Arlington mayor threatens to sue City Council

ALBANY — The Arlington City Council actually held a rather routine called meeting Monday night, which was slightly out of the norm for many in attendance, who had grown accustomed to bickering between the city’s new mayor, Ray Williams, and several council members.

The body stuck to mundane issues like repaying $15,000 to Early County because of an overpayment, laying in a new 2-inch waterline and committee and board appointments. The appointments have been a sore spot for Williams and council member Tyron George.

Recreation board appointments were the final item discussed at Monday’s meeting. Williams had named nine people to the “Recreation Committee” at the previous meeting, but George contends the nine were to belong to a “Recreation Board” and needed Council approval of Williams’ recommendation.

According to section 2.20 (b) of the Arlington City Charter, “All committees and committee chairs and officers of the city council shall by appointed by the mayor and shall serve at the pleasure of the mayor. The mayor shall have the power to appoint new members to any committee at any time.”

And therein lies the rub. The mayor says the citizens he selected are committee members. Some council members, though, say they feel the would-be appointees are part of a recreation board. They named their own members, rejecting the mayor’s recommendations.

To seemingly complicate matters, the difference between committee member and board and authority member is not defined in the city charter.

As the meeting adjourned, William stood up, said “There may be litigation,” and left the meeting room.

Williams confirmed later he had hired Albany attorney Maurice King to represent him and is considering suing the City Council.

“How do you define committee, board and authority members?” King said Tuesday. “That’s the question that needs to be asked. The charter does not answer that question. But if the council doesn’t like who (Williams) recommends, the council can vote not to accept that recommendation. There was a case I think up in Gordon City where basically they went through this in regard to the appointment of a city attorney. One of the council members abstained, creating a tie, and it came down to if the mayor could vote.

“I think the Supreme Count of Georgia said you can’t count an abstention as a yes or a no and ruled the mayor could not vote. So, with these charter issues, what we are talking about here could be argued you have conflicting sections of this city charter.”

The matter may or may not be litigated, but the end of Monday’s meeting did little to to clear the air.