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City of Lake City
Meeting Video Below
Lake city council doesn't care if they break the law
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Council raises back under scrutiny
By JAMIE WACHTER on Saturday, October 14, 2023Subhead
Kennon offers city options to nix automatic increases.
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The Lake City Council’s roller-coaster raises could be back on the way out.
During its 6 p.m. meeting Monday at Lake City Hall, 205 N. Marion Avenue, the council will discuss Section 2-53 of the city’s code of ordinances related to the council and mayo’s compensation.
According to the city code, whenever city employees get a flat percentage raise, the mayor and council automatically get raises equal to the percentage. In September, the council voted to remove the 3% raise from themselves. They were later informed by Attorney Todd Kennon that the ordinance doesn’t allow the council to decline their raise by a simple vote.
Instead, he was authorized to look into how that could be changed moving forward.
For Monday, Kennon offers the council three options, including leaving the pay raise method as is.
The other options are to change the code’s language to have the council vote each time they offer across-the-board raises to determine if they also get an increase, and if so, mandates that the percentage doesn’t exceed what the employees received.
The second option would be to allow for a simple vote of the council to waive their raise by a “majority, super majority or unanimous vote.”
In the document from Kennon, he advises the council that if they choose that option, he recommends they seek an opinion from a law firm specializing in employment law to “ensure the legality of the process” in relation to employment law and wages.
The council’s salaries aren’t the only pay rate that will be discussed Monday. After appointing Assistant City Manager Dee Johnson as the city’s interim manager at its Oct. 2 meeting, the council decided to discuss his compensation at the next meeting. Kennon asked if they wanted to address Johnson’s pay with the new title, which begins officially on Thursday.
Kennon is also supposed to provide an update Monday to the council on whether Colin Baenziger and Associates is willing to serve as the city’s headhunter for the full-time manager opening. Baenziger was set to take over the city’s search last year but the city appointed then-interim manager Paul Dyal to the position full-time before Baenziger could begin the process.
Kennon didn’t return calls from the Reporter on Friday about Baenziger’s interest.
STREET DEDICATION
On Monday, the council will consider approving a resolution dedicating a portion of Long Street in memory of Mariah Reginae Smith.
Smith, 12, was shot and killed while doing homework on her grandma’s couch on Aug. 24 at a residence on Long Street.
In September, former Councilman Glenel Bowden requested the city dedicate a portion of the roadway in Smith’s honor so she would never be forgotten, as well as a conversation starter about what happened.
In addition to agreeing to the street dedication, the council also agreed in September to dedicate $200,000 for gun violence prevention funds in Smith’s memory.
UTILITY ORDINANCE CHANGE
The city council is also set to hear the second reading of an amendment to the city’s ordinance on utilities.
According to the amendment, the city’s rates for water and sewer will go up annually based on the consumer price index changes.
According to the proposed ordinance change, the city’s rates will be adjusted to match the change in the current’s year’s CPI compared to the previous year’s CPI on July 1.
The increase shall never exceed 10% in any year.
Otherwise the ordinance amendment in regards to the city’s utilities just gives the city manager or assistant city manager the power that previously belonged to the city’s utility director. It also replaces the city’s utility committee with the city council as the council previously disbanded committees.
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Attorney: Warren can’t legally serve; City Council doesn’t care
By JAMIE WACHTER on Tuesday, June 6, 2023Subhead
Kennon’s opinion on need for clemency to sit on board ignored.
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Kennon (left) and Warren
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The Lake City Council decided Monday it doesn’t need legal guidance on filling boards and committees.
Despite an opinion from City Attorney Todd Kennon that Sylvester Warren can not legally serve on the city’s planning and zoning board, the council instead chose to leave Warren’s appointment intact.
The council unanimously voted to remove an item from Monday’s agenda that would have rescinded that appointment. Warren was placed on the planning and zoning board by a 4-1 vote at the city’s May 15 meeting.
“This council has already voted on this item and anything outside of what we have already voted on and from what I’m hearing, I see that there’s nothing attached as to why we’re here,” Councilor Chevella Young said in making the motion to remove the item from the agenda. “We’re not in the business of entertaining foolishness… If we don’t see it in writing, we don’t have time to address it.”
Kennon, though, said his research indicates Warren, a convicted felon, is unable to serve on the city’s committee. That research was prompted by a public records request pertaining to Warren’s rights being restored, including clemency.
He said he believed it was part of his job as the city’s legal counsel to address and research the issue.
“As my client, I felt like the city council needed to know what the law was and so I researched the issue and I’m willing to provide my results,” he told council members, noting he provided them a report. The Lake City Reporter received a copy of the report following the meeting through a public records request.
In that report, which was dated Friday, Kennon pointed to Article 6, section 4 of the Florida Constitution for why he believed Warren can’t legally serve on the planning and zoning board. That section addresses the restoration of a felon’s civil rights. The right to sit on a jury or to hold public office can only be obtained by requesting and being granted clemency.
Kennon’s report said Warren indicated his right to vote has been restored.
“However, he has not had his other civil rights restored nor has he been granted clemency related to his felony conviction,” Kennon wrote in the report, adding that holding public office includes city committees that are delegated portions of the city’s powers such as zoning and land use issues like the planning and zoning board decides.
Councilor Todd Sampson, who was the lone council member to vote against Warren’s appointment in May, said Warren didn’t hide his background. He added Warren’s application to the planning and zoning board was vetted twice.
“If he could not have served, it should have come up before this point — it should have been when the application was brought forward,” Sampson said. “To me, unless there is some other reason it has to be there, I second the motion that we remove this from the agenda.”
City Manager Paul Dyal also said he didn’t have an issue with Warren’s appointment.
“I think he is a big asset and unless there is something to be proven that’s really, really out of the atmosphere of why he can’t, I see no reason why he can’t serve on the board,” Dyal said, noting that the council voted and he doesn’t pick the members on the committee. “I have never had any objections to it…”
Even Kennon noted that he felt that Warren was qualified to hold the position, except for the legal problem.
“It has noting to do with Sylvester. I like Sylvester,” he said. “An issue was raised and I looked into it and I provided my legal analysis.”
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Find out how Concerned Citizens of North FL has made a difference in the community and the lives of those we serve. We are committed to creating lasting change.
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Perhaps Venessa George (White Springs Town Manager) should work as hard to help the town!
Durrett pressured to drop Warren’s charges
By JAMIE WACHTER on Wednesday, May 3, 2023Subhead
State attorney caught off guard by large group in town hall meeting.
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State Attorney John Durrett responds to a question Thursday about charges against Sylvester Warren. (JAMIE WACHTER/Lake City Reporter)
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LIVE OAK — A tri-county coalition of 35 people ambushed State Attorney John Durrett on Wednesday with calls to drop charges against a Lake City man.
The group from Columbia, Suwannee and Hamilton counties met with Durrett to discuss what was described as civil rights concerns.
Originally scheduled for the State Attorney’s Office in Live Oak, the meeting was moved next door to the Judicial Annex where the Suwannee County Commission meets after the coalition outgrew the conference room in Durrett’s office.
Durrett said he was expecting to meet with Suwannee County School Board Member Norman Crawford and “four or five” others to discuss concerns.
Those concerns from the larger group evolved into specific attempts to pressure Durrett to drop charges against Sylvester Warren. Warren faces charges in Hamilton County for an incident at a Columbia High and Hamilton County High basketball game in December, as well as charges in Columbia County for interfering with a traffic stop in Lake City last month.
Warren was charged with trespass after warning on school property and resisting an officer without violence in Hamilton County by Durrett’s office. The Lake City Police Department arrested Warren on April 15 for the charge of obstruction without violence.
Tyron White, a Hamilton County resident and pastor at Deep Creek Missionary Baptist Church, told Durrett, who stood at the dais in front of the packed meeting room and provided answers to questions posed to him that didn’t deal with specific cases, that if he didn’t drop the charges against Warren, he would make sure Durrett was voted out.
“I’m going to make sure brother. This is no threat. This is a promise. I’m going to make sure whatever it takes,” said White, who also accused Hamilton County Sheriff Harrell Reid of threatening Durrett into charging Warren for the December incident in which Warren tussled with officers who were trying to remove a group in the gym stands at the request of a school administrator.
Durrett, who had earlier refused to comment on the active cases involving Warren, adamantly denied that accusation.
“That’s not true,” said Durrett, who acknowledged that those in attendance weren’t going to believe him.
When asked by the crowd if he had originally told Warren that no charges would be coming in the Hamilton County case, Durrett again denied the accusations.
When contacted by Warren at night about the incident, Durrett said he only promised to “conduct a full and thorough investigation” to find out what happened prior to cell phone cameras being turned on.
“Did I ever say to him that there would be no charges filed against him, no,” Durrett said.
Crawford, who called the meeting and also reserved the Judicial Annex in case a larger space was needed, encouraged Durrett, who agreed to attend any future town hall meetings of a similar nature, at the end of the meeting to reconsider the charges.
Lake City residents Vanessa George, Warren’s girlfriend, and Glenel Bowden, who was wearing a “Leave Sylvester Alone” T-shirt, earlier said the charges needed to be dropped, saying Warren was targeted due to his role as an activist.
Bowden said those in attendance and other African Americans already have no confidence in law enforcement, saying the only thing they have working for them are their cell phone cameras. George, though, said she disagreed with that sentiment since both incidents involving Warren were on video and yet he was still charged.
“You know these are bogus charges,” George repeatedly said to Durrett. “You and I both know these are bogus charges. Everybody in here knows they’re bogus charges.”
George did agree with Leslie White, a former president of the Suwannee County NAACP chapter, and Tyron White that the community’s strength came at the polls and with the ballot boxes.
Leslie White, who began the meeting, wanted to know if Durrett and the State Attorney’s Office would start to resume civil citations, a program he said had great success under previous State Attorney Jeff Siegmeister.
Durrett said he has had discussions with the Department of Juvenile Justice about that program in recent months. He added he could provide statistics about the program.
White then brought Angela Gardner up to speak, who questioned Durrett on why he has not helped her sons, Willie and Bricen Bowden get out of prison. The pair were sentenced to 30 years in prison for shooting into a car in Lafayette County in 2013. They were convicted in 2015.
“I never promised, personally, that I was going to come back and undo somebody’s conviction,” Durrett said, noting he had agreed to previously look at that case to make sure it was handled correctly. “Your boys were convicted of a violent crime.”
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