Resident demands answers, urges recall amid fallout from city manager hiring

A Franklin resident, Lynn Rabel, used the public comment period to sharply criticize the City Council's recent handling of a city manager recruitment and to call for wide-ranging accountability.

Rabel told the council she had read news accounts and was "disappointed in the current Franklin City Council," saying the city had "sunk to the lowest of lows" and that the council's "poor decision making regarding the hiring of yet another city manager" plus "overt racial overtones" and repeated turnover were grounds, in her view, for recalling council members. She asked for a full accounting of "the total cost to taxpayers for the last two city manager searches" and for figures on severance, contract costs, harassment-related legal fees and other expenses tied to turnover.

The remarks were followed by a written comment read into the record from Barry Cheatham that criticized the council's apparent willingness to invite a former manager to return and decried what the letter called an "unearned and unnecessary severance." Both statements framed concern about the financial and reputational cost of frequent turnover in the manager's office.

Council members addressed those criticisms during the council-comment period. One council member (Miss Banks) said her votes were "based on trust" and that recent developments had eroded that trust, noting an incident in which a photograph taken of members and the city manager at a restaurant had raised transparency concerns. Another council member defended his actions and record, saying he has worked "for the people" and decried what he called "selective outrage." A different council member emphasized procedural fairness and said she would not criticize colleagues for voting as they saw fit.

The meeting record shows the council later entered a closed session to discuss prospective city manager candidates and, on returning, held the required certification under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act; most members certified the closed session but one member explicitly stated, "I do not certify," and another recorded an abstention.

The council adjourned after completing its agenda. There was no immediate public vote to alter personnel decisions; residents who spoke requested clearer public accounting of costs related to recruitment and severance.

The council did not provide a line-item accounting at the meeting; when asked, public commenters said they wanted exact figures for search costs, severance and legal fees.