Amid the normal business of the Lewisburg City Council, one recently elected councilperson’s combative style drew attention during the Tuesday, September 17, meeting.
The distribution of power between parts of the Lewisburg government and the validity of the continuation of said government was the source of strife between Councilmember Eddie Johns and other city officials.
In one example, according to Johns, the amended charter passed in September of 2018 and the recent municipal elections means the city has a new government and, as such, must re-establish the various committees the council uses to do business.
“Committees of council are extremely important,” said Johns. “Finance committee, public safety has been hit or miss, public works, they’re extremely important,” Johns said. “The guidelines that we approved … on the 25th of May, the operating guidelines for the city. They even went so far as to name committee members and chair. But the committees have never been formed.”
City Manager Jacy Faulkner presented council with a document containing a summary of each committee, with descriptions from committee members of the historic functionality of the committee.
“I think it was important to get feedback from each of our staff members that are key to these committees; right now we have a public safety committee, public works committee, and a finance committee,” Faulkner said. “The people that are really key to those would be our treasurer, chief of police, fire chief, and public safety director. … There’s not written, formal guidelines, but I’ve asked these people who have been with us and helped administer these committees to provide their understanding.”
However after her description of the document, Johns rebuked what he seemed to perceived as an attempt by city officers to “set the agenda.”
“Your [Faulkner’s] comment here that the city manager and the mayor and the department heads will drive the agendas and discussions at committees; no. … Historically doesn’t count,” Johns said. “John Manchester, rest his political soul, is no longer here. That government that we had for 20 years is no longer here. We have a council-driven government.”
When asked for comment from Mayor Beverly White, City Attorney Tom White stated that the committees were formed in a City Council meeting immediately following the swearing-in of the new councilmembers in June.
“I certainly think that Mr. Johns is accurate that this council needs to formulate rules and regulations for its committees, I think that’s true,” said Tom White. “I don’t know that I agree that the committees don’t exist. I think that by function of the organizational meeting on June 25, even if it was the old council that voted on it, council elect was there. By function of the organizational meeting and by appointment to those committees, those committees do exist.”
Tom White also explained that the committees currently operating could continue to operate based on the precedent alone.
“Our city code indicates that while City Council can adopt, readopt, or amend rules governing the official conduct of its members conducting its business, but if it fails to do so, then the rules that were in effect prior to that organizational meeting would still be in effect,” said Tom White. “So what I’m saying is that to the extent that the implication is that everything is being done wrong … I don’t think that’s true. I think that this government has been operating under the rules that have been in effect and that’s appropriate until the rules are changed.”
Throughout the meeting, Johns continued to insist Lewisburg’s government fundamentally changed after the amended charter was passed.
However, Lewisburg’s charter is not a perfect match for the plan five specified by the State Code. During the charter amendment process former Lewisburg Mayor John Manchester noted the intent of the new charter was to solidify the then-current practices of the city government, with a few minor tweaks, such as the removal of the city recorder position, shifting the responsibility to the city clerk, and a more clear distinction between the mayor and city administrator.
The charter itself also notes the process for the departments; “all city departments, offices, and agencies shall be subject to the direction and supervision of the city manager,” reads the charter. The manager herself is appointed and removed by city council, as are the other department heads, but is directly under the supervision of the mayor.
“I was here when Stranco, God rest his legal soul, brought this forward,” Johns said. “He sat right here, and my wife and I for three sessions, he said this is a new form of government, this is a mayor-manager plan five. If you look up mayor manager plan five in the state code its quite clear and it also says that anything that varies from that in the charter is automatically void.”
Johns referred to the West Virginia State Code, which lays out different types of governments in section §8-3-2.Under Plan V;
• There shall be a council of not less than five nor more than eleven members, elected either at large or from such geographical districts.
• There shall be a mayor elected at large by the qualified voters of the municipality as may be established by the charter, who shall serve as a member and the presiding officer of the council; and a city manager who shall be appointed by the council;
• The council shall be the governing body; and
• The manager shall be the administrative authority. He shall manage the affairs of the city under the supervision of the council and he shall be responsible to such council. He shall appoint or employ, in accordance with this chapter, all subordinates and employees for whose duties or work he is responsible to the council.
The final paragraph also specifies that each of the five government types listed are in the state code in order to “establish basic requirements of alternative plans of structure and organization of city government,” but also specifies that “the structure and organization of a city government may be specified by the charter in respects other than those enumerated, and in elaboration of the basic requirements, insofar as such charter provisions do not conflict with the purpose and the provisions of the alternative plans prescribed.”
Johns also pushed for the creation of a new committee for council to consider city policy and administration.
“Council, as Mr. Stranco told us, has to act [with] the unity of command, so we have to act together,” Johns said. “Council can’t sit here until three in the morning coming up with administrative guidelines for you or policies for the city, so there has to be some other mechanism to do that. That’s why I’m going to recommend we form a management committee that we can then comply with our charter correctly. If we don’t comply with the charter, if we let the administration set the agendas and determine the efficacy of our own committees, then council is not doing its job.”
Johns cited the need of council oversight on the executive branch of the city government, citing the plan five.
“Is council a legislative body?” Johns asked. “We tried to bring this up with Stranco and he dodged it, are we a legislative body in which the administration presents things and [we vote] or are we a deliberative, management body in which the plan five government says we are? If we believe we have a new job description, if council is the governing body of this city and is to give direction to the manager, then we need something like this. If you subscribe to the fact that the old way is fine and John [Manchester’s] way of running the city is what we want to keep doing, then we don’t need this. It really is just that simple.”
Councilmember Arron Seams also pointed to a potential redundancy of a council policy committee with City Council itself.
“I’m just a little confused as to why we can’t make these administrative suggestions as this body,” said Seams.
“We meet all together, we’re all already here, we all found the time this evening to be here. I definitely think we want to be in compliance with the state code and the charter. That’s the oath I took. I’m just not certain we need to have another committee comprised of us to do something that we could do in these meetings.”
A special session of City Council was approved to be held in order to work on the potential creation of a new administrative committee.
In another combative incident, Johns pushed back on Faulkner and the chief of police on guidelines for new Lewisburg Police Department TASER equipment and the guidelines by which it could be used.
Previously, council approved the purchase of TASER units for the police department, equipment that was not authorized by the departments Standard Operation Guidelines (SOG), but through the use of general orders by the chief of police. Johns objected to this method of approving the equipment.
“Those are in general orders and can be signed by the police chief,” Faulkner began to explain.
“No ma’am they cannot,” Johns interrupted. “No officer should carry a weapon or device that’s not authorized by council, full stop.”
Mayor White then asked Chief of Police Chris Teubert to address the question of general order authorization.
“I will address it how we’ve handled it in the past,” Teubert began.
“Doesn’t matter chief, this is a new government,” Johns interjected. “You cannot have officers on the street with weapons that are not authorized by the council. … Sure, an officer could get away with an ‘action’ if he’s trained well and his action is handled properly, he will probably not be criminally prosecuted. However, the city is still liable for his actions and the first thing that a platiff’s attorney is ‘is this device authorized?’ and you’re going to have to say ‘no, it’s a general order.’ … It’s like the fourth time we’ve had this discussion.”
“May I speak? I was asked a question and I’m just trying to answer,” Teubert said. “I’m not trying to be confrontational. To answer your question ma’am mayor, general orders are an accepted practice. If that is something this council does not wish to do, that is up to this council. But as to what the city attorney said, until it is changed, it is my understanding that it would be an accepted practice until it is changed by council. … We would do it as a general order until I could get the complete SOGs revised because … it is a very large document and I have to research State Code, … guidelines from the law enforcement training committee, … so the general orders are what have been in place to give these TASERs legally out [to the officers] until we can complete the whole SOGs.”
Johns rebuked Teubert, citing the need for more council oversight on the police department; “The reason we went to general orders is because it was bureaucratic to take the [SOGs] to council for approval. The least effective manner of operating troops, if you will, is a general order. The chief has a certain amount of responsibility. He’s not an elected official, he’s an at-will employee. He can direct his forces under state law to a certain point, but his weapons, his manners, every single thing he does has to be approved by this body.”
When asked for comment by Mayor White, Tom White explained that while he hadn’t looked specifically into SOGs versus general orders, he reiterated an earlier point; if a policy has been in place and worked a certain way and has not been changed by council, it will only change if council specifically changes it.
“I think Mr. Johns has made it clear he doesn’t want to [operated under general orders] anymore,” Tom White said. “So, the rest of this body probably … needs to make the determination [on] if the chief can operate the police department under general orders or does he have to turn it into SOGs? You all need to tell him that. … But I think until you tell him that, the fact that previous councils has let him use general orders on these things is still effective.”
In addition, any recommendations, including any potential SOG revisions, could not have been placed on the council’s agenda due to sunshine laws, which require the publication of any public meeting of council at least three business days before the meeting, with an agenda of topics for the meeting.
“To speak to the timelines there, the agenda [for city council was] set in place before the [planning commission] meeting took place,” Faulkner explained. “It took place on Friday, so to put it on the agenda would put the cart before the horse because if it wasn’t approved, it wouldn’t come before [council] this evening.”
Teubert noted that part of the reason for general order use for the authorization is due to October being the earliest the TASERs could appear before council.
Seams asked any items from the public safety meeting be included on the agenda for the October meeting of council.
When later asked for comment on the heated discussion, Mayor White stated it was “not like anything I’ve experienced on my 16 years on council.”
Read more in the Friday, September 20, 2019, edition of The West Virginia Daily News.
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