A special called Tuesday meeting orchestrated by McComb selectmen Danny Esch and David Myers took away some of Mayor Zach Patterson’s powers but preserved others.
Esch and Myers called the meeting and drafted its four-item agenda, which took aim at how much control the mayor should have over city operations.
In question were the mayor’s authority over the newly formed city community relations and tourism department, his proposed personnel reorganization of the police department and his authority to approve selectmen’s travel and expense vouchers.
Selectmen voted 4-2 to transfer authority over the Department of Community Relations and Tourism from the mayor to City Administrator Sam Mims, who also supervises all other city departments. Selectmen Melvin Joe Johnson and Robert Earl Smith dissented.
But the board stopped short of reining in the mayor on the issues relating to the police and travel vouchers, voting against the measures 2-4.
A jam-packed crowd filled the City Hall meeting room and spilled into the hallway. Onlookers greeted Patterson with applause as he entered the board room.
A text message was reportedly sent to residents claiming the mayor was to be removed from office at the meeting.
In May, selectmen voted to create the community relations department, which replaced the McComb Visitors Bureau and allowed the mayor to control it.
Myers said when that action was passed, he approved of the department and placing Tasha Dillon as its director, but now he disagreed with the mayor’s control over it.
“It’s very unusual for us to do that,” Myers said.
He said that no city department should be treated differently. “This is not the way the city is set up.”
The Department of Community Relations and Tourism replaced an existing city tourism department and removed the McComb Main Street Association from the city budget.
Patterson said he believed the former tourism department was underperforming.
“It was doing nothing, in my view,” he said, adding he should be able to address such issues.
Patterson said its former director, Carmen Walsh, was hand-picked by former Mayor Tom Walman. Walsh resigned a few weeks after Dillon’s arrival.
Patterson also claimed the Enterprise-Journal unfairly placed a tourism department ribbon-cutting photo with Walman in the newspaper during last year’s mayoral campaign.
Additionally, Patterson said that he believed Mims’ relationship with Walsh and other city employees was too close.
Smith said this morning he believed the city board didn’t give the mayor a fair chance with the department.
“We gave it to him. To this point it hasn’t been proved that it’s not working,” Smith said.
Patterson said despite leanings from the city board to fire Walsh after Dillon was placed at the community relation’s helm, he lobbied to keep Walsh on board.
Myers said the issue is not about Dillon being hired as director, and he approves of the job she’s doing. But he said community relations supervision should be consistent with the other departments. Esch agreed.
“I just feel everything should be done underneath the city administrator position,” Esch said.
With the vote, selectmen also agreed to limit the community relations personnel to three, including Dillon. Patterson said Dillon told him she would not ask for any more employees for the department.
He told selectmen that he also needed the department because he felt there were too few who supported him.
“I need an office for promoting the good will of McComb, Miss.,” he said.
MAYOR AND POLICE
A move by Esch and Myers to remove the mayor’s supervisory authority over the police department failed to gain support from the other four selectmen.
Patterson said the board granted him the authority in April to reorganize the police department because he and the board felt it was in need of change.
The mayor said that decision was made around the same time selectmen approved a $5,000 pay raise for police officers in a closed-door meeting.
Myers said he believed the organization of the department should be left to Police Chief Billie Hughes.
“I think about that and it was not a great idea,” Myers said.
Patterson added that he hasn’t made any personnel moves in the department since he was granted the authority to do so.
“None. Zero,” Patterson said, adding that if he did he would inform selectmen.
Myers said the mayor has already used the authority by indirectly attempting to remove former Assistant Police Chief Perry Ashley.
Patterson said he asked Ashley to supervise police investigations, but Ashley refused and later resigned.
“There was never a move to demote him,” said Patterson, adding that the department was shorthanded and needed the help.
“But he decided to move on and that’s the case,” Patterson said.
The mayor said he never wanted to replace Hughes or anyone else in the department.
He said it was Myers’ idea to remove Hughes.
Myers admitted that he has wanted a change in police leadership in the past, but said as long as Hughes remains he will support him. “I’m not after the police chief,” Myers said.
TRAVEL VOUCHERS
In another matter, selectmen passed on removing the mayor’s authority to approve travel vouchers for the board and city attorney.
Again, Esch and Myers, who promoted the measure, failed to gain support from the rest of the board.
Last week, Patterson, in a heated discussion with Myers over mayoral power, reminded the selectmen that he was the one who signed off on their expenses.
Myers called that an “idle threat” and said it would not be fair if the mayor held up travel vouchers for personal or other reasons.
Myers added that selectmen sometimes spend several hundred dollars on travel expenses.
Smith said he has had no problem with travel vouchers under the mayor’s control and thought the procedure didn’t need to be changed.
“Is this motion to chastise me?” Patterson replied.
The mayor said Myers had taken what he had said last week out of context. He said he has never denied or delayed travel vouchers and would not do so.
“This is an attempt to water down the mayor and put him in his place,” Patterson said.
