Amherst officials dealing with Taylor dustup

Facing public scrutiny over the controversial resignation of former County Administrator Rodney Taylor, Amherst County supervisors are having a hard time staying focused on county business.

“We cannot work effectively in this kind of atmosphere,” Chairman Leon Parrish said. “We’ve got to get this stuff behind us.”

Chris Adams, the board’s vice chairman, said the aftermath of Taylor’s departure is hindering “our productivity as a county” and has been a distraction for nearly two months.

After exactly three years with the county, Taylor resigned April 24 over matters that were dealt with in closed session away from public view. Board members would not comment on Taylor’s departure at the time, calling it a personnel matter.

State law allows officials to go into closed session through set guidelines but does not prohibit them speaking on any matters discussed in closed sessions.

Following a public outcry in May from residents demanding answers, Taylor sent a letter to Parrish June 1.

The letter says that his resignation stemmed from allegations that he accused a supervisor of sharing confidential information with Tom Shrader, an Amherst attorney. The information is related to an ongoing investigation by Town of Amherst police into a non-work-related matter involving a county employee.

Shrader was an attorney for the employee, according to Taylor’s letter. Shrader declined to comment when reached by phone last week.

Neither Taylor nor the supervisors would name the employee, citing the ongoing investigation. The board voted last week to order an investigation into the origin of the leak.

“It’s my hope they get to the bottom of it,” Taylor said.

Taylor has said he was asked to resign amid allegations that he accused Supervisor Don Kidd of leaking the information to Shrader. Kidd, who also is represented by Shrader, has said he did not leak the information.

Board members themselves disagree over why Taylor was asked to resign.

Adams said in an interview that Taylor was asked to resign for being dishonest with the board regarding accusations related to the leak of the information.

Taylor said that was not true and said he believed that all conversations he had about the investigation were appropriate and proper.

Parrish said the board did not ask Taylor to resign for reasons of dishonesty and that he does not agree with Adams on that.

Supervisor Vernon Wood said, “As far as I’m concerned, he didn’t lie to me.”

Taylor’s conflicts with the board date to June 2008, when Adams and Kidd supported a no-confidence vote about Taylor’s job performance.

The motion, following a closed meeting, failed 3-2 when the other three supervisors shot it down. The matter was not publicly explained at the time.

Adams said he chose not to talk about the motion out of respect for Taylor’s public image. It was not intended to appear secretive, he said.

“Knowing what I know now and what our intentions were,” Adams said, “I have made but one mistake in this whole process and that was not firing him instead of asking him for the resignation.”

Kidd said he didn’t have confidence in Taylor’s job performance and considered him an ineffective manager. The 2008 no-confidence vote was done to grab the public’s attention, he said.

Adams said, “I don’t care whose feathers I ruffle,” later adding, “This was not personal. This was business.”

Taylor said he was hired at an annual salary of $78,000 in 2006, he said. In late 2006 and late 2007 he said he received two $6,000 increases after receiving positive job performance reviews and said he never had problems with the board until Adams and Kidd were elected in 2007.

The no-confidence vote showed a “lack of professionalism” by the two, Taylor said.

As a county resident, Taylor said he hopes the next administrator will be experienced enough to handle internal conflicts. Taylor had served as a county supervisor himself, and as Amherst County registrar, but did not have county administration experience.

Parrish said shortly after Taylor’s resignation that the county would seek a “seasoned” administrator. He later praised Taylor as a fiscal manager and said this year’s budget process was one of the smoothest he’s ever experience in 15 years as a supervisor.

According to Taylor and several board members, there was talk of his leaving the post back in January of this year, but the board decided to renew his contract in March. The investigation involving the county employee started in April. Kidd, Adams, and Parrish said Taylor would still be administrator today if that episode had not occurred.

Parrish and Wood voted against asking Taylor to resign. Supervisor Ray Vandall, who in 2008 voted in Taylor’s favor in the no-confidence vote, said he voted to request the resignation because of the accusation regarding Kidd and the leak.

Parrish said that since the majority of the board believed Taylor should resign, he accepted the resignation.

“There’s no way he could work effectively,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to work in that environment.”

Following a public meeting in May at which supervisors were sharply criticized for how the situation was handled, several board members have said they still believe in open government.

The board had recently scheduled a closed session to discuss the hiring of a new county administrator, but opted to speak openly about the process with the caveat that the names of potential candidates not be disclosed.

The county is reviewing 30 applications for the job. “We have some awesome prospects,” Adams said.

Wood, who except for Parrish has the longest tenure on the board, is stepping down from his seat later this year. He said this situation has probably been the hardest he’s had to go through as a board member and he wants to see the county move forward.

“I don’t like to see things like this happen anywhere, especially in Amherst County,” said Wood.