City accused of conflict of interest

The Indianapolis office of a federal agency accused the City of Portland of nepotism and pulled funding for its housing authority director.
Portland City Council on Monday discussed the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Indianapolis office’s accusation that allowing Portland’s Housing Authority to be run by the Mayor Randy Geesaman’s wife, Carol Geesaman, is a conflict of interest.
Council also heard an update on a proposal for a bike share system and voted to amend payroll ordinances for the city’s department heads.
Carol Geesaman has served as the mayor’s secretary and simultaneously served as the head of the Portland Housing Authority for the last four years, but HUD administrators decided earlier this year to pull funding for her salary on charges that her role as housing administrator was a conflict of interest. Before Oct. 1, her salary was $31,500, with half paid by HUD for her role as director of the housing authority and half paid by the City of Portland for her role as the mayor’s secretary. Then HUD ended its funding of half of her salary, leaving city council members to decide at Monday’s meeting whether to fill the gap.
“We’ve had discussions all this year, in 2016, with HUD, and every year they change the rules, somebody new comes into play. It turns out that all these years it didn’t matter that Carol was also my wife, and now they’re saying there is a problem because of nepotism, even though the nepotism didn’t come in until after I came into office,” said Mayor Randy Geesaman.
Portland’s Housing Authority will now be governed by the Muncie Housing Authority, and Carol Geesaman will only serve as the mayor’s secretary.
Mayor Geesaman explained that combining housing authorities in smaller cities with nearby larger ones is a trend that’s not unique to Portland.
“They said that a lot of the operations that have only 50 vouchers they did away with. Decatur is an example, Union City. So then they said, ‘There’s a bunch of new rules, we have our own inspector, so we are gonna come in and just take over HUD,’” Randy Geesaman said.
Portland clerk-treasurer Lori Ferguson explained to council that since the HUD pay ended Oct. 1, Carol Geesaman would only receive half of her pay at the end of this week without a decision by council.
Council members Bill Gibson, Don Gillespie, Judy Aker and Janet Powers, absent Kent McClung, Michele Brewster and Mark Hedges, voted to approve covering the pay until the end of the calendar year for Carol Geesaman to continue working full time as the mayor’s secretary. Members plan to review the topic for 2017 and decide whether the position should be full time or part time, since Carol Geesaman will no longer serve as head of the Portland Housing Authority.
Jay County Trails Club president Theresa Inman showed council one of the model bikes for the proposed city bike share program. The bike share kiosk would hold five bikes that could be used by residents and visitors to ride throughout the city on a per-hour charge. The program’s cost would total $31,000, but Inman explained that Barry Hudson has pledged $10,000, a grant would provide $5,000, Jay County Visitor and Tourism Bureau would cover $5,000 and Jay County Hospital would also contribute $5,000. That would leave the city needing to pledge $5,000 to implement the program. Yearly maintenance would also cost about $2,000 to $2,500 a year.
Council member Bill Gibson expressed apprehension with the proposed plan, questioning the high price tag for five bikes.
“How many people in Portland actually ride bicycles? I see very few people riding bicycles, that’s the reason I ask,” Gibson said. “At the price of those bicycles plus the upkeep on those suckers, we could buy a new bicycle for everyone that rides it every year and still get by cheaper.”
“Absolutely, you absolutely could do that. And you won’t have a bike share program that your city is proud of, and you won’t have a bike share program,” Inman said.
“I just don’t think it’s gonna fly in the City of Portland,” Gibson said.
Council tabled a decision on the funding because of the three absent members, and will discuss the issue at its Oct. 17 meeting.
Council also voted to amend the city’s payroll ordinance to comply with new regulations from the U.S. Department of Labor.
To comply with new regulations on employees who have salaries of less than $47,476 effective Dec. 1, council had to decide whether to agree to overtime pay for Portland’s department heads or to raise salaries and thereby exempt the positions from overtime considerations.
Portland’s department heads currently make an annual salary of $47,425, $51 shy of being above the cutoff for overtime consideration. Council voted to to raise salary pay by $51 for department superintendents in order to put them above the threshold and exempt them from overtime pay.
In other business, council:
•Voted to submit an application to the Office of Community and Rural Affairs for a $600,000 grant to go toward improvements to the city’s wastewater treatment plant.
•Approved an ordinance to permit money from an FAA grant for land acquisition at Portland’s Municipal Airport to be transferred to an account for use in buying the land for the proposed runway extension.
•Heard from Geesaman that three of the four houses in the city’s Blight Elimination Program have been demolished, and that plans are being made to acquire other blighted houses using the remainder of the state grant money. Resident Sandy Bubp also proposed creating a city program to buy abandoned houses at tax sales and demolish them, helping to streamline the process of blight elimination in the future.
•Tabled a decision on what time and date to conduct trick-or-treating for Halloween.
•Discussed the preliminary report by Ball State Urban Planning students on the city’s new redevelopment plan. The preliminary report will be presented in a public meeting 6 p.m. Wednesday in the community room of Portland Public Library.
•Heard proposal from Decatur Main Street Board member Brad Martz and Decatur Main Street Organization Committee Director Kelly Ehinger on designating U.S. 27 as a historic route within the city limits.
•Was informed by Geesaman that work has begun on a new 42-inch sewer line to replace an 18-inch line along the Salamonie River.
•Approved paying claims totaling $1,740,922.99.