There has been no shortage of complaints at Willow Park City Hall and elsewhere by members of the public claiming that Mayor Teresa Palmer has not been treated with respect by members of the city council and staff.
On the flip side, but not as widely made public, are complaints by city staff, who say that they have been harassed by the mayor and other residents operating on her behalf.
As noted in a previous story, City Manager Bryan Grimes has retained legal counsel, and he referred us to his attorney for a statement. We have made numerous attempts to obtain comments from Mayor Palmer, but have been unable to obtain a statement.
As reported in the July 25 issue of The Community News, much of the tension stemmed from a meeting in Georgetown on June 26.
According to Palmer, Grimes was harassing her to the extent she filed a complaint with the Georgetown Police Dept.
The Georgetown police determined that Palmer’s complaint “did not meet the threshold for harassment.” Palmer said surveillance video from the hotel would back up her story.
After posting the video, a number of people who viewed it did not feel it backed up her story.
The altercation began when it was discovered that Mayor Palmer had not been registered for the conference.
According to a document sent by a city staff member to City Secretary Deanna McMullen and three city council members, “Following my arrival to our table at the conference, I was told by Mr. Grimes that, in response to the missed registration, Mayor Palmer told him, ‘You are an idiot. You’ve always been an idiot. And you make the City of Willow Park look like idiots,’” the employee said.
The employee further said that she and City Planner Chelsea Kirkland sat on either side of Palmer during the conference.
“[She] never addressed the earlier issue, and spent most of her time back and forth on her personal phone then to her city phone. Mayor Palmer left at the serving of lunch and did not return to the conference … I would like to attest that, over the past few years in the city’s employ, Mr. Grimes and I have had several spirited disagreements, and at no point have I ever felt physically threatened by him, fearful for my safety, or fearful of physical harm by him, even in his angriest state.”
[The entirety of documents used in this story will accompany the web posting of it.]
Grimes’ attorney, Trey Loftin, accused Palmer of creating a hostile work environment for Grimes.
“She has used her mayor title to attempt to get him arrested and to coerce the city council to terminate him. This is obviously a pretext for Wrongful Termination and Constructive Termination by creating a hostile work environment from her extreme and outrageous conduct. This abuse of her office is a Chapter 39 Penal Code crime known as Official Oppression,” according to Loftin.
Loftin alleges that Palmer’s goal was to get Grimes fired since before she took office. He said Palmer “demanded, illegally, all personal records especially personal contact information of all city employees, which Mr. Grimes refused. She told people (from supporters to Mayor Doyle Moss to members of the city council) then that she would get him fired. Bryan Grimes had the courage to stand up for city employees and respectfully tell her no—he is not going to break the law to appease her. Now she is on a vendetta warpath and quotes scriptures to pretend she is some kind of suffering sacrifice instead of an angry person who will manipulate and falsify anything she wants.”
Loftin reiterated that the video from Georgetown did not back up Palmer’s claims.
Further complaints from staff accuse Palmer of inappropriately attempting to change city council meeting agendas.
On the agenda for the July 8 meeting, Palmer was said to have called to ask that public comment be added to a particular agenda item. She was communicating with City Secretary Deana McMullen, whose husband had suffered a heart attack the day before. A staff member was also in the office.
“Mayor Palmer responded the same request and added that the word “action” on the item related to the road study be removed, and that the Dean Ranch be removed from Executive Session,” the staff member said. “Deana was flustered, unable to concentrate, and began to cry, stating that she needed to get to the hospital to visit her husband who had suffered a heart attack the day before. Refusing to allow me to finish posting the Agenda, I asked to reply using her city phone. To my recollection, I responded that the Clearion development presentation comments were addressed in the brief; the word ‘action’ does not require that Council act, it only gives them that option; and that the Dean was requested by a Council member so it must remain.
“She [Palmer] replied that the word action ‘can and will’ be removed, and she wanted the Dean moved to the 8/12 Agenda. I responded, identifying myself on Deana’s phone, and replied that we would remove the ‘action,’ and [then city attorney] Pat [Chesser] said that the Dean must remain on the agenda. She responded that the City Attorney only approves the legal form of the agenda, not what is on it. At this time, Chief Lacy entered Ms. McMullen’s office. I called Mr. Chesser and asked how I should respond. He said that the items are not his concern but if a council member requested it, it must remain on this agenda. I responded accordingly to which a response was received asking for a citation language, that neither Deana, Chief Lacy, nor I knew or understood.”
In planning the July 15 special meeting at which a quorum did not attend, the city employee said she was pulled out of a meeting on July 11 by Mayor Palmer and resident Marcy Galle.
“I was handed papers and demanded by Ms. Galle, in a raised voice, ‘This needs to be posted RIGHT NOW.’ I opened the paper to see that it was an agenda for a Special City Council Meeting on Tuesday, July 15. I stopped and stared at the document. I asked where this came from because staff did not create it. Ms. Galle responded, in her same aggressive tone and now higher volume, told me that they created the agenda and repeated that and it needed to be posted ‘right now.’”
A few moments later, “I said that I needed to call the City Attorney to confirm the procedure to which Ms. Galle hostilely retorted, now yelling at me, that the Mayor can call a Special Meeting under Statute [whatever]. I put up my hand to her and said, ‘With all due respect, Marcy, I have to call the City Attorney.’ I continued that this is not my job and I needed to check with him. She spouted back at me, demanding that I get the City Attorney on the phone and ‘put him on speaker,’ and if he wasn’t available, that too ‘was a problem.’”
Once Chesser was on the phone (on speaker) he asked Palmer if she had checked with council to see if there would be a quorum.
“She stated that she had not, and Mr. Chesser told her that it was poor decorum and rude to call a meeting without checking with Council to see if they were available, and that he, himself, may not be available to attend. Ms. Galle proceeded to yell statutes from across the room, stating that the mayor may call a Special Meeting. Mr. Chesser replied that that was true, but said it was rude to not confer with Council and that there may be no one there because she didn’t see if Council was available. All while Mr. Chesser was speaking, Ms. Galle was making snide, negative comments in the background, mumbling several times about many things she thought were wrong within the city.”
On July 22 the city’s communication and marketing director reported that resident Spencer Hodge was in the building. The city’s IT contractor Todd Covington asked her to load the city’s streaming software on her computer so they could show it to Hodge.
“As I pulled up the software, I heard Todd and Hodge talking in the server room, and I heard Todd say repeatedly, ‘don’t touch that, don’t touch that.’
“Todd and Hodge then entered my office and came behind my desk to look at the streaming software. Mayor Palmer came with Hodge into my office but set her things down and stepped out. She came back in towards the end of the conversation.”
Hodge asked why city council meetings were not also streamed on YouTube.
“I told Hodge that we had previously experienced technical difficulties simultaneously with Facebook and YouTube streaming and that we chose to stream to Facebook, which had much higher viewing numbers. Hodge continued to interrupt me and peppered me with questions but didn’t wait for an answer.
“Hodge then begin to demand that we needed to stream to YouTube exclusively and said I don’t understand how communicating with the public works, but that we definitely needed to stream to YouTube. He began raising his voice and became extremely confrontational with me.
“Todd attempted to change the subject several times back to Hodge’s original question about remote attendance in meetings. Hodge got increasingly aggressive, coming out of his seat several times and raising his voice at me.”
Space does not permit thorough descriptions of all the events reported at city hall, but the staff there feel demoralized.
In the original message to the city council referenced at the beginning of this article, it concluded with these words:
“Although our staff is united and remains committed to its duties and solidarity, the past six months’ worsening unprofessional atmosphere of childish antics, polarization, and victimization that has been displayed by our leadership is insufferable, intolerable, embarrassing, and absolute lunacy. Between the social media callouts, naming council members and staff by name, with claims of incompetence and demanding that all staff be fired, and the members of the public berating us and making demands in our own offices within City Hall, it has become a hostile, unsafe workplace where members of the public believe that they are free to attack us at any time so long as they physically accompany the mayor or believe that they speak on her behalf. If left unchecked, the city will undoubtedly suffer the loss of exceptional staff members causing a severe hardship for our residents and businesses as the city begins to slowly disintegrate to the horror it once was. We need your help.”
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