Tallahassee Reports has learned that an applicant for the Board counsel position with the City of Tallahassee’s Independent Ethics Board represented the Board’s Ethics Officer, Julie Meadows-Keefe, in a personal legal matter within the last year.
Meadows-Keefe failed to publicly disclose this relationship with John Reid, an applicant for Board counsel, during the Board’s selection process to fill the position.
The Ethics Board is scheduled to select a Board counsel at the Board’s meeting today at city hall.
The Board is revisiting the previous appointment of Mr. Reid, which was ruled invalid after it was revealed that an Ethics Board board member was ineligible to vote due to an overlooked residency issue.
In addition, public records show that Reid was selected to work with the Tallahassee Independent Ethics Board last fall in complaints filed against then Mayor Andrew Gillum and City Manager Reese Goad.
This work with the Ethics Board came after Reid’s personal work with Meadows-Keefe.
At this time, TR has not been able to determine the role Meadows-Keefe played in the selection of Reid for his work with Board in the fall or her role in the Board counsel selection process.
Repeated calls to Julie Meadows-Keefe have not been returned.
Check back for updates to this breaking story.
It should be the CYA , not the COT board. corruption so deep, it will never be reversed.
Way to go Julie Meadows-Keefe. Just another indication that ethics are hard to find in the Capital City. I truly believe that up and coming have no sense of or care about ethics. It's who get there first with the most. (Money-influence) I hope the justice department continued to monitor the governments of Tallahassee and Leon County. This corruption is inbred from years of the same in Tallahassee. Somebody needs a stint in federal prison to get everyone's attention..
The "Ethics Board" cannot be trusted as far as we can collectively throw their sorry butts.
This town is run by crooks, period.
Start over. We don't need ethics that don't stand the ethics test.
Exactly they never investigate anything just look at their agenda. They have virtually no calls coming into the hotline and when they do have something it is outside their jurisdiction. Change the charter to abolish the ethics board and refer all ethics complaints to the state ethics commission. We can save money by not duplicating resources. If we have the state ethics board why do we need a local one especially when they never investigate anything anyway. We could file an ethics complaint to the independent Tallahassee ethics board about the ethics officer not declaring a conflict but we all know the board will simply say they do not have jurisdiction over her. They already did this with a complaint against the ethics officer a few weeks ago. Since they never investigate anything I still wonder what she does all day except laugh all the way to the bank while she rakes in our hard earned tax money.
I am running for Leon County Commissioner At Large Group 1 and I totally believe that the Independent Ethics Board SHOULD be an Independent group and NOT attached to ANY Elected Office and each Member should be fully Vetted. If an Elected Official or someone running for Office does not want that then, they must have something to hide.
It's not just the COT people! It's the county, state, representative's, senators, etc....
Ms. Alli - Thx for trying to redirect away from COT but the COT people sure enough cornered 99% of the sleaze market. And this is an Article on the COT ETHICS (and lack thereof) Officer - once again above ethical rules....are you a COT employee - trying to protect this sLeazership?
No, I'm not a COT employee. I am self employed so I deal with the county, city and state ON ALL LEVELS and they are all the same! THANK YOU it's mainly COT, I don't live in a box!
Is this a final list selected by the board or resumes just being submitted?
Wouldn't the disclosure come at the public meeting?
How do they personally know each other?
Was there a public meeting held where this was not disclosed or is the meeting yet to commence?
So Just Why? - would a direct conflict of interest and failure to disclose important information to an appointment or an investigation be relevant to Keefe, Gillum, Daniels, Maddox, Fernandez, Barber, Marks, Goad, Thompson, Miller, Buss, C. Jackson, Blair, Hendricks, etc. at this point, FBI? These rules don’t apply to the City of Tallahassee ‘sLeazership’ team....
Mayor Dailey - you are in a position to address this?
Great reporting T. R.
But honestly without a MAJOR house cleaning of embedded upper management at C. O. T. it is nothing more than wishful dreaming for anyone to expect anything ethical from this latest attempt to make the voters think the Independent Ethics Board will be independent or ethical.
Wishful dreaming because everyone knows there will be no cleaning of upper embedded management at C. O. T.
Ethics Shmethics.
I believe the real focus should be on cleaning Up Tallahassee and Leon County.
Do a nationwide search for a city and county manager.
Change the city law, rule, or Charter for the COT whereby voters vote within City districts and not at-large.
(Curtis Richardson must disclose the contents of the text mail between he and the new commissioner.)
Replace the state attorney ASAP as there is a legacy that Tallahassee needs to retire and too many mistakes and and injustices.
I believe the latest was the deal with the devil that the state attorney made. Especially when the state attorney's father was busy participating in conduct Unbecoming instead of solving the Mike Williams case and ignoring Mrs William( Mike's mother). It wouldn't have been hard for a competent Sheriff to investigate and solve that case and the deal that his son the state attorney made is ridiculous.
Tallahassee and Leon County need to clean up their acts starting with the above.
I totally agree with everything you said.
And further support your statements on "Little" Jackie Campbell's fools deal with Winchester. And cannot believe any rational person with common sense could think otherwise about "Little" Jackie's fools deal.
The citizens of Tallahassee expect ethical behavior from its ethics officer. Why would the board tolerate such behavior?