Sometimes things actually do move swiftly in Colatown:
Embattled Columbia Police Chief Tandy Carter was fired this morning, following tensions with City Council over the handling of the April 21 car accident involving Columbia Mayor-elect Steve Benjamin.
Carter held a news conference at police headquarters just before noon today, insisting he acted within the scope of the law — and his personal code of ethics.
“I am a professional police chief,” Carter said. “I am not a puppet police chief.”
Well, now he’s not ANY kind of police chief.
I’m still sort of reeling over this. Tandy Carter was a good police chief. And then, in a situation in which it seemed OBVIOUS that the thing to do was bring in another agency, he dug in his heels and got all defensive. And I just don’t understand that.
I was thinking about it over the weekend, and wondering. When someone says, as I have since the start, that he should call in another agency on the Benjamin wreck, does he actually think that we’re saying we don’t trust him? That’s certainly not what I meant to say. I trusted him completely. But, not having been born yesterday, I clearly understood this as a situation in which lots of OTHER people wouldn’t trust him on it (you who read this blog regularly may have noticed that there are a few cynical people out there when it comes to their views of public officials). And there was no way he needed that heat, or Columbia needed the controversy.
This situation got crazy and went bad fast.
I’m still sort of spinning.
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Sorry to take so long to post that, folks. I just found out, which is weird. I’ve been monitoring Twitter right along, but I didn’t see anything from Adam since his post this morning about the fact that city council would be considering a new policy today intended to avoid this kind of situation.
Now this. To quote Keanu Reeves, “Whoa.”
This wasn’t an issue of police proceedures, performance or methodologies. This was about the political appearance of inpropriety.
I don’t think anyone questioned the ex-chief’s abilities in a decisive way. But he sure blew open the discussion about his judgement. I will assume that this push-back was brewing for a long time with the Council or City Manager over other issues. The real question is why he choose to make a stand on an issue that could not be anything other than a political loser for him? Was it career suicide by Council here?
Check out the post on the new (interim) chief, Col. Carl Burke…
As long as there are idiots on city council who think they run everything and have to micromanage everything, Columbia will never keep strong department heads.
One thing that’s missing from the “Personal Code of Ethical Conduct” is acknowledgement of being a part of a larger organization (the city government), of which he is not the head and which has personnel rules and regulations that all employees must follow to maintain employment.
That lack of understanding appears to be the crux of the problem.
@martin–I think he simply believed that as the professional law enforcement head, he should have final say over law enforcement. He may have believed he was backing his troops.
I have to say that I don’t get Tandy’s Last Stand entirely, but I do know every one of the major players here, and they are all good people, to a one. They are all operating out of the best of intentions.
It is such a shame that we lose Tandy out of all of this.
I lack understanding about the Columbia political dynamics, but it would seem that both Mark and Martin have something there. It would have been wiser to have turned the investigation over to someone else. The good that might come out of this is that a protocol is developed to handle such things.
Here’s Steve Gantt’s termination letter to the ex-chief.
And here’s the chief’s written “Personal Code of Ethical Conduct.”
Neither of these documents in any way explains what just happened, but I share them for what they’re worth.
What’s going to be the shame is not only losing Tandy, but the lawsuit he’ll win for wrongful termination. The pinheads on city council, Mayor Pinhead, and City Manager Pinhead are going to regret getting involved in this accident investigation when they had no business other than pushing their uneducated opinion on how a professional lawman should do his job.
City of Columbia residents, prepare to have your taxes increase yet again to pay for the cost and penalty of this pending suit against the city.
Yes, Pat–I do understand the dynamics, and I believe that if Tandy had just turned it over immediately, none of this needed to happen. He dug in, and then it became, to him anyway, a referendum on the quality and integrity of his department.
Lawyers understand the “appearance of impropriety”–I think Marines not so much.
“Lawyers understand the “appearance of impropriety”–I think Marines not so much.”
And who would you rather have watching your back?
I think Chief Carter is the only public official at the City level that is operating under a code of ethics. The city manager has an MPA, but he is not a credentialed manager by the ICMA, which holds its managers to a code of ethics. Clearly, Council has no code, though Councilman Finlay called for one, had he been elected. I just find it interesting that one employee believes so strongly in honor and integrity, but finds himself juxtaposed against those who don’t really know what that means, so their response is to fire him. Not a good way to recruit a new professional city manager, what more another professional police chief. Bottom line, what does it mean to abide by a code of ethics in the public sector? I’m looking for answers.
“And who would you rather have watching your back?” – well, both. BTW, as the rank goes up, appearance becomes more important (or more understood). Wonder if the merger idea will take off.
On another note, am I the only one seeing the time on the posts advanced 12 hours? I feel like I’m living the tv show, Early Edition.