| Greenback public notices show continued failure to comply with
charter, state law Sarah Grace Taylor-thedailytimes.com
Public notices filed with The Daily Times suggest city of Greenback
failed to comply by state and local laws regarding public meeting
notices for most of the past nine years.
Per the Greenback charter, “each ordinance, or the caption of each
ordinance, shall be published after its final passage in a newspaper
of general circulation in the municipality. No ordinance shall take
effect until the ordinance or its caption is published.”
Additionally, the charter mandates that “the annual operating budget
and budget comparisons of the proposed budget with the prior year’s
actual figures and the current year’s estimated figures” also be
published in a newspaper of general circulation not fewer than 10
days before the governing body considers passage of the final
budget.
Of the 34 notices submitted by the mayor from Jan. 1, 2010 through Dec. 26, 2018, 22 pertained to meetings, budgets or ordinances.
At no time in the nine years did Greenback publish the full required
budget and comparison within the time frame listed in the charter.
Prior notice was only given of the budget meeting on five occasions,
only three of which were published with compliant notice and none of
which included the budget comparison.
The most recent notice published in either the Maryville or
Lenoir City paper ran in The News-Herald on June 13, and gave
“notice” of a June 12 meeting, at which the 2018-19 budget was
finalized.
Only one notice, published in November 2010 regarding a flood
plain ordinance, was about any ordinance outside of the adoption
of budgets.
Under the charter, no budget or ordinance can come into effect
without proper publication. Similarly, Tennessee state law
requires all public meetings have adequate notice published, or
all action at the meetings becomes null and void.
After filing a complaint about the apparent lack of meeting
notices for the Board of Mayor and Aldermen, Greenback resident
Lisa Russell received the following from Lee Pope of the
Comptroller’s Office of Open Records Counsel:
“Under the Tennessee Open Meetings Act (“TOMA”), governing
bodies, such as the Mayor and Board of Alderman, must
provide adequate public notice of both regularly scheduled
and specially called meetings.”
Pope sent an inquiry to the Greenback mayor’s office on Dec.
12 and has not received any response to questions regarding
the complaint.
Mayor Tom Peeler did not return any of several requests for
comment.
Peeler was the mayor of Greenback for 44 years before losing
his re-election campaign on Nov. 6. to Dewayne Birchfield, a
former alderman who won with 62 percent of the vote.
Since the election, Birchfield and some residents of the
town have accused Peeler and his wife, Norma, the town’s
recorder, treasurer and director of human resources, of
stalling the transition of mayors
by way of canceling public meetings.
While Birchfield and Peeler ultimately agreed to a
transition today, the canceling of the November meeting
of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen and the
questionable responses by
Peeler to two public records requests
have spurred
an inquiry by the state
comptroller and scrutiny from some
residents.
When asked how the city publishes public meeting
notices, Peeler responded in a prior interview, “We
don’t,” admitting later that day that he knew it was
illegal to not provide adequate notice and adding “what
are they going to do? Fine me for it? I’m out.”
A day later, Peeler told the newspaper that he misspoke,
claiming public meeting notices are posted every month
in the Greenback post office. Peeler was unable to
provide dates of theses notices other than November
2018, when a meeting was canceled.
Four citizens of Greenback have denied to The Daily
Times that these notices are posted regularly, and a
former Greenback alderwoman said the rare notices that
were posted during her time in office (from the late
1980s to early 1990s) often were posted on the day of
meetings and only if a meeting had been canceled.
While the state comptroller is still looking into
the matter, the open records counsel says if
Peeler’s original statement is true, a violation of
TOMA is apparent.
“If they’ve really been providing no notice at all,
it’s pretty obvious that it is not adequate notice,”
Pope said. “In that case, hopefully, whoever
replaces him in his position will operate in more
accordance with TOMA.”
Peeler told The Daily Times earlier this month that
he will be leaving the mayor’s office today, handing
the reins to Birchfield.
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12/31/18