In the coming November elections, Tallahassee voters will find a proposal to strengthen city whistle-blower protections on their ballots. It comes after years of discussion about how to protect city employees against retaliation if they bring formal complaints against city commissioners, their staff, or the inspector general or his or her staff. The ballot measure would put those functions under the Office of the Inspector General, and place that office into the city’s governing documents.
The Office of the Inspector General was established by local ordinance in 2020, when the City Auditor began serving as Inspector General in addition to his already-established duties. Now the plan is to merge the Inspector General with the City Auditor, which IS in the charter. The result is a marrying of their current functions AND granting the IG’s office additional protections to carry out investigations.
That’s important, says City Commissioner Jeremy Matlow, because as things stand now, a majority of the city commission could fire the Inspector General since the position isn’t in the charter.
“By a 3-vote majority on this board, we could eliminate the inspector general if he started investigating something that may embarrass a commissioner, embarrass the city manager, embarrass any of us up here – he could be eliminated in 3 votes," Matlow said. "So, what we’re saying today is: Do we want the inspector general position in the hands of the people through our charter?”
The city’s Inspector General is Dennis Sutton. He says adding the proposal to the city charter would make it more difficult for someone in his position to be removed for decisions concerning investigations into complaints against certain city leaders.
“The proposal from the Inspector General’s Office would fill the gap that’s being proposed to be filled by the ethics board and the charter review committee’s proposal," Sutton said. "It would also go beyond the limits of just that, though. It would bring the full power of the Inspector General’s Office to fill that gap rather than the narrow scope of authority of the ethics office.”
Sutton says the Inspector General’s role will continue to include auditing. The proposal to expand whistle-blower protection was one of several put forth by the charter review committee, but the CRC’s version would have made the Independent Ethics Board the conduit. Mayor John Dailey, Mayor Pro Tem Curtis Richardson and Commissioner Dianne Williams-Cox voted against that proposal, and it failed.
Dailey voted against the proposal to expand the Inspector General’s role as well. He told Sutton the commission needed to know how a new law that takes effect on October 1st would affect the discussion. Senate Bill 7014 requires complaints to be based on personal knowledge or information rather than hearsay.
“What we asked you at the last meeting to bring back was an analysis of whistle-blower protection and in particular, with the new law that was just passed and signed by the governor that’ll come into effect, how does it all work?" Dailey said. "And now what you have brought back is a wholesale change of the inspector general’s office and the auditor’s office and quite frankly, there is confusion about it because this is a very, very big, very important position.”
Williams-Cox made the motion to put the Inspector General proposal on the November ballot. Commissioners voted for it 4-1, with Dailey in dissent.
