Two aldermen threatened to walk out of Tuesday's Indianola Board of Aldermen meeting after a comment made by Alderman Marvin Elder.
Aldermen Darrell Simpson and Gary Fratesi stood up to leave after Elder made a statement regarding certain members having a “slave mentality.”
The comment came during a lengthy discussion of a proposed schedule submitted by Public Works Director Jimmy Strong.
Elder made the motion to accept Strong’s schedule as presented. However, Fratesi made a subsidiary motion, which took precedence over the regular motion, to accept the schedule, but with an addendum that the supervisors have to be there at 7 a.m. with the employees unless the supervisors have been out on call all night.
Elder did not agree with that, so he interrupted and said, “Looks like to me we’re going back to this slave mentality.” At that point, Simpson and Fratesi arose to leave the session.
“I’m not going to be subjected to that again,” Simpson said.
Mayor Steve Rosenthal rapped his gavel and repeated several times, “Alderman Elder, you are out of order.”
Rosenthal asked the two men to stay to continue the meeting, and when he was able to proceed, Fratesi’s motion failed for lack of a second. Elder then made a subsequent motion to accept Strong’s proposal without any additions, and it passed 4 to 1 with Simpson voting no.
Strong had presented a six-page typed document that in addition to offering a work schedule, it contrasted the current number of employees versus the number employed when Strong was hired as director, it spelled out his current workload and criticized remarks on a flyer Fratesi submitted at a previous meeting that were also published in The Enterprise-Tocsin earlier in May.
With regards to the information and schedule Fratesi presented at the aldermen’s last session, Strong said the schedule his workers are now operating under and that he is presenting is the correct one,
“That other schedule was a made up schedule,” he said. Strong accused Fratesi of assassinating his character because of information that was contained in the flyer.
Fratesi injected, “Mayor, if he’s going to keep referring to me, I need to reply, you’re not hammering him down but every time I speak, you say no you can’t speak.” Rosenthal assured Fratesi he would have his moment.
In a document prepared for Tuesday’s meeting, Strong referred to the board as negligent and irresponsible in how it handed the topic of work schedules for his employees at prior meeting.
Strong maintained that Fratesi’s flyer was not presented because his workers were not working or because of the schedule. He stressed that Fratesi has a problem with him that stems from a year ago when he blacktopped a private driveway on MS 448.
He said he and Fratesi used to talk often but since that incident they have not.
Strong said he put asphalt on three driveways that day including Fratesi’s, but maintains that he did it legally because they were on a state right-of-way. In response, Fratesi said that Strong extended the driveway on only one house along that stretch and did it while the whole board was out of town at a conference.
Fratesi maintained that he received several calls from citizens while he was out of town and questioned why
Strong did not do any other driveways along MS 448. Strong’s proposal is to begin the workday at 7 a.m. and end it at 4 p.m., with a 15-minute break in the morning and another in the afternoon, on site, with a one-hour break at noon. The employees would return to the work barn at 3:30 p.m. to fuel the equipment, trucks and mowers for the next day plus check the tools in.
Fratesi had criticized the current work schedule at last meeting and called it inefficient because employees were spending a great deal of time going back and forth to the public works barn.
Strong accused Fratesi of blindsiding him by not presenting the issue to him first.
Fratesi defended his position and said all he asked for was the 15-minute break to be taken on site and do away with coming back to the city work barn.
