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Members of the Board of Mayor and Aldermen erupted into heated discussion when Mayor Pro Tem Jenna Amacher proposed several amendments to the City Charter during its November meeting.

In an item titled “A resolution to support amendment of the City Charter,” Amacher passed out several sheets of information not included in the agenda.

Amendment to form Ethics Committee

Her first proposed amendment was a motion to add a provision concerning the creation of an Ethics Committee into the Charter under “Governing Body.”

Amacher quoted the current ordinance (Ordinance No. 1349) that provides the City with either an Ethics Officer or Ethics Committee. Currently, City Attorney Stephen Worsham is acting as Ethics Officer for the board.

“The Ethics Officer or Board would investigate and determine merit for questions regarding misconduct,” she said.

Amacher added that she preferred a committee so that the decisions regarding such conduct would not be solely on Worsham’s shoulders.

Worsham responded to Amacher’s proposal favorably.

“I think this is a move in the right direction, you might recall that I have mentioned that our Code of Ethics may not be adequate in order to address a number of issues that have arisen here,” he said.

His one note was that the change be made in ordinance form, not in the City Charter.

Mayor Ray Knowis proposed that the decision be postponed until further chance to address the issue, but Alderman Daniel Berry said he liked the idea, just that he agreed with Worsham that the change should be made in ordinance not the City Charter. Alderman Derick Mann agreed with him.

In response, Amacher amended her motion to make her proposal an ordinance instead of a Charter amendment. The motion passed with Knowis voting nay.

Amendment concerning Mayoral Appointments

The next amendment Amacher motioned concerned mayoral appointments.

“No member of the Board of Mayor and Alderman may be paid by any other entity for attending meetings as a board representative,” said Amacher. “An outside entity may reimburse the City of Tullahoma for monies paid to liaisons serving in their official duties. All boards and commissions served as appointed by the BoMA or the Mayor shall receive compensation of $150 per meeting, per appointment. It may be a potential violation or ethics to perform such duties as liaison while accepting the stipend. No such violation shall occur unless three consecutive meetings are missed.”

“This is just for information purposes,” said Amacher. She explained that whether the proposed amendment was adopted or not, she just wanted to start discussion.

Knowis began discussion, saying “I’ll start the conversation because this has arisen because I appointed myself to the TUA (Tullahoma Utilities Authority). TUA pays a stipend to board members. Before I appointed myself to the board, I’ll make it known that I was asked to serve on that board. I met with the City Attorney and with the TUA attorney if there was a problem with me serving on that board. I was advised that there was not, it has been confirmed by emails to each of you (aldermen) which you have received. That is why this has arisen.”

He added that he would not vote for the amendment, and gave the floor to Amacher.

“I don’t understand why you would vote no,” said Amacher. “This protects you, Mr. Mayor.” She said the amendment would not keep Knowis from being on the TUA board.

“This allows you to continue serving on that board with pay,” she said.

“The fact is, you openly used your power of appointing to financially gain,” she said. “You’ve not only done it once, but you’ve done it twice.”

She said that he should have declined payment from TUA before taking on the position as a matter of public interest, given his position as Mayor. She said he further should have disclosed the situation to the BoMA and asked how the situation should be handled before taking further action.

“In fact, you should have offered your resignation or at least give up your pay,” she said.

At that moment, Knowis began to speak but Amacher said “I’m speaking Mr. Mayor. Right now, I believe I have the floor,” but Berry interrupted her.

“Point of order, this topic is not what we are discussing here. We are discussing an ordinance,” said Berry. “If we want to have the debate that you two are having, we can have that at a later time. But I would ask that the board get back to the business at hand.”

Amacher conceded and got back on the topic of the proposed amendment or ordinance, and said that the previously stated issue would be a topic for an Ethics Committee, should one be created.

“One of the reasons I proposed this is because I believe that some of you board members go above and beyond when you go to those meetings and those in the future will as well.” She discussed the time and money it takes to be a part of the government. “Those of us that have served on this board know that we spend more than we make.”

Berry said that he thought the proposal was “a conversation that we need to have,” but that he didn’t think it belonged in the charter, but rather an ordinance. He said he would vote against the amendment to the charter, but would be interested in an ordinance.

Alderman Bobbie Wilson, who motioned second for the amendment, spoke next.

“There is language in the charter about compensation, so it could fit in there,” she said.

Berry and Mann argued that the charter states such things could be handled “by ordinance.”

“Let’s just set it by ordinance and be done,” said Berry.

Amacher responded that she would be alright with setting the amendment by ordinance instead, and withdrew her motion with instruction to City Administrator Jason Quick to create an ordinance for the next meeting.

Amendment to change Mayor Pro Tem language

“I started with ones that might not go in the charter, but I have two more, and they do go in the charter,” said Amacher.

Her next proposed amendment to the charter was to change the language of Mayor Pro Tem to Vice Mayor, which brought about a dispute amongst the board.

“Mayor Pro Tem is somewhat of an outdated term and it’s not generally used in cities that operate under a Mayor-Aldermanic charter. In fact, it is most common that those operating under this type of charter have a Vice Mayor, which is essentially–it’s pretty close to the same thing. There is specific language that is adopted under the state code,” said Amacher.

She quoted the state code for motion, saying “Under Board of Mayor and Alderman cities and towns Vice Mayor vacancies and office: The board shall elect an alderman to the office of Vice Mayor who shall serve as mayor when the mayor is absent or unable to the duties–” but was interrupted by Berry who asked for point of order. He told her she needed to make a motion, so she did.

“I make a motion to revise the portion (of the charter) concerning the Mayor Pro Tem to adopt the language consistent with TCA 6-3-107 (Tennessee Code Annotated) and there’s not a single word in this changed on the paper I have given you. It is the language verbatim from that code,” said Amacher.

“The board shall elect an alderman to the office of Vice Mayor who shall serve as mayor when the mayor is absent or unable to the duties of the mayor’s office and in case of a vacancy in the office of mayor until the next mayoral election.”

Wilson seconded her motion for discussion. Berry was given the floor to speak in response from Knowis.

“Tullahoma has a private charter, which means that there’s no other charter in the state like ours,” said Berry. He said that the state did provide a set of charters for municipalities to follow if they so chose, but the charter Tullahoma has means that the city can make changes that only affect the city of Tullahoma as they are done by private act. He explained that municipalities that adopted state codes could only change their charter if the Tennessee state code was updated, but because Tullahoma did not adopt any specific state recommended code, they could change their charter at any time.

“To say that we’re pulling this directly out of what the state codes says is not quite accurate, because while we may have a hybrid style of the government, we are not what the state Mayor-Aldermanic charter” lays out, said Berry.

“I am okay with the Mayor Pro Tem (title), I don’t believe that it’s outdated. It’s exactly what it’s supposed to be. If the mayor’s not able to make it, then we’ve got somebody to fill in. If, heaven forbid, something happens, then we do what we do for anyone else on this board, we find a new member,” Berry said. “And we replace that seat. It doesn’t have to be a member of the board. I’d like to see it stay that way. I’ll vote no to this.”

Wilson spoke in favor of Amacher’s amendment.

“It would make sense that if something happened, that the mayor was not able to continue as mayor that rather than appoint someone new to the mayor position, that it would be somebody from the board,” she said.

“Under the current system, it still could be someone from this board,” interjected Mann. “But it could also be someone from the public.”

“Mayor Pro Tem would serve (as mayor) until the board elected the new mayor,” said Knowis.

Alderman Jerry Mathis, the previous Mayor Pro Tem, spoke up.

“But, if you have a Mayor Pro Tem, anyone on this board could be selected to serve the mayor position,” said Mathis. “If you have a Vice Mayor then it goes to that Vice Mayor, and we don’t have a choice.”

“Well you still get to choose the Vice Mayor,” Amacher replied.

There was some back and forth between the two about the difference, before Berry added “Maybe the vote did not go the way it was supposed to go but we all just went along with it and let it happen. Maybe something happened in that time and we decide, nope, that’s not what we want.”

Berry said this wasn’t about anyone in particular, he was “just using an example.”

“So, Daniel, just a caveat–you’re not determining whether I’m your mayor,” said Amacher. Berry and she agreed that it wouldn’t be enacted until the next term anyway.

She said that yes, Tullahoma has a private charter, but the state code “was written as guidance” and asked Worsham to correct her if she was wrong regarding some other state code suggestions that were adopted.

Berry said “that didn’t exist when our charter was written.”

Amacher said the code in Tullahoma’s charter was taken verbatim from TCA, but Berry said that the state actually used Tullahoma code for that suggested code. Amacher disagreed, citing other sections of city code and added that the state didn’t take everything directly from Tullahoma.

She said this wasn’t “a vote for me, you are doing this to streamline future boards.” She added that this would only be until the next election cycle.

Mann responded to her statements about streamlining the code by referencing his training and previous study session.

“I looked at it with a few simple guidelines,” he said. “One: did this need to be updated because it’s legally required? Two: are we behind with other cities in the state? And three: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

“I think that we’re trying to make something out of nothing here, and again, I don’t think this is something that should be in the charter,” he said.

After much back and forth, Amacher said “To me, what we have, we’ve never had to utilize it, thank goodness, but should we have to, you’re gonna find out just how inefficient it is.”

Mathis responded “Why would we even consider making a change?”

Amacher said because it was a state recommendation.

There was more back and forth before Mann called to question and brought the vote forward.

The motion failed out with only Amacher and Wilson voting in favor of the change.

Amendment to remove officers

“Alright, I have one more that I know y’all are never gonna pass, but I’m bringing it up anyway,” said Amacher.

Amacher discussed a legal wording issue with her last proposal and asked Worsham for his input, but he said “Actually, Ms. Amacher, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Since I didn’t get this (information) in advance, it’s making it difficult for me to provide insight.”

Amacher said she didn’t have time to send the amendments to him ahead of time, and Worsham said “Well, I’m not going to comment on these, because I’m just not as smart as you are.”

“They’re all failing anyway,” Berry commented.

“I just feel like that was very disrespectful,” she said in response.

“Let’s just move on,” said Berry.

“We do have a lot of misogyny in here,” said Wilson.

“The misogyny is thick in this room,” Amacher agreed, before returning to the subject of her last amendment, which was “Removal of Officers.”

Amacher said she wanted to have this conversation while the meeting was televised “because the last meeting was not televised, which I did not agree with.”

She reiterated that she wanted to discuss these revisions “for transparency purposes.”

“I welcome someone making a motion to pass this ordinance until the next meeting or motion for an ordinance,” she said. “One of the things we can write in (to the charter) is the removal of officers.”

“I make a motion to potentially add this as recourse into our charter. Removal of officers. ‘The mayor or any mayoral appointee may be removed from office for crime or misdemeanor in office, for grave misconduct showing unfitness for public duty or for permit disability by majority vote of other members of the board,’” said Amacher.

She said it was for the board to be “able to potentially have teeth” when dealing with any board member misconduct.

Wilson seconded once again “for the sake of discussion.”

The amendment was again put to a vote, but before the vote was finished, Worsham again spoke up.

“I actually have a comment about this. This may violate the due process of anybody who is tried under this,” he said. “I absolutely am opposed to this, I think it’s probably illegal, and I beg you not to put this in our charter. I think it would be a horrible mistake.”

Amacher countered that it was pulled from TCA, and Berry disagreed. She stated she also pulled it from another charter, but did not specify which charter.

The amendment again failed out with only Amacher and Wilson voting in favor.