Oops, ‘Reply’ who? With staff out and procedures changed EDA board chair’s frustration levels rise

He started it, EDA Board Chair Gray Blanton could be thinking (as he gestures to Ron Llewellyn who started the ‘Reply All’ email exchange several days after the Dec. 14 meeting. Royal Examiner File Photos

Front Royal-Warren County Economic Development Authority Board of Directors Chairman Gray Blanton verified to Royal Examiner on Wednesday, December 19, that he did not intend for a series of email messages he sent out the previous day regarding some frustration he was experiencing with the situation at the EDA to be copied to media sources.

“I learned my lesson on Reply All,” Blanton admitted in a phone conversation.

Actually the Reply All exchanges began on Monday, December 17, with EDA and County Attorney Dan Whitten’s emailed notice of the originally-scheduled time and date of the EDA Special/Closed Meeting slated for Wednesday, December 19 at 11 a.m.

EDA board member Ron Llewellyn “replied all” at 7:31 p.m. “See you there”.

Blanton, installed as chairman in late August following Greg Drescher’s resignation from the chairmanship, replied nine minutes later attempting to verify that the meeting had been moved to Thursday – “NOW IT IS NOT WEDNESDAY WE AR MOVED TO THURSDAY, RIGHT,” Blanton replied all.

At 9:21 a.m. the following morning, Tuesday, December 18, attorney Whitten replied verifying the date and time change of the EDA Board Special meeting to 10 a.m. on Thursday morning, December 20. Whitten later confirmed that the meeting was rescheduled to facilitate the full board could attend.

At 6:38 p.m. that evening Blanton again replied all – “I will be there 10 a.m., miss tennis again, this is getting ugly and the board of supervisors need to step up, they have us there, no employees and we are suppose to do this job for nothing and get all the blame.  The auditors are running this.”

Two minutes later Blanton added in another reply-to-all comment, “I’m angry about this, I am not use to being put in this position”.

An hour and 10 minutes later at 7:50 p.m. Whitten replied, again to all, “Gray, Please contact me to discuss your concerns.”

Contacted first on Wednesday, Whitten said he felt Blanton was frustrated with the amount of work being put on the EDA board due to the ongoing auditor’s examination of EDA financial records in the wake of the discovery of irregularities in the Town of Front Royal’s debt service payments to the EDA. Those irregularities discovered by Town Finance Director B. J. Wilson initially indicated overpayments totaling over $291,000 over an eight-year period. A final number on Town overpayments, as well as if a similar situation exists on the County side, have yet to be determined.

Contacted later Wednesday afternoon Blanton said it had been a harried couple of days due to a combination of factors, including the audit, an absence of staff to deal with day-to-day EDA business, as well as one of the changes made regarding EDA finances following a 3-3/4-hour closed session at the board’s regular monthly meeting of Friday, December 14. See Related Story

“It has been very frustrating – we’re going through the audit; we told Jennifer to take some time off and Missy is still out, though I think she will be back Thursday,” Blanton said of the EDA executive director and secretary.

Prior to her sudden departure from the morning December 14 EDA meeting after receiving a phone call about a family medical emergency, McDonald told the media that Secretary Missy Henry was absent getting medical tests regarding her own medical concerns.

With Henry out and McDonald given time off in the wake of her sudden departure from the first of two December 14 EDA closed meetings, Blanton said EDA board members, who are unpaid by state law, have had to divide up some time at the EDA office to keep daily business flowing.

With 5 of 7 members present following a lengthy Dec. 14 morning closed session, Ron Llewellyn reads a series of motions that included removing the executive director from bank account management and check-writing authority.

And due to approval of a resolution removing the executive director from check writing authority following that lengthy December 14 morning closed session, Blanton said a number of checks discovered to cover bank payments coming due this week with McDonald’s signature on them along with his as chairman as the required second board member signature, had to have McDonald’s name removed and replaced with either Vice-Chairman Bruce Drummond or Treasurer Thomas Patteson.

This led to delays in the mailing of those bank payments – “That’s not me, I don’t like making bank payments late,” Blanton said of one of the factors leading to his accelerated frustration levels exhibited in the emails he thought were only going to fellow board members and EDA staff.

We asked if he thought the added special meeting closed session now scheduled for Thursday, December 20, to further discuss the executive director’s job performance and debt and accounting services might lead to additional action regarding adjustments to McDonald’s duties.

“I won’t know till it happens – whatever is decided I want it to be before a full board. And if anyone disagrees I want to know what the reasons are,” Blanton replied.

He also said he did not expect that new numbers would be available regarding the auditor’s exploration of EDA finances at the Thursday closed session.

Asked if he thought the Warren County Board of Supervisors might get those numbers the following day at another suddenly-added special meeting/closed session also called to discuss debt and accounting services, the EDA board chairman said, “I hope so – and that they give them to us.”

After the 5:20 p.m. adjournment of the second December 14 closed session discussion of the executive director’s position in front of the second partial EDA board of the day, Blanton told the media, “We did talk about her performance – yes. It was all the things the auditor brought up we didn’t have total explanations for. We’re getting those – we got half of them now and we’ll get the other half later. We’re going to find out what went wrong; get the Town their money as soon as we can come up with that figure.” See Related Story

From left, Ron Llewellyn, Jennifer McDonald and Gray Blanton near the end of the regular session of the Dec. 14 board meeting.