Snellville Council Strikes Ethics Complaint Items From Agenda

This article originally posted at 11:35 p.m. Monday, Sept. 23. 

The Snellville City Council meeting Monday (Sept. 23) was a rather quiet one with the mayor and mayor pro tem absent. 

As announced at the beginning of the meeting, Mayor Kelly Kautz was out of town and Mayor Pro Tem Tom Witts had a death in the family, so Councilwoman Diane Krause was appointed to take the lead for the evening. 

What were anticipated to be the big items of the meeting were actually voted 3-1 to be taken off the agenda, as recommended by City Attorney Tony Powell. Councilman Mike Sabbagh voted against amending the agenda.

Those items concerned the two complaints filed by ethics watchdog George Anderson. The first one listed on the agenda was the reconsideration to rescind the last council meeting's approval of the settlement agreement where Anderson apologized for the claim he made against Witts last year.

Anderson had filed the complaint under the belief that Witts owed back state taxes and therefore shouldn't be in public office, but in the apology that was read aloud at the Sept. 9th council meeting, Anderson admitted he didn't have any basis for the complaint. 

While the signed settlement agreement was submitted to the city attorney, on the morning of the hearing Anderson asked to have his name withdrawn from the consent agreement, saying that he was misled or coerced into settling. There is still a court hearing Oct. 4.

Anderson's other ethics complaint item that was removed from Monday's meeting was filed against Witts again and also Councilman Dave Emanuel. Anderson alleged they both violated the city and state conflict of interest statutes during an executive session. 

Powell suggested taking the two items off the agenda because both items were still going to court regardless of what the council voted on. He guessed that Kautz probably placed both items on the agenda to discuss them, but it's unclear since she wasn't at the meeting.

Sabbagh was the only council member to vote against striking the two agenda items.

"I'm not going to support this removal from the meeting because of the fact that it's still going to be in court and if it does come back again, it may be [seen] in a different light," he said.

Sabbagh also voted against an amendment to the city's code of ethics procedure, which the three other present councilmembers voted in favor of and thus passed. The item related to filing complaints and determining a cognizable claim.

"Having a code of ethics in the city is pretty important and is something I support," he said. "[This is] a pretty quick change that could resolve situations on the short horizon, but will not, however ... resolve situations in the longer term." 

Powell explained that the code is there as a preliminary review where the city attorney and the city manager look at ethics complaints first to make sure the complaint is reasonable and not frivolous, citing the complaints by Anderson.

"Once you get to the point where you have hearings on this of this nature, the damage is done to the person who is absolutely innocent," Powell said. "With this procedure that is before the council does is that it eliminates frivolous claims from getting that kind of publicity and coverage and forefront when it's obvious from the very beginning that it was simply politically motivated speech."

Other items on the agenda: 

-Krause read a resolution honoring the city's Public Safety Night for Sept. 24. Snellville Police Chief Roy Whitehead and members of the Snellville Citizens Police Academy Alumni were presented with the resolution. 

-Councilman Bobby Howard read a resolution recognizing the Gwinnett Animal Hospital's 40th anniversary and announcing that Sept. 21 would be known as Gwinnett Animal Hospital Day in the city. The resolution was presented to hospital staff.