Darke County resident Karyl Parks attended Wednesday's meeting of the Darke County Commissioners and once again pressed the three with questions regarding the recent settlement with former employee Melody Lucas (and some answers are given regarding the plaque commemorating Medal of Honor winner Douglas Dickey that was previously displayed at the courthouse and will soon find a new display at the Garst Museum).
Without editorializing, the public comments portion of the minutes from the DC Commissioners' Office can be found after the break in their entirety (click on continue reading), and full minutes of the meeting can be found by clicking here.
(Transcripts on Record -is/might not be- Context of entire Comments)
**DC Citizen Karyl Parks: Wanted to know why the “medal of honor” plaque was removed from the Courthouse?
**Commissioner Rhoades advised that he wasn’t sure but Commissioner Delaplane attended a meeting this past Monday on that.
**Ms. Parks: This is our only county “medal of honor” winner honoree.
**Commissioner Delaplane & Commissioner Stegall: Both stated that we have three (3).
**Commissioner Delaplane continued: We have two (2) Civil War and one (1) with Mr. Dickey. We had a meeting and the way it was explained by Judge Hein was because there was remodeling on the floor. They had done painting and then checked with the Veterans Service, if they would accept that plaque and they advised that they would. Veteran Service Officer Deb Kaiser took it out to their offices and then thought that there was not enough traffic to see it, so they then contacted the Garst Museum to see if they could have it there. It hasn’t been displayed as of yet, but Judge said he is going to talk to Mr. Clay as to the final resting place of that plaque.
**Ms. Parks (cont.): Another thing was that last week I was told that my figures were in error. I wasn’t told what figures were in error.
**Commissioner Rhoades: I got one thing for you, you just reminded me of something. You brought up about having a joint EMA, and someone brought up in here and not sure if it was you or whoever, but we have been talking to Champaign, Preble, Auglaize, Miami, Mercer, & Clark for a joint “Extension Agent”. When you said that the other day, it dawned on me afterwards so that was what that was.
**Commissioner Rhoades continued saying that he had to bring that up before he forgot.
**Ms. Parks: commented that she appreciated that.
**Ms. Parks (cont): I find out that Mrs. Lucas does have, she worked for a “fortune 500” company in a leadership capacity and stated that she did have leadership qualities.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Didn’t recall having that on her Resume’.
**Ms. Parks: The way I see it, my husband begged me, please not to come here, he begged me, he really did, and he said that these are nice guys. Ms. Parks says “Jeff, you’re a nice guy; I would not hire you, you know, I would not vote for you for office”.
**Ms. Parks continued: Commented that a nice guy doesn’t get you anywhere. Charismatic, yes, I really believe that you are nice guys. But, I still have a problem with this when I tried to find facts which you said were erroneous, I get stonewalled wherever I go because everybody is afraid of losing their job.
**Ms. Parks cont.: In this case, it seems validated because Mrs. Lucas did lose her job. I feel that there is corruption in the Government from the top down. I can’t do anything about the top but I need to voice my opinion from the bottom, because it might, I doubt it, might make a difference. In the paper I saw that Mrs. Delaplane got a lot of flak for “breach of trust” and I feel the “breach of trust” comes with the Commissioners who are covering up, which I feel and last week I feel I got the run-a-round. I feel like Mrs. Delaplane speaking out and trying to prevent a wrongful thing from happening which was courageous thing to do and the right thing to do.
**Commissioner Rhoades: You know what, before I get completely lit up, your completely wrong because you have no idea, I have no idea what she said to that lady;
**Ms. Parks: I don’t either;
**Mr. Rhoades (cont.): and I’m not getting nailed for something, because what I said behind closed doors was confidential between the three (3) Commissioners, that is not dishonestly and is not corruption. Whatever the H--- she said, I don’t know. All I know is that the Lawyer told us to settle what we had to. I don’t know what she repeated, what got misconstrued, but I’m not taken the d--- rap for this anymore, I’m tired of it. I didn’t do anything wrong. We three (3) Commissioners, we sat over there and talked;
**Ms. Parks: Why did you pay for a grievance?
**Commissioner Rhoades: Because I had a Lawyer tell me whatever the h--- was repeated between them two (2) ladies was enough that would have made the Board over there cite even more and give her even more money than what she got.
**Ms. Parks: Well she has my vote next fall, which she didn’t get this spring. But she has my vote next fall;
**Commissioner Rhoades: For telling something out of turn that shouldn’t been told?
**Ms. Parks: Because she is trying to;
**Commissioner Rhoades: Your full of it;
**Ms. Parks: prevent a wrong.
**Commissioner Rhoades: There was no wrong. We may have had a discussion on how we felt about things, but there was no wrong. Do you know what was said, because she’s never told me what was said.
**Ms. Parks: No, I don’t know what was said.
**Commissioner Rhoades: So you are making an assumption, you’re making an assumption on something.
**Ms. Parks: I read the newspaper from Ryan Berry’s comments;
**Commissioner Rhoades: Well that was totally wrong, and there is going to be a retraction coming from that because he already told us that. He was wrong. But, I don’t know what that lady said right there to the other lady, but it must have been enough for my Lawyer to advise us that the county better cut their losses and go with it.
**Ms. Parks: There is a lot of intimidation when you go and try to find the facts cause everybody is afraid to say something because it seems like the Commissioners have a “mafia” thing going on.
**Commissioner Rhoades: You haven’t a clue what is going on. Your sitting on the outside looking;
**Ms. Parks: No I don’t. That is why I’m here to find out.
**Commissioner Rhoades: I’m telling you what, I don’t know what was said, and that is my point. All I know is what;
**Ms. Parks: Everybody is afraid of the Commissioners. Everybody in every capacity when your trying to find out;
**Commissioner Rhoades: Good; **Ms. Parks: Good, Good, they are afraid of the Commissioners because you throw a hissy fit because you want to step up and say “this woman opposed me, she filed a grievance, would she be working for me, yes, if I was wrong, she would be working for me”.
**Commissioner Rhoades: No, I wasn’t wrong, that’s the point. We were not wrong;
**Ms. Parks: You have not proven to me that she was wrong.
**Commissioner Rhoades: We had two (2) times the State’s Board of, the Personal Review Board over there, said that the Commissioners did not do anything wrong. We were not in the wrong. Did you get those facts? H--- no you didn’t get those d--- facts. Now you got the facts.
**Ms. Parks: You haven’t given me anything to prove that Mr. Lee, who is no longer here;
**Commissioner Rhoades: That is beside the point.
**Ms. Parks: He said himself that he wasn’t qualified.
**Mr. Rhoades: No, No, No, don’t even go there because you were not involved in any of the interviews and you can’t make that assumption. You have no idea what facts, what was said, how the interviews went, you have no idea.
**Ms. Parks: You strike me Sir with somebody that has too much testosterone and you stand up and you oppose me and your gone. That is the kind of corruption that we need to get rid of in government.
**Commissioner Rhoades: There is no corruption. You have no idea what we said.
**Ms. Parks: Yes it is corruption.
**Mr. Rhoades: Oh it is not and you no darn well that it is not. I went through the facts. The State Board heard everything that we did, two (2) times. The State, all the Lawyers, all the Judges, all of them agreed that we as a Commission Board did everything right.
*Ms. Parks: And you as a Commission Board;
**Commissioner Rhoades: All it comes down to is that she is a sore loser cause she didn’t get it. That is like Mr. Ward in here the other day, he is a sore loser cause his son didn’t get it. So, get over it, we did everything right. That Board over there, the Lawyers over there looked at the whole case and said that we did it right. So why should I want to pay her for something that I didn’t have to pay her for.
**Ms. Parks: She didn’t sue you, it was a grievance.
**Commissioner Rhoades: A grievance, right. But in the common term out there everybody is going to call it sued, everyone out there.
**Ms. Parks: A grievance is when somebody feels that something is wrong.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Right. She had that right to do that.
**Ms. Parks: That is her right and she got asked to resign because she did. That is wrong.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Sorry about your luck, that is how it happened and it is going to stay that way, nothing is changing.
**Ms. Parks: That is the same kind of reason why people are afraid of the Commissioner’s Office. When Public Offices are;
**Commissioner Rhoades: That surprises me, I disagree. Everybody is afraid of us?
**Ms. Parks: My husband told me today that if I came here today that our property taxes would go up and he started to get excited. He told me that I would end up in the river with cement shoes. That is the kind of fear that the Commissioner’s Office;
**Commissioner Rhoades: Go back and tell Jeff, one fact for sure, go back and tell Jeff that we cannot raise his taxes, property taxes. We do not have that authority.
**Ms. Parks: No, but you have Assessors that would come and;
**Commissioner Rhoades: No, we have nothing to do with that.
**Ms Parks: Yeah, right.
**Commissioner Rhoades: B--- S--- the State does that, mam.
**Ms. Parks: My husband begged me to not come here;
**Commissioner Rhoades: You ought to start listening to him because you got all your facts half screwed up like you did the other day. I’m sorry I’m getting mad. But I’m tired of getting beat up for something that we didn’t do wrong. Your making assumptions on what your reading of other people’s opinions. Until you sit in there and went through the process we did, you don’t have a clue of how things work.
**Ms Parks: That is why I’m here to try and find out.
**Commissioner Rhoades: You can’t do it when you weren’t there to see it. So how can you make that assumption?
**Ms. Parks: So you are going to let me sit in your office everyday and watch you work?
**Commissioner Rhoades: It is open.
**Commissioner Stegall: It is a public session, mam. Everyday is open to the public.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Your more than welcome to come in here and sit, I don’t care. I absolutely do not care.
**Commissioner Stegall: That is your right. That is why we have “Open Sessions”.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Come on in. If you got that much time on your hands, come on in.
**Commissioner Stegall: You are more than welcomed.
**Commissioner Rhoades: We never said that you can’t come in.
**Commissioner Delaplane: Yes. I will agree with Mike that the State Review Board did say that, two (2) times, that we did do everything correctly, according to the so called do you want to say (?) training a person, an employee, and then we also did the correct interview process;
**Commissioner Rhoades: Our process, the interviews were done correctly. Like Mike said, there were comments made and I don’t know if that was a total reasoning, there was probably other comments made, that she was addressing that agreement that she wanted us to settle on. So that was the process for paying that monetary amount. I think that was something that we didn’t think we really needed to do because we didn’t think we was in the wrong, the State Review Board said we wasn’t in the wrong, but then it continued on and so that is where the negotiations happened with the two(2) Lawyers.
**Commissioner Rhoades: We could have kept fighting it, but we would have paid that out in lawyer fees and still kept on fighting and it would still be going on.
**Commissioner Delaplane: Right. That was the suggestion that we should go ahead and do a settlement instead of continuing on with the time and money being spent.
**Commissioner Stegall: You have to remember, I only found out about this, the in depth part, about 5 weeks ago, before this all started. From what I was told, from what I have seen, from what, talking to our Attorneys, when they said this is the best way to go. I told both Commissioners, I wasn’t involved in this but I will back whatever you think we should do because you guys are more intimately involved with the whole situation. We had an attorney tell us that this is our best bet is to just settle this, and that is what we did.
**Commissioner Rhoades: I want to apologize for cussing. I do get very upset I do, so I’m apologizing.
**Commissioner Stegall: But that is what I know. We were advised by our Attorney that this was the best avenue. After all the Attorneys, after they found out what they needed to find out, she came into Mike and John at that time, and said, “your best avenue is to settle”.
**Commissioner Rhoades: I didn’t mean to offend you, I’m sorry.
**Ms. Parks: I’m just saying if I had a good qualified employee that I would treasurer that employee and if I had somebody that was doing a good job and they opposed me I would say, “Ok, ok, we screwed up and I would treasurer that employee and they would still be working for me”. Now you have to spend more money and train a new employee in her position that you don’t know if that’s going to work out.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Do you know that?
**Ms. Parks: No, I don’t.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Since I have been here we have been on five (5) LEPC people, five (5) different LEPC people.
**Ms. Parks: Why are you so hard to work for?
**Commissioner Rhoades: Were not, they just don’t stick around. Were not;
**Ms. Parks: In your opinion;
**Mr. Rhoades: It is part-time, it is not a full-time job. The LEPC position is only a 20 hr. job.
**Ms. Parks: I will be back.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Come on back. I’m not saying you can’t.
**Ms. Parks: It is not my husband’s fault.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Elisabeth?
**Elisabeth Wirrig w/Daily Advocate: I have nothing.
**Commissioner Rhoades: Jim;
**Jim Strobel: I’m here to listen.
**Commissioner Rhoades: I figured that.
**Commissioner Rhoades (cont.): Alex Mikos w/TIGER Radio: I was asked a question last night by an individual that asked, was wondering, if there was some kind of insurance, in dealing with the process?
**Commissioner Rhoades: It never went through our CORSA stuff, like she was saying. It was a settlement through the Bureau of Personnel. Had it, kept on going to trial, it would have been a different story.
**Commissioner Stegall: Then CORSA could have been brought in.
**Commissioner Rhoades: We still would had a large deductible to pay before that happened anyhow. Anything more?
**Ms. Parks: No, I’ll be back.
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