If convicted of violating Georgia ’s open meetings statutes, seven elected representatives could receive a $500 fine
If former school system fleet manager Rick Wheeler is a transportation consultant, as his new boss, elected officials, and a public record says, the Dougherty County School Board conducted an illegal meeting Monday.
The school board kept the public from its discussion about Wheeler’s hiring, saying that it was to discuss personnel matters — an exemption to the state law requiring meetings to be accessible to the public.
But school system attorney Tommy Coleman says that despite what’s in the public record, Wheeler wasn’t hired Monday as a consultant, but as a temporary part-time employee. Rather, “consultant” will be Wheeler’s job title during his temporary assignment handling special transportation projects under deputy superintendent Robert Lloyd, Coleman said Wednesday.
Coleman also said the minutes from Monday’s school board meeting will document Wheeler’s part-time employment status.
“He’s going to be treated as an employee,” Coleman said of Wheeler. “Whatever they (school board members) think they voted on will be legal.”
In Georgia , local elective boards are prohibited by law from excluding the public from its meetings, except when personnel, litigation, and real estate transactions are being discussed. In those cases, excluding the public is legal, but not required. Elective officials are allowed by law, Coleman said, to publicly discuss executive session proceedings.
Violating the open meetings law is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $500.
Coleman said that if Wheeler indeed were a consultant, the entire board – for whom Coleman works – would be guilty of violating the state open meetings law. The board members are: Chairman Michael Windom, at-large member Richard Anson, and district representatives David Maschke, Milton “June Bug” Griffin , Willie Weaver, Emily Jean McAfee, and James Bush.
Weaver, an attorney, was reappointed Monday as Albany ’s municipal court judge; he also is a candidate for Dougherty Superior Court judge.
If indeed the open meetings law was broken, it is doubtful school board members will be prosecuted; no charges were filed last year when the Albany City Commission illegally met last year to discuss its relationship with the Albany Water Gas & Light Commission.
What’s compellingly different in the school board matter is that a board member has admitted – in writing — to participating in the illegal meeting; Maschke did so in a Tuesday e-mail to Windom.
“Once in executive session, matters of personnel were not discussed … ” Maschke said. “Since Mr. Wheeler no longer is an employee of the school system, it is improper and illegal for the school board to meet in executive session to discuss the hiring of a consultant … While I believe your desire for discussion and debate amongst the Board members is genuine, holding illegal discussion and debate behind closed doors under false pretenses is improper and does not meet the test of the Sunshine Law or open government.”
Later, in open session, the board voted 4-3 to hire Wheeler as a consultant; Maschke was among the dissenters.
“This is yet another example of the board returning to the way it operated some years back with secret and illegal discussions and improper votes,” Maschke said.
In an interview Wednesday, Maschke noted that the transportation consultant position was not advertised, as is customary for full- and part-time positions.
While Maschke says other illegal discussions have been conducted during closed school board meetings, Coleman says Maschke should have made his case during the executive session, but didn’t.
“Their obligation is to speak up while it’s being done. It’s too late when it’s over,” Coleman said.
