Tuesday, November 10, 2009 9:47 PM CST
County board drops 2 health board members
By DAVE FOPAY, Staff Writer
dfopay@jg-tc.com
CHARLESTON — The Coles County Board on Tuesday voted against reappointing two members to the county’s mental health board with one member making claims of a lack of financial oversight.
The board voted 6-5 against new terms on the county 708 Mental Health Board for Henry “Woody” Kramer and Frank “Pete” Love. County board member Mike Weaver spoke against the appointments, questioning part of a retirement package for county health department Administrator Fred Edgar.
The retirement package the mental health board approved last week allows Edgar to buy the vehicle it provided him for work use. Weaver claimed Tuesday that the board didn’t seek bids for Edgar’s vehicle when the panel bought it and should also allow others to bid to buy it now.
“It is the responsibility of our appointees to perform in a manner that is consistent with our policies,” Weaver said. He also said he learned that a health department employee frequently played golf during working hours this past summer, but after the meeting wouldn’t identify the employee.
Joining Weaver in voting against the appointments were board Vice Chairman John Hurst and members Doyle Anderson, Paul Daily, Mark Degler, and Phil Wilson. “Yes” votes came from Chairman John Bell and members Jan Eads, Dan Lawrence, Stan Metzger and Marc Weber. Member Clint Bays didn’t attend Tuesday’s meeting.
Metzger is also a member of the mental health board and was the only member of that board to vote against Edgar’s retirement package. After Tuesday’s meeting, he said he hasn’t seen any indications of improprieties such as Weaver mentioned.
“I have no way to verify that,” Metzger said. “I was opposed to the retirement package. I wasn’t opposed to the nominees.”
Contacted after the meeting, Kramer, who had been the mental health board’s chairman, declined to address Weaver’s allegations.
“It’s a judgement the (county) board can make and what they base it on is their privilege,” he said.
When he was contacted, Love said the mental health board agreed when buying the vehicle that Edgar would be allowed to buy it when he retired. He defended the board’s and the health department’s performances and said no county board member ever told him of any concerns.
“There have been no fiscal irregularities,” Love said. “I can say nothing but good things.”
Edgar couldn’t be reached for comment Tuesday. He has been the health department’s administrator for more than 35 years and plans to retire in March. His retirement package also includes payment for 55 of his 148 unused vacation days; the policy for other county departments is to cap payment of unpaid vacation days at 20 upon retirement.
There are now three vacancies on the seven-member mental health board following the recent resignation of member Mike Neal. The remaining members are Metzger, Eugene Bauer, Betty Coffrin and Mark Donnell. On Tuesday, Bell said he’ll meet with the county board’s Health and Safety Committee to discuss possible replacements so new members might be appointed next month.
The mental health board meets three times a year and allocates money to various mental health and social service agencies in the county.
The county board’s Health and Safety Committee voted earlier to recommended the Kramer’s and Love’s appointments, which the board delayed last month because of the lack of a committee recommendation.
The board had been scheduled to vote on the appointments in September as well, but concerns about communication with the mental health board led to a delay. Kramer later met with the Health and Safety Committee to address the concerns.
There was no discussion on the appointments themselves Tuesday after Weaver’s comments, though Wilson called for two members to abstain from voting. He said one member’s spouse receives office space and “considerable funding” from the mental health board, while another member has a business relationship with one of the appointees.
“I think they know who they are,” Wilson said when asked to identify the board members. That led Hurst to ask State’s Attorney Steve Ferguson if the members’ votes could be addressed that way before Lawrence and Eads said they thought Wilson was referring to them.
Lawrence’s wife Toq Lawrence is the director of the county Big Brothers Big Sisters program, which rents office space from the mental health board and is one of the agencies that receives county mental health funds.
“It’s not my wife’s program,” Lawrence said.
Eads said Kramer does business with her real estate brokerage but she didn’t see that as a conflict. Bell then called for a vote and said members could vote as they thought was best.
“I’m sure more than one of us has had dealings with one of them or the other,” Bell said.
Contact Dave Fopay at dfopay@jg-tc.com or 238-6858.
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Harry Potter wrote on Nov 11, 2009 7:00 AM: