VALDOSTA —
LAKE PARK — Lake Park citizens will have to wait several months before being able to attend another City Council meeting following Tuesday’s resignation of two council members.
Deb Cox, Lowndes County elections supervisor, said Georgia state law dictates that another special election cannot be held until July 31.
“We couldn’t possibly hold another until then,” said Cox.
Lake Park City Attorney Rob Plumb said that typical city business will operate as usual. Trash will be collected, grass will be cut and payments for bills or taxes can still be handled, even though City Council cannot vote or adopt any new ordinances until a special election to fill the two council member positions.
“There’s no indication that there is going to be any reduction in services or anything that would effect the safety of the population,” said Plumb. “Fire and police departments are still functioning and utilities are still going.”
The Lake Park charter states that a quorum requires a minimum of three council members. With the resignations of Eric Schindler and Paul Mulkey Tuesday night, the council no longer has a quorum with only two councilmembers and Mayor Ben Futch left.
Plumb said they are working with the Board of Elections to determine if there is a possibility of moving the special election to an earlier date. He hopes that an upcoming primary in April will be an option.
“We look forward to having a new council in place as soon as possible where we can go on doing positive things,” said Mayor Ben Futch. “We’ll be kind of limited by the resignation of those two councilmen. I feel like they have kind of penalized the citizens of Lake Park with us getting on in a positive direction. They’re going to put us back, but we’ll be fine and in the future we plan on doing a lot of nice things.”
Futch said that the February cleanup, which was approved by council in the January meeting, was going well and that Lake Park operations would continue within the scope of the 2012 budget.
When council members Schindler and Mulkey resigned Tuesday night, Mulkey ensured that mayor and council realized they could no longer conduct official city business without a quorum.
“I’m really concerned more for Lake Park now,” Mulkey told The Times Wednesday. “Lake Park doesn’t need this. Lake Park is a small and quiet town.”
Mulkey said he still had no idea why Futch and council members Sandi Sherrill and Russell Lane decided not to re-appoint experienced employees at the Jan. 3 council meeting.
Schindler has his own theory about why former City Clerk Ann Peterson, Police Chief Bert Rutland and Fire Chief David Brown were not re-appointed.
“What it does is it removes any obstacles for a collaboration between Futch, Lane and Sherrill,” Schindler said Wednesday. “It allows them to micro-manage City Hall. I don’t know what their agenda is. I was more than willing to work with them. I sat down with an open mind because this is about the city.”
Schindler said once Rutland, Peterson and Brown were dismissed and a list of names for replacements were read off quickly and without thought, he began to re-consider his participation on a council that would not serve the citizens properly.
“Positive breeds positive and when you bring in negativity, vengeance and nepotism into the city, that’s when it gets corrupt and you don’t want that,” he said. “With a city of about 700 people, there shouldn’t be this type of turmoil or uneasiness. They deceived the people and us (Mulkey and Schindler) and didn’t even try to hide it. They were blatant and open about their deception.”
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