Grappling with a controversial town manager choice that had seemingly torn the small town of Jay nearly asunder, the City Council ultimately voted 4-1 to put off a hiring decision indefinitely.
They did so in front of what City Attorney Steve Cozart described as a nearly unheard of standing room audience July 7, most of whom had come out to show either support for or voice opposition to the hiring of April Watson, the town’s only true candidate to replace the recently retired Eric Seib.
Watson, as many in the town had only recently learned, is a convicted sex offender who served 12 months in prison for, as a teacher at Jay High School, having sex with 17-year-old Jay High School students.
“It’s appalling to see what’s going on up here in Jay,” said Pace resident Cindy Smith. “Sexual offenses are not victimless crimes.”
Watson had also put in seven years of apparently exemplary service to the town and was promoted last September to be its operations manager.
Seib had been operations manager before his promotion to town manager seven years prior and, on the same day Watson was promoted, the council also voted to cut back on his hours to allow for a transition period.
“All this hubbub on the (social media) is just that. This lady has done nothing but work,” said resident Butch Kent, who added that he’d spent years working in prisons and was glad to see a rare reformed former inmate. “She has given me no reason to resent her. I didn’t want to be somebody who didn’t speak up for this lady.”
Kent’s words received an ovation from many in attendance.
Watson and cohort Ashley Burkett, both teachers at Jay High School at the time, were arrested by the Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Office on Aug. 6, 2009, for engaging in sexual intercourse with male students in 2007. Consensual sexual encounters, which involved three teens, occurred on an occasional basis over a four-month period, between July 1 and Oct. 31, court records show.
Investigators learned from two of the teenagers involved that they’d had sex with Watson at either her residence or Burkett’s home. The third victim said he was involved in sexual activity with Burkett at her residence and at Watson’s home.
Records indicate the young men typically hooked up with the women after Burkett and Watson had spent off-duty time at a location identified only as “the creek.” The teens said they did not receive instruction from either educator and did not engage in sexual intercourse on school grounds or at any school event.
Court records indicate that both Watson and Burkett were sentenced to 15 months in prison and served a year of that time.
Both were placed on community control, a form of house arrest, for 18 months and probation for five years. Under the terms of their plea agreement, both Watson and Burkett were branded by the legal system as sexual offenders.
Two members of the City Council, Mayor Shon Owens and Councilwoman Nina Hendricks, voiced their support for Watson prior to the meeting. Owens contended she had great support in the community, though opposition to her hiring also ran strong.
Councilman Mike Hutto voted against putting off either hiring Watson or moving on to another candidate.
The most vocal opposition to the hiring, and then the decision not to act, came from a group familiar to the Santa Rosa County Commission and Milton City Council as activists on numerous topics. Owens exchanged barbs with two of those activists, Smith and Jerry Couey.
Smith described herself as a sexual exploitation activist and a victim herself. She asked the council if anyone in the group had been so exploited, to which Owens jumped in to say that he had been abused as a 5-year-old and had managed to move on without trauma.
Owens grew disturbed with Couey’s comments that the decision not to make the hire with a large group of people present amounted to “kicking the can down the road.” The mayor said Jay had done just fine without a city manager in the past and could operate that way again.
“You’ve been up here one time in 10 years, maybe,” he said. “You have absolutely no idea what we do up here.”
He said Couey and others had been opining that to hire Watson would be a terrible thing, yet they complained when the council decided not to act on the town manager hire.
“We couldn’t even satisfy you today,” he said.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Jay puts off decision whether to hire sex offender as city manager indefinitely
Reporting by Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Tom McLaughlin, Pensacola News Journal | USA TODAY Network
