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While the city attorney’s cursory review of the two ethics complaints against Mayor Terry Lynne found no ethics violations, the Farmers Branch City Council voted unanimously to hire an outside firm to investigate the allegations.
Only three minutes of the three-hour closed, executive session were available for public viewing.
Mayor Terry Lynne welcomed the two new city councilmembers (David Reid for District 3 and Roger Neal for District 5) and read the title of the agenda before closing the session that was held at Thursday, May 16, in the Farmers Branch City Hall study session room.
Only he and City Attorney David Berman were visible in the livestream at the start of the meeting.
At 8:58 p.m., Mayor Pro Tem Richard Jackson, city council representative for District 4, called the meeting back back into session. That that point, the entire city council as well as several city staff, including City Manager Ben Williamson, City Secretary Stacy Henderson and Director of Communications Jeff Brady were visible.
The room was quiet and calm, with Lynne sitting in his customary position at the head of the table.
Berman gave this statement, which the Branch Herald transcribed from the YouTube recording.
“I’m going to begin by saying that I have submitted in accordance with the provisions of our code of ethics a report to the council dealing with the two complaints that were filed against the mayor last week. My findings generally indicate or suggest that no ethics violations existed, but that is with the caveat that my review is necessarily limited or restricted to specifically the terms of the complaints themselves and the documents that were submitted in support. It is not my charge or my task or my duty under our code of ethics to conduct any kind of a formal investigation or to determine the existence of additional facts or negate alleged facts. I’m just simply doing a very cursory review determining whether or not that information is enough to create the possibility of an ethics violation. Again, my findings suggest, generally suggest, that no violations existed, but my findings are not conclusive. My findings are simply a preliminary, cursory review, and that’s about it.”
Jackson immediately motioned to hire outside counsel to look into the allegations, “to promote public trust and in the interest of transparency, that we commission the city attorney to conduct, to contract an outside counsel to conduct an investigation.”
Councilman Omar Roman, District 1, seconded the motion, which passed unanimously.
No other comments were made, and Jackson closed the meeting at 9 p.m.
Branch Herald will continue to follow this story and will post as more information comes available.
The video of the May 16 Special Session is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwhiOFZ6hYY
