Speaking Personally - Mea culpa

 

Every week in these pages, I subject our elected officials to intense scrutiny. This week, I’m using this space to show that no one, especially me, is above this scrutiny. I made a mistake, and I reported something inaccurately. I’d like to make it right and make sure the truth is crystal clear. 

 

On November 29, I wrote and printed a front page story called “PSAC to choose fire chief.” PSAC stands for Public Safety and Advisory Committee, and it’s a newly created committee in the City of Willow Springs. Its function and purpose are unfolding, and as I watched the committee grow from idea to reality, I made an assumption. I reported this assumption as a fact. 

 

The November 29 article said that the PSAC voted in their first meeting to recommend accepting the resignation of Fire Chief Vance Farmer and to recommend the Assistant Police Chief Alan Lewis be appointed as Interim Fire Chief. I got that wrong. They did not vote on it at all. 

 

Because I was personally present at the first PSAC meeting on November 20, I witnessed City Administrator Beverly Hicks make an announcement about the resignation and anticipated appointment of the fire chief after the committee emerged from a 45-minute closed session on the topic. She said nothing about a vote, and when she said “we,” I assumed she meant the people in the room for the closed session.

 

The board of aldermen eventually voted and approved Lewis for Interim Fire Chief in the December 18 meeting. Hicks told me in an interview on January 7 that his name first came up for consideration in a closed session of the board of aldermen in the fall. Hicks’ “we” referred to the board of aldermen and herself.

 

It’s important to understand that closed sessions are exceptions to the Sunshine Law. That is – there are specific topics outlined by Missouri law that allow political entities to shield specific information from the public. In this case, the hiring, firing, or promotion of an employee. As a member of the media, I cannot demand the details of a closed session. The public and the press are entitled to know about any motions or votes in closed sessions, but that’s all. 

 

This is why, after coming out of a closed session, I assumed the announcement was the result of a vote. 

 

In reality, the members of the brand-new committee were learning about resignation and replacement only thirty minutes before I did. With her announcement, Hicks was looping me, and the public, in on an important development. However, there was no vote, and the PSAC never made a recommendation to the board of aldermen. 

 

In fact, because of the timing of the resignation and the need for a new interim fire chief, PSAC never functioned as a search committee for this position. Their attempt at a second meeting in early December had to be abandoned because of a lack of quorum. 

 

In short, I assumed where I should have verified, and the way I reported on it complicated an already delicate personnel situation. Though per the ordinance that defines their role, the PSAC could have and perhaps would have, served as a search committee for a new fire chief, they did not do so this time. 

 

The ultimate and legal decision-making authority never left the board of aldermen, and the newly created committee never made a recommendation. 

 

As everyone, me included, struggled to understand the role and purpose of this new committee, I misunderstood. And then I spread misinformation. 

 

I take my role as a trusted local news source very seriously. Though I cannot promise never to make a mistake again, I can promise to take every inaccuracy to heart and to admit fault visibly. When I get it wrong, I will make it right.