Bogart City Council gets ugly again

Bogart City Council
May 1, 2006
Oconee Living Section
Athens Banner-Herald
Bogart Council agrees to disagree with Mayor
By Daniel J. Matthews, Jr.
Correspondent

The long simmering feud between Mayor Jan Thurmond and city council members Woody Bruce and Terri Glenn came to a head at the Monday meeting in Bogart. The city lawyer David Wages started before the meeting giving Thurmond the answers she did not want to hear, namely her son’s engineering firm of Armentrout, Roebuck and Matheny was no longer employed by the town after a motion was passed terminating the operating agreement at a special called meeting April 16.
Even the minutes for the April 16 meeting were not entered in the record for the May meeting after Mayor Thurmond forgot to bring an affidavit and resolution coming out of an executive session. She called home to try and get her husband to retrieve the information during the meeting but was unsuccessful.
There was even some question as to whether there was a quorum present for the meeting, with the missing Tom Peavey and Gary Gunter absent from the goings on. Gunter introduced the resolution to get rid of the present engineering firm.
Thurmond retaliated by suggesting Gunter go into the three creeks needing cleaning and cataloging that was going to be the job of the city engineering firm. Gunter let it be known he could not make the meeting because his wife was in the hospital with chest pains.
Conflicts have also yet to be resolved between the recently revised code book and the town charter, including over whether the mayor actually votes or not.
The rancor and acrimony between the members of the council was nothing compared to angry exchanges with the owners of Jagco Company, also known as Action Ads Display, who want to put a couple of billboards in Bogart. Arthur Geisler and Bruce Pendleton stormed out of the meeting after having words with Thurmond and her threatening to call the police several times. Geisler and Pendleton threatened their own legal recourse to address their grievances with the eight month process.
The central issues seem to be around whether there was official action in denying the motion months back and the lack of attendance to two consecutive meetings on the part of the co-owners. Thurmond refused to call their motion for a vote.
“I have complied with everything you have requested and we want our permit,” said Geisler. “Y’all are crazy,” said Pendleton.
Council member Glenn got a few words in edgewise soon after Thurmond hastily adjourned the meeting at 5 til Eight. She was upset with Thurmond’s characterization of the council’s activities in the Oconee Enterprise newspaper.
The city accepted deed to the former library next door to the city hall. There was talk of having an office for Eddie Thomas and Diane Craft.
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