Erin City Council Meeting

By Staff Writer
Meeting was called to order, first the issues of parking was discussed the Mayor passed around copies and a large picture of what they are hoping to do.first between Bell's old lottery room all the way down past Gill's and Carl's Restaurant they are wanting to make this road one way so that diagonal parking can be added on the side of Price Florist. also the city has been approached by Philip Powell about buying the parking lot on the other side of Price's for extra court house parking . No final answer was made on this.
Next was to pay the out standing bills, this ways passed .
Then was the issue of the new Chief of police position. Smitty Price had Linda Bratchsi read the paragraph where it is the Mayor's job the promote, demote, hire or fire an employee with the board approval. so then board asked the mayor what he was going to do..the room went silent waiting for his answer.Then with a strong voice he said Quote:I want to elect Mr. Daryl Allison to the position of chief, Can we have a vote...Betsy Ligon said that she wanted to refresh everyone's memory that Mr. Allison has sued the city about 15 years ago and has personally files bankruptcy, and she did not think he should have the position, nest she added that he was kin to Mayor Baggett and Mr. Gooden and that the policy states that you can not hire a relative. There was never a answer to what was in the records on what was family(mother, father, brother,sister, in laws etc...)
Then Loranie Beecham spoke and said sometimes suing is the only answer and as far as personal bankruptcy that does not mean that he could not do the job. The Mayor asked again for a vote. PJ gooden Made the motion and Smitty Price Seconded it so the room went slight again.
Alderman Beecham-NO
Alderman Shires-NO
Alderman Price-YES
Alderman Lockhart-NO
Alderman Richardson-YES
Alderman Ligon-NO
Alderman Dunn-NO
Alderman Gooden-YES
So the mayor appointment for Daryl Allison was turned down. The Mayor said that he would run more ad for the position and change the qualifications in the ads. Betsy Ligon said the she would not authorize the Mayor to spend and more money on ads that he must pick one from the 4 he had. then Smitty Price stated that the Mayor has a budget of $2500.00 for ads and that a ad would not cost that much .