The ‘Ayes’ Have It – Gentry Contract Denied

by Greg Ritchie

Messenger Reporter

CROCKETT –  Crockett City Council drew another “sellout” crowd, as the city held a joint council and Crockett Economic and Industrial Development Corporation (CEIDC) meeting Tuesday, July 9 at Crockett City Hall. With both implementing a corrective plan for CEIDC and the much-discussed contract of CEIDC Executive James Gentry on the agenda, the meeting was full, 20 minutes before it was set to begin. 

The public comments section lasted well over half an hour, with citizens asking about the legality of the proposed contract, if certain council members should recuse themselves due to prior service on the CEIDC board and whether the money spent on Gentry’s employment contract might be better used elsewhere. 

The situation was compared to that of a private business, where results and allegations, such as those Gentry faces, might not lead to a five-year contract. Precinct Four Councilman Elbert Johnson was unable to attend the meeting, but was referenced as someone who, as a businessman himself, might well relate to this way of thinking. 

With Johnson not present, any tying vote would come down to Crockett Mayor Dr. Ianthia Fisher for a deciding majority. 

The first item on the agenda was to have the legal firm who presented a corrective action plan for CEIDC to continue to work with the city to help implement the plan. 

“I think it’s a good idea that the ones who actually did the investigation and research and actually provided information are also going to follow through,” Fisher said. “We could go out and get a new group, but continuing with the same legal services would be better than reinventing the wheel.”

The motion was quickly passed unanimously. 

Then the meeting came to the issue of Gentry’s employment contract, many of the details of which were presented in the last edition of The Messenger. 

Fisher began the discussion by pointing out the city had been able to consult legal counsel regarding Gentry’s contract and confirmed there remained some areas of concern. 

“As I said from the very beginning, when we looked at the corrective action plan. The purpose of the corrective action plan is to provide direction on how you correct the problems that were in the report,” Fisher said. “I think it’s essential, as an economic development office, to know what those problems are, so you can have actual action-corrective planning.  My concern is if we don’t have the corrective action review, we’ll be back to stage one. So my recommendation at this point, is that before we go into giving a contract, we need to make sure the actions are able to be corrected, and so a person would not be held accountable for something that wasn’t covered.”

Precinct One Councilman Dennis Ivey agreed the experts presenting the plan should come first, saying, “Weeks ago, I made a motion that we table this until we heard from our legal counsel, so that we could know more about this and what to do. But that wasn’t the wishes of the council and that’s how we wound up here tonight. You know, we wouldn’t even be having this meeting, if we would have just waited until we heard from them and they gave us the plan.”

Precinct Three Councilwoman NaTrenia Hicks said none of this would have been necessary, had city council been more open to communication with CEIDC to fix the problems. She said during her time on the CEIDC board, they were unable to have communication with the city council to try and work together and work things out then. 

Mayor Fisher briefly explained some of CEIDC’s history, how there had always been issues, and even after the city restarted it a few years ago, none of the core issues ever seemed to get resolved. She said the forensic audit had been a way to have outside experts help the city figure out where the problems were, for all to see, and try and correct them. 

“Which years will the Executive Director be evaluated for?” Hicks asked. “Because this council put him (Gentry) on administrative leave, so he can’t receive an evaluation for that time.”

Fisher explained an evaluation would come later, after working on the corrective action plan. She said firmly there could be an employment contract after that work had been completed, but, “not a blanket five-year contract.”

Questioned again by Hicks, Fisher explained a job description must come first, with a plan, then with evaluations along the way on the progress of implementing that plan.  

“There needs to be a document, from the time they specified the problems in the report, specifying what the job requirements are and what will be evaluated,” Fisher said. “Otherwise, we’re just saying, ‘I like you, we don’t need to discuss this,’ and give him a five-year contract. I have never seen anyone just give out a blanket contact.”

Precinct Five Councilman Mike Marsh made a critical motion for the city, tying any contract negotiations to implementing a corrective action plan for CEIDC.

“I move we reject this employment agreement and direct that no agreement will be considered until the corrective action plan is finished, the CEIDC bylaws are changed, the needed policies are put in place and the CEIDC Director’s lawsuit be dismissed or dropped.”

Marsh, Ivey and Fisher voted yea, with Hicks and Precinct Two Councilman Darrell Jones voting no. 

Hicks requested several discussions to be placed on the next city council agenda, including the possible hiring of a public relations person for the council for, “transparency purposes, so that not only one side of the story is out there.” Several members of city council were confused by this, but agreed to put it as a discussion at the next meeting. 

Hicks also requested an item for the next meeting to change the CEIDC board of directors, its registered agent and the location of their meetings. Not completely understanding, Fisher and Crockett City Administrator John Angerstein asked for some clarification. While the exact meaning was not clear, it may be an attempt to restart an independent CEIDC board, with members not on city council, to hold their own meetings in a different location. 

When the council moved to make a second vote to mirror the first – they were officially meeting as both city council and CEIDC board – Hicks modified the motion she had read earlier, alluding to CEIDC board members as a separate entity in the language. Called out on this by both the public and several council members, Hicks claimed she read the language wrong and corrected herself. 

After the meeting, this reporter was approached by one of the council members who asked it to be published that contracts such as Gentry’s are standard in city governments. As we have reported in The Messenger, city employees who depend on political votes for their employment often have such contracts, with varying time frames, salaries, bonus structures and other possible perks. 

While there may be convenient language in some other employment contracts, it is the job of the council to question that, and should they do so, it would be featured in our stories. The focus at the current time on Gentry’s contract is due to its highly controversial language and clauses, his history with being suspended and criticized by several outside expert groups and his pending one-million-dollar lawsuit against the city. 

Greg Ritchie can be reached at [email protected]