The Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners is slated Tuesday to make its appointment to the ethics panel tasked with investigating embattled colleague Tommy Hunter.
Just who will be appointed, however, remains unclear.
An ethics complaint was filed Feb. 6 against Hunter, the District 3 commissioner who called civil rights leader and U.S. Rep. John Lewis a "racist pig" on Facebook. The complaint was filed by two local attorneys on behalf of an Atlanta woman named Nancie Turner and alleges that, with the "racist pig" Facebook post and others, Hunter violated several sections of Gwinnett's 2011 ethics ordinance.
One of those sections urges elected officials and county employees to “never engage in conduct which is unbecoming to a member or which constitutes a breach of public trust.”
MORE: After 'racist pig' post, a new Gwinnett normal: disorder and disruption
MORE: Photos: 13 controversial Facebook posts from Gwinnett Commissioner Tommy Hunter
MORE: Timeline: Aftermath of Tommy Hunter's 'racist pig' Facebook post
The complaint was given the go-ahead to proceed last month, triggering the first-ever assembly of the Gwinnett County ethics board to hear the case. The Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners gets one of five appointments to the ethics board, and the appointment is listed on the agenda for the BOC's Tuesday meetings.
The agenda does not, however, list the name of the potential appointee. Board Chairman Charlotte Nash declined to provide more information Monday.
“The appointment was placed on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting in anticipation of the Board being ready to make this appointment,” she wrote in an email. “Release of any other information is premature now.”
But Nash did say last week that the BOC had “a few potential folks” in mind.
"We really are trying to focus on somebody that's independent, thats not tied to a lot of specific groups or anything like that," Nash said after a lengthy, protest-filled meeting. "... Trying to find somebody that's interested enough to do it but's not already locked into a position."
Other appointments to the board of ethics come from the Gwinnett County Bar Association, the Gwinnett County District Attorney’s Office, the Association of County Commissioners of Georgia and the subject of the complaint — in this case Hunter.
The bar association has already appointed local attorney David Will, and District Attorney Danny Porter has appointed a grand juror named Terri R. Duncan.
As of late last week, the remaining appointments had not yet been made.
Once the ethics board is in place, Hunter’s team will have 30 days to file a formal response to the complaint. The panel will then investigate as it sees fit and vote whether or not to sustain the complaint.
If the complaint is sustained, the ethics board could then recommend penalties ranging from written reprimand to removal from office and referral to criminal authorities.
A spokesman for Hunter has called the construction of the ethics board "entirely unconstitutional" and the ultimate fate of the complaint may lie in the hands of a judge in DeKalb County, where ex-Commissioner Sharon Barnes Sutton is challenging the legality of her county's ethics board.
That board, like Gwinnett's, relies on some appointments from private organizations. Barnes Sutton's lawsuit claims only elected officials should be able to make such appointments.
The ethics complaint against Hunter is the first ever filed under Gwinnett’s 2011 ethics ordinance, which was intended to target shady land deals and other types of corruption.
About the Author
