Three board members from the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence (FCADV) told House members they knew little about the exorbitant compensation package they approved year-after-year for the nonprofit’s chief executive.

Melody Keeth, Laurel Lynch and Angela Diaz-Vidaillet said they never intended to give former FCADV President/CEO Tiffany Carr 465 paid time off (PTO) days in fiscal year 2017 and 620 PTO days in fiscal FY18 and were shocked when she “cashed” them in after resigning in October.

The PTO payout and Carr’s $761,000 annual salary added up to more than $7 million in compensation over three years.

The three FCADV members testified for six hours Monday in front of the House Public Integrity & Ethics Committee.

Keeth, who was board chairwoman in 2016, 2017 and 2019, said the PTO was because Carr told them she had a brain tumor and might need surgery requiring a lengthy recovery. It was not to accrue and be banked, she said, although every contract explicitly stated it was to accrue and be banked.

“I could never imagine that the time given for her to manage her illness, that she would convert them to cash,” Keeth said. “I could never imagine us being here today. The Tiffany Carr that I knew would never have taken this PTO.”

The revelations surfaced after the state’s Department of Children and Families (DCF) demanded documents from FCADV in the wake of 2018 investigations by the Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald.

Under a 2012 law, DCF contracts exclusively with FCADV to manage 42 domestic violence centers. It received $52 million in state and federal funds this year.

After nearly two years of “stonewalling,” the House Public Integrity & Ethics Committee received more than 100,000 FCADV documents in early February. Because many were redacted, it issued subpoenas for original documents and for 13 former FCADV board members and staff to testify before it.

Five subpoenaed witnesses were scheduled to testify Monday. Time expired before two could. They will appear Thursday with several others. Among them will be board members Penny Morrill and Sherrie Schwab, Treasurer Theresa Beachy, Chief Operating Officer Sandra Burnett and Chief Financial Officer Patricia Duarte.

Not among them are Vice President Donna Fagan, yet to be served, and Carr, who lives in North Carolina, which only recognizes subpoenas issued by judges.

The three board members who testified Monday disclosed while Carr was being paid $761,000 to direct FCADV, she also was managing an Alabama domestic violence program, operating Florida land-development companies and being paid $80 an hour as a FCADV consultant from her Highlands, N.C., home after resigning because her health was imperiled by Florida’s climate.

Rep. Randy Fine, R-Palm Bay, asked Lynch how she could approve 620 PTO days for Carr as chairwoman in 2018.

“On what planet would you offer somebody 620 days in PTO in a year with only 365 days?” he asked.

Lynch, executive director of HOPE Family Services in Bradenton, maintained documents she signed in May 2017 were not the same ones updated onto Carr’s contract in June.

“This was made without your authorization?” asked committee chairman Tom Leek, R-Daytona Beach.

“And knowledge,” she replied.

The three claim Carr’s salary was justified.

“We’re competing with for-profit corporations for talent. We are well-resourced, and I credit Tiffany Carr for making that happen,” Lynch said. “We have attorneys on our staff. We have never been able to have battered women represented in court. It was a game-changer. Tiffany Carr made that happen for us.”

Diaz-Vidaillet, president/CEO of Victim Response Inc. of Miami, said Carr “tripled and quadrupled the agency’s budget, got thousands more beds” for victims.

Lawmakers probed the three about their relationships with Carr.

Diaz-Vidaillet, who earns $284,000 annually to manage Victim Resource’s $4.5 million budget, including $1.5 million from FCADV, said she’s known Carr since 1994, joined the board in 2010 and they vacationed in Paris together in December.

“This was the last trip before she had to decide on having brain surgery,” Diaz-Vidaillet said.

Lynch earns $140,000 a year as HOPE’s executive director, which receives about $1 million of its $2.4 budget from FCADV.

A board member for 14 years, Lynch said she’s known Carr for 20 years. They have a “business colleague relationship.” She purchased a home from Carr in 2011 in Franklin, N.C.

Keeth said Carr hired her in 1997 to manage Serene Harbor, where she earned $94,000 a year, and was retiring at the end of February and moving to North Carolina.

Rep. Jackie Toledo, R-Tampa, asked Keeth, “Ever been to Tiffany’s $2 million home in North Carolina?”

“Which one?” she replied. “I’ve been to two of her homes.”