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Flower Mound town manager placed on leave (updated)
By Chris Roark, croark@starlocalnews.com
In a special meeting Saturday, the Flower Mound Town Council unanimously voted to place Town Manager Harlan Jefferson on paid administrative leave.
The council also named Assistant Town Manager Chuck Springer as interim town manager.
It was believed the council was going to terminate Jefferson's contract on Saturday. Mayor Tom Hayden declined comment, citing personnel matters.
During the public hearing portion of the meeting, Jefferson’s attorney, Don Colleluori spoke to the council, the only member of the audience to do so. He said Jefferson understands that it is the council’s right to terminate his contract, but he said Jefferson had not been given the opportunity to address any concerns the council had of him.
Colleluori also said possible reasons for the council wanting to terminate Jefferson’s contract may be related to developer surveys in which area developers gave low marks to the town’s processes. But Colleluori said those processes are set by the council and that the town manager only enforces those.
The attorney also claimed that because Jefferson declined to resign, an effort began to find ethics code violations against his client. The attorney said no violations were found.
Colleluori also claimed that the council recently hired an outside attorney to help the town avoid paying Jefferson his severance.
More to come.
The following are comments from the readers.
In no way do they represent the view of Starlocalnews.com
In no way do they represent the view of Starlocalnews.com
weirtalking wrote on Sep 24, 2012 11:31 AM:
" If Mr. Jefferson was only enforcing the laws and ordinances of the Town, why are councilmembers so determined to fire him? As the legislative body of Flower Mound they could simply change those laws and enact new ones. Then, the Town Manager would enforce the new rules. Perhaps that would take a few weeks longer to accomplish, but it would save taxpayers about a million dollars. Why does it seem as though there's a looming deadline that this council is trying to meet? What impending occurence is motivating them to put residents on the hook for so much money, in addition to smearing the reputation of a man who appears to have done his job in an ethical and principled way? Sooner or later, the real reasons for this precipitous action by this council will come out. "
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