and Rose look like him. You could put on a jogging suit to sit up there the way for Hokei. Look, you all need TO GET IT TOGETHER. WHAT'S WRONG, MISS B? Miss Busty. She just as beautiful as she can be.

She want to do the job. AND QU NEVER BE MISS BUSTY. SHE NOT SMART ENOUGH. M. THIS YOUR HOMETOWN. You ought to want this TO LOOK BEAUTIFUL. STOP FOLLOWING UP WITH THAT THAT GIRL OVER THERE SAY cuz when she leave here, wherever she leave at, WHEREVER SHE LIVE AT, believe you me, her roles are not like your role in Pokei. You know it. And you wasn't brought up like that. Thank you. She sitting over there looking like dot on on sor come about homes up city clerk we have any additional comments now you get

city clerk no sir thank you I'll entertain a motion for the German Mr. Mayor,

I just want to I just want to say something. You know, I what what what happened? What? Mr. Mayor, I just I'm I'm going to say what happened. What happened when where they come and Miss Miss Blessie's family comes and and Mr. at at the end and Miss Messy sitting here laughing and at the end of every meeting where they come and insult everybody including myself. It is ridiculous. This needs to stop. This needs to stop. We do have rules of procedure that say that you cannot direct comments directly to people in a disparaging manner and they do that every single meeting and it's not myself, it's one of you all to allow residents to come and curse AT THE MICROPHONE. THAT YOU won't happen that won't happen in any other city. So you were right when you said that doesn't have her for her family to march in here every single meeting and bully people, insult people, lie on people, that that should really stop Mr. the mayor. So, I feel like I need to stand up for not only myself, but this city and and saying something publicly because this is ridiculous and it really should stop and your rules prohibit it.

That's right. Even under citizen comments, it's prohibited. You need to you need to do the right thing by all citizens. And I DON'T CAST AND I DON'T cast spells. This is a workshop. I during this workshop. Yeah. Don't hate my family because they support me. that you are doing. So obvious.