The Palm Coast City Council late Tuesday night called for an independent investigation of Mayor Mike Norris after Interim City Manager Lauren Johnston confirmed that he unilaterally demanded in a private meeting that she and Chief of Staff Jason DeLorenzo resign, what would be a “blatant violation of the city charter,” in Council member Ty Miller’s words. Norris is denying the charge.
Council members, including the mayor, are legally prohibited from interfering with the administration. Their hiring and firing role is limited to the city manager and the city attorney. Even then, they may not exercise that role without the elected body’s consensus, in open meetings. A trail of fears about arbitrariness and heavy-handedness had long preceded Norris’s election last November, and evidence of both had hissed about City Hall from time to time since. None were as grave or explicit as Tuesday’s allegations as revealed by Council member Charles Gambaro.
“I have a concern that was brought forward to me yesterday that I think we need to discuss,” Gambaro said by phone, as he was attending the meeting from out of town, “and that has to do with your request for the direct resignation of our staff, meaning the acting city manager and Mr. DeLorenzo in your office. I think it could be a major, major ethics violation. And it’s my understanding that it’s not the first time that you’ve tried to directly intimidate or to try to force the city manager to fire not only the chief of staff, but other members of our senior staff.”
Norris tried to protest. Gambaro immediately shut him down. “I have the floor,” he said. “It’s also my understanding that you carried out this request after our legal counsel, both Mr. Blocker and Mr. Duffy, advised you multiple times that your requests were inappropriate and in violation of the city charter.” Jeremiah Blocker and Marcus Duffy of St. Augustine’s Douglas Law Firm are the city’s attorneys.
Gambaro was equally concerned about the manner of Norris’s alleged demand, which he described as Norris telling the executives, “‘This is a one-way conversation, and I’m going to ask for your immediate dismissal [from] your office,’ and then you just basically dismiss them.”
Gambaro asked Johnston to confirm whether that took place, “yes or no.”
“Yes,” Johnston immediately said from the dais, two seats from Norris.
Norris again tried to intervene, and again Gambaro stopped him. “Hold on. Hold on,” Gambaro said. “So by your actions, Mr. mayor I’m real concerned. I really like working with you, but you may be creating a toxic work environment, and one that may be disseminating fear and intimidation across our staff that’s really working hard to meet all of our demands. And so as such, I’m formally asking my fellow council members–not you, Mr. mayor–for consensus to formally request an independent look at this investigation at next Tuesday’s council business meeting into these serious allegations, Mr. mayor. We need to take an independent look to address these issues. But failure to not address the concerns that are brought to you is, in my mind, not an option.”
Miller and fellow-Council member Theresa Pontieri were just as disturbed by the allegation. The fifth seat was empty, Ray Stevens having resigned. The appointment process, now certain to be influenced by the Norris issue, is running through mid-April.
“It’s very concerning, because the charter directly prohibits any member of this council from directing staff decisions that are solely the purview of the city manager,” Miller said. “Anything below the city manager is the city manager’s responsibility in terms of hiring and firing. So that’s one. Two, directing the city manager without the consensus of the council is also a violation of the city charter. And then it’s very hard to get past this, because my concern here is that if we’re not playing by the rules, then they’re going to be abused. And whether it’s you, Mr. mayor, or me or Councilman Gambaro or the vice mayor doing it, it’s still wrong fundamentally.” He spoke his support for Gambaro’s request for an independent investigation, “because that’s how we figure out whether this is right or wrong. To me, what I’ve heard, these are blatant violations of the city charter.”
“Independent” was not defined, though it suggests that a law firm other than the Douglas Law Firm will be retained for the job.
Norris conceded only that “frustrating” discussions took place behind the scenes, but not that he called for anyone’s firing. “There’s three people that were in that room when we had our conversation yesterday,” Norris said. He did not name the three, who would have been himself, Johnston and DeLorenzo, though shortly afterward he referred to someone who was on the phone during the meeting. He alluded to the city attorney. “How can I put this? I said that I was going to discuss with the council. You know about this, and it’s a little bit of frustration. But you know, we are under a lot of pressure here, and me and Lauren, we had a good conversation today, and it’s a lot of frustration, but I did not, I certainly didn’t do what’s being said, and counsel was on the phone.”
He then deflected the issue to a previous controversy last fall when Gambaro was appointed to the council, an appointment Norris tried to challenge, considering it a violation of the charter. The city attorney has repeatedly said that the appointment was done according to the charter. As for his issues with the top staffers, “I wouldn’t even bring up that discussion tonight, because I think we’re where we need to be. We are working together,” Norris said. “I think Lauren understood I was a bit frustrated, but I certainly didn’t tell her to fire anybody, because I know better than do that. I would never, I would never do that.”
“She just said you did,” Miller said, referring to Johnston’s confirmation.
“I have not directed anyone to do it. I’m an above board kind of guy, and I’m frustrated,” Norris said. “I’m frustrated that we’re in this situation. But I did not tell Miss Johnston, Miss Lauren Johnston, to fire anybody. I said I was going to discuss with the council what we need to do to fix this city.”
“She just confirmed that it happened that way,” Gambaro said, with the council as witness.
“I know there’s only two positions I can hire and fire or–” Miller tried to interrupt, presumably to let him know that he cannot hire or fire anyone, before Norris caught himself. “Yes, that council can hire and fire. I know that for a fact, but I am not–I have not directed. But we can take whatever actions we need to. But I think Lauren understands my frustration. We had quite an ordeal today. But you do what you got to do. If you want to investigate, go right ahead.”
Norris and the council have been weathering waves of public criticism over a proposed utility rate increase, what would be the sharpest increase in the city’s history, paired with the largest loans in the city’s history, to finance a gargantuan, $615 million utility capital improvement plan. Norris had approved the plan on first reading only to inform the council last week that he was reversing course unless the plan was paired with a building moratorium. Norris’s reversal seemed to reflect what some city staffers and some elected officials past and present have cited as excessive sensitivity to social media vagaries that end up informing capricious decisions or confrontations like the one alleged took place with the top executives.
Council member Theresa Pontieri, the senior member of the council, had also apparently been made aware of the situation. “From what I hear,” she said, “it definitely warrants looking into.” She was especially concerned that the mayor’s behavior could be clouding the city’s search for a new manager, which has been hampered by the council’s poor image as it is. The council had narrowed its choices to five candidates earlier in the meeting.
“This is not healthy for our city,” Pontieri said. “Decisions like this need to be thought of high level in a robust way. And I understand mayor that you could have been frustrated. Whatever happened that facilitated anything even close to this, I understand you’re frustrated. We’re all kind of frustrated, under a lot of stress for a lot of different reasons. But you said it earlier. We have workshops for a reason. We should have workshopped it. We should have talked about it. They are adults. She has the ability to sit down there and listen to constructive criticism and we talk about things. Poor old Carl Coty gets thrown under the bus more than any staff member I know. And the guy has not been in the position that he’s in now for very long to warrant the type of abuse he takes.”
Coty is the city’s director of stormwater and engineering, and as such has been the point man on several critical issues. Some council members past and present have found it easier to shoot their messengers to silence them than to responsibly grapple with the message.
The council adjourned immediately after that.
