Council criticizes mayor's decision on lawsuit

Six months after it was filed, the Red Oak City Council was finally informed of the details of a lawsuit naming the city and its administrator as co-defendants at a closed session Monday night.

While council members were unable to discuss details of the lawsuit or the closed session, several are frustrated it took this long for them to be notified.

“I personally thought we should have been informed immediately,” Councilman Ivan Craig said. “How can you support somebody if you don’t know what’s going on?”

Former nuisance control officer Christine Morrison accused City Administrator Brad Wright in the lawsuit of sexual harassment, violating her civil rights, and punishing her for fulfilling National Guard obligations.

Councilman Tom Pratt said the council should definitely been informed within 10 days of the lawsuit being filed.

“They made a decision for the entire city, its not just the council,” Pratt said. “It’s our job to take care of various parts of the city, and I would say a lawsuit is a definite part of the city.”

Mayor Ted Schoonover said he was made aware of the lawsuit soon after it was filed in federal court, and that he decided the council would be informed once the lawyer hired by the city’s insurance company completed his investigation.

Despite the fact that a majority of the council disagrees with his decision, Schoonover stands by his action.

“I would do it all over again,” he said. “Until we had further information, they didn’t need to know.”

”I totally disagree with that … and feel the council deserved to be told immediately of litigation that had been filed against the city,” Councilman Larry Brandstetter said.

Wright said he and Schoonover were simply following the attorney’s advice.

Craig disagrees with the decision.

“That’s the thing that’s just not right … to keep the council in the dark, I don’t think it’s the best thing to do,” Craig said. “But the mayor stands by his decision, and I respect him for that. It just didn’t seem right to keep us away from knowing what was going on.”

Craig is equally certain this episode will have long-term negative affects on the council and administration.

“I think the council’s reputation has been tarnished a great deal,” Craig said. “Anytime you have the public loose confidence in the decisions you make, it is difficult to get that confidence back. It only takes a second to make something go wrong, but it takes a long time to get it back.”

However, not everyone on the council disagrees with the mayor’s decisions.

“I hate to second guess the mayor,” Councilman Mark Gregg said. “It’s difficult to inform anybody until you have some facts.”

Gregg said even if the council did know about the suit, there wasn’t anything they could do.

“It would have been nice to know, but there wouldn’t have been anything we can do about it,” Gregg said.

He’s also glad the mayor made the decision to delay notifying the council.

“The decision was made by the mayor in consultation with legal counsel,” Gregg said. “If it had just been made by Brad (Wright), it would have been a different story.

Brandstetter though believes since Wright works for the council, the council needed to know immediately.

“The city administrator, by code, works for the city council, and because the city administrator works for the council, he had an obligation, or someone did whether it’s him or the mayor, to gather the council in closed session and notify us of the litigation that had been filed.”

Schoonover said he disagreed with that interpretation, and doesn’t believe he contradicted the ordinance in any way.

Councilman Roger Waggener was unavailable for comment for this story.

Morrison’s lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial in November, 2010.