The Tallahassee City commission is looking into whether Leon County Commissioner David O’Keefe trespassed on the construction site of the city’s new police headquarters. Commissioners got an update on the issue Wednesday.
Earlier this year, O’Keefe had joined City Commissioner Jeremy Matlow to view the site after neighbors complained of trees being cut down. On Wednesday night, City Manager Reese Goad showed commissioners video from O’Keefe’s phone. It shows him leaving the construction site when asked to do so by a worker there.
“We are going to move up and honor that man’s request," O'Keefe said into the phone. "As much as I don’t like being told what to do, I don’t believe that dude is in charge of this whole project -- and judging by the fact that he’s got a hardhat and a clipboard, and a yellow-and-orange vest, he is probably just doing his job here. I’m going to turn this off because I have to hop this fence again, and it does not look as cool as when I was younger, and I do not want that video to be on the internet.”
At a previous city commission meeting, earlier this month, Commissioner Dianne Williams-Cox asked staff to look into the matter, saying that if a regular citizen had done that, the person would be in “a whole lot of trouble.” Mayor John Dailey seconded the motion, saying he believed the act of jumping the fence to be a felony.
The motion passed 3-2. But at Wednesday night’s meeting, the public speakers blasted the officials behind the move. Here’s former Leon County Commission candidate Will Crowley:
“It seems more and more that the city of Tallahassee has friends and it has enemies. It has people who deserve the benefit of the doubt, and it has people who don’t.”
The Tallahassee Police Department is now investigating, along with the State Attorney’s office, and Commissioner Jeremy Matlow says those investigations feel politically motivated. O’Keefe was with Matlow when the incident took place, and Matlow is often at odds with Dailey and City Manager Reese Goad, who Matlow says the police ultimately answer to.
“Every law enforcement officer who feels the pressure to look into this from City Hall," said Matlow. "How much direction from the fourth floor at City Hall does law enforcement need? There should be more separation there. Our job as an elected body isn’t to sic the police on the people we don’t like. Our job here is to make public policy, and for weeks, we haven’t been making public policy! We been talking about a guy with a phone standing next to a holding pond.”
Dailey and Goad reiterated that the matter was on the agenda for information purposes only, not political ones. And Goad told Matlow that TPD wasn’t playing a political role. He says the information presented during the meeting was not part of the police investigation.
“It’s easily observed where Mr. O’Keefe was. It’s easily observed how he got into the site. It’s easily observed how he interacted with the contractor. We have not indicated anything related to an investigation, criminal charges or any consequences that could come from that. You continue to say that -- I’m not saying that.”
Matlow maintains the discussion isn’t in service to the broader community. He points out the new police headquarters will probably top $100 million -- and says the commission ought to be talking about that instead.
