Walton Mayor Gabe Brown submitted another letter of resignation to City Council on Tuesday evening—and this time, it’s effective immediately.
This is the second time that Brown has resigned from being mayor this year. He resigned in March, only to rescind the resignation 10 minutes before it was set to go into effect on March 31.
Brown dropped off the letter to City Council while they were in executive session in council chambers. The letter, written on the front of a U.S. Bank envelope, reads: “I quit. I’ll turn my keys in when I clear out my office this week.”
As there was no “effective by” date written on the letter, Brown’s resignation goes into effect immediately and cannot be rescinded.
Brown left the premises immediately after dropping off the letter, without speaking to council or any city residents in attendance at the special meeting.
There will be another special meeting on Thursday, May 9, in which councilman Dan Martin said that City Council plans to accept the resignation. After that, the city has 30 days to appoint an interim mayor to serve the remainder of Brown’s term.
“We have plenty of candidates that we’ve come across that have worked in the city in the past and I can name half a dozen here that would be qualified to fill the role, but I don’t want to jump the gun, I want to hear from the citizens about any names we might not have considered,” Martin said. “But we do have to move quickly. It’s budget season.”
Martin added that council will hear from any city residents that are interested in taking on the position to determine the best candidate before moving forward. As of Tuesday evening, no residents have expressed interest in taking over Brown’s position.
Although he has resigned, Brown still has potential to run for mayor again this November since he was not impeached from office. It is unclear if he still desires to run for another term. He has previously run for the position unopposed.
“If nobody else runs, he’ll get it again,” said former councilwoman Barbara Farrow. “Most residents don’t know all that’s going on, they don’t come out to the meetings, they only hear what everybody else talks about.”
“Part of the reason Council wants to present its findings next week is so the public can see what’ we’ve looked into and what we found, so if Mayor Brown appears on the ballot again, they may understand. They may have the full record of his time in office,” said Martin.
Council was originally expected to bring charges against Brown at the meeting, but decided to table the motion due to the resignation. According to special counsel Bryce Rhoades, who is leading the investigation into Brown’s conduct, the charges will be revealed at Council’s regularly scheduled meeting next week on Tuesday, May 14. While it is unclear what exactly the charges relate to, the meeting agenda read that they involve “misconduct and/or willful neglect.”
According to Martin, the city has conducted a full financial audit in their investigation of Brown.
“It’s not as simple as just credit cards,” he said, adding, “We have been looking at more and more and more than what’s initially been reported.”
Council did not share any further specifics on what the investigation encompasses.
Martin added that the financial audit of the city has confirmed no wrongdoing on the part of any other city employee.
“This city is a great city in Kentucky and we have just been hampered by substandard leadership, ” Martin said.
City council also approved two resolutions at the meeting—one directing Rhoades to prepare a report of the investigation’s findings, the other authorizing an agreement with Elishia Chamberlain to serve as a special consultant to assist with the investigation and other legal matters.
Council did not elaborate on what exactly the contract entails, however, Martin said that Chamberlain would be taking on many of the responsibilities of a city manager—a role that’s been repeatedly and recently requested by former mayor Mark Carnahan and other residents. Chamberlain was formerly the city administrator of Ludlow.
“As you guys are all aware, we lack a city manager and it’s something most cities our size or larger have,” Martin said. “The consultant we hired is doing a lot of those roles. She has experience and she’s a professional.”