BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Monitor Editor
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS— Mayor Karen Lake and Council Member Tony Brown exchanged allegations of malfeasance and using city property for personal benefit at Tuesday night’s city council meeting.
The special meeting was called after City Manager Lynn Rutkowski submitted her resignation. During the meeting, council members voted 4-1 to reject the resignation and allow Rutkowski to withdraw the offer, which she did.
Brown, who asked for the special meeting because he was going to be absent from the council’s regular April meeting started the discussion by praising Rutkowski, telling his colleagues and a packed council meeting room that Rutkowski guided the city through the COVID-19 pandemic and successfully shepherded improvements to Keystone Beach, the beach pavilion, South Lawrence Boulevard and the airport. He also praised her for cultivating relationships with county, state and federal officials.
Text messages and social media posts
Brown then turned his attention to Lake, repeating past claims that the mayor sends late-night, harassing text messages to current and past city managers regarding city business,
“Mayor, you have an issue with texting and tweeting,” he said. “That’s obvious.”
Brown then referenced two tweets Lake wrote in February where she accused the city manager of lying about her education.
“Evidently, you can lie about being a high school graduate and still win a $70K city manager job,” Lake wrote on Twitter on Feb. 7.
“We hired a liar and a high school dropout at $70K per year,” Lake added in a tweet the following day.
Brown then pointed out to Lake that the mayor voted to hire Rutkowski as the city manager after previous manager Scott Kornegay retired.
“You voted just like the rest of us to put her in this position,” Brown said. “There’s no excuse for this kind of behavior from a mayor or any of us up here.”
Brown added that after Sen. Jennifer Bradley and St. Johns Water Management District Chair Rob Bradley congratulated their daughter about her admission to the University of Florida’s law school, Keystone Heights Vice mayor Steve Hart added a congratulatory comment to the proud parents’ post.
“From one Gator Lawyer to another,” Hart wrote, “Congratulations.”
Brown then pointed out Lake’s response to Hart’s congratulatory note: “Steve Hart, Education doesn’t matter for the City of Keystone Heights. That’s what you advocated for Lynn Rutkowski. She’s a high school drop-out. You support her.”
“That is bull crap,” Brown told Lake. “I’m sorry. I’m sick and tired of it. Why in the world, as many times and since you have sat there in that seat, have we said and commented on your tweets and your emails —or not emails but your texts and stuff like that— you continually do it and even in the situation we are (in) right now?”
“Who in the heck wants to work as a city manager here that has council continuously texting, emailing and putting this stuff out there on social media?” he continued.
Claims of malfeasance
Brown then accused Lake of malfeasance when he said she instructed two city vendors to work beyond the duties set out in city contracts, incurring additional costs for the municipality.
“I personally feel back in 2019 that malfeasance was done on your part, mayor, as you contacted the engineers that we had which is Michael Baker at that time to conduct some services without this council knowing, without staff knowing, “Brown said, “and then we get a bill for it so the city taxpayers— I’m a city taxpayer— I had to pay for that bill.”
Brown added that Lake also instructed a contractor who was hired to remove vegetation from Keystone Beach to do additional work not authorized by the council.
“This goes against the Keystone Heights Code of Ordinance Article 3, Section 11,” Brown said. “The only city employee or contractor that a council member is allowed to speak with about city business is the city manager and the city attorney.”
Procedures for impeachment
Brown then read the procedures to impeach and remove city officials.
He did not call for the mayor’s removal, but he did lament the state of Keystone Heights politics.
“We all have had differences at some time but when a house is divided, things can’t get done,” Brown said. “This house is divided, and we need to get some mortar to put on our bricks and get rebuilt or we’re going to fall apart.”
She lied for eight years
Lake told her fellow council members that Rutkowski’s education or job performance was not the main issue she was concerned about now, but rather Rutkowski’s misleading statements and the likelihood she tampered with city records.
“What it is about for me, and it’s always been about for me, which is the point that has been missed from the beginning, was she lied for eight years about being a high school graduate,” Lake said.
Lake also said Rutkowski lied to her about the status of a recent downtown land sale.
Lake added that Rutkowski also misled council members in February when she said she was first hired by the city without completing a job application. Lake said Rutkowski’s assertion is contradicted by then-City Manager Terry Suggs and former Mayor Mary Lou Hildreth.
“(Suggs) distinctly remembers reviewing her application because he had two positions open,” Lake said. “He needed to fill a full-time finance position and a part-time code enforcement position. He said she wasn’t qualified for the finance position, so he hired her for code enforcement.”
“What happened to that application?” Lake asked. “Somewhere between these three city managers something happened to an application that went missing and it doesn’t appear to me that it would have been a function of Mr. Suggs because he doesn’t really have a dog in the race, and it probably isn’t a function of Mr. Kornegay because he’s also a professional and would have treated that public record accordingly.”
Lake then added that Rutkowski had the most to gain from the missing form because it would have documented what she claimed about her educational background at the time of her hiring.
“My point about all this is, is that if she is involved in that, that’s a concern to this city. She is our city clerk and in charge of our public records,” Lake said. “When asked, she needs to produce the public record and if she had destroyed it, that also would have been a violation of a public records request.”
Brown questioned about property stored at city facility
Lake then turned her attention to Brown, showing him a photograph a of trailer stored on city property.
“Is that your trailer?” Lake asked Brown.
“No,” Brown responded, “because the city of Keystone bought that trailer and that belongs to the city of Keystone, thank you very much. Don’t try to pin something on me.”
Lake then showed Brown a photograph of a smoker stored on city property and asked him if he owned the item.
Again, Brown said the smoker was owned by the city.
“Do you think I’m stupid enough to go park a business van or trailer or anything on city property?” Brown asked Lake.
Brown then asked Lake why she instructed contractors to perform additional work beyond the scope of their city contracts.
“I don’t remember,” Lake said. “I was probably not aware of the rule at the time, Tony.”
