College Corner refuses fiscal officer's resignation after attorney leaves

The College Corner Village Council has refused to accept the resignation of the village fiscal officer for a second time at a special meeting June 25.

For months, newly elected mayor Molly Cason, along with two newly elected council members, Danyell Bosler and Ann McCoy, have struggled to get access to village records and buildings. According to reporting by WCPO, Cason didn't get keys to the village office until more than four months after she was sworn in, just one week after the outlet first reported on issues in the village.

Until May, only the village fiscal officer Jennifer Woods and her father Mike Sims, the volunteer village administrator, had access to the office. In a meeting last December before Cason and the new council members were sworn in, the village council approved a new contract for Woods, the village's only full-time employee, granting her 120 paid sick days yearly.

Now, Woods is trying to resign, but the village council won't accept her terms.

"Mike and Jennifer having total control of the village has kind of put us in an uncomfortable spot because no one else knows the ins and outs, just those two," Cason said. The village is currently going through its regular state audit, and Cason says she would like Woods to stay at least through its completion in August.

According to the resignation agreement which was voted down 4-3 on June 25, Woods would have been paid six months' worth of her $72,000 salary, plus all of her accrued vacation and personal leave.

Woods did not respond to a request for comment, and Sims declined to comment.

Village loses attorney, pays $5k more than yearly budget for attorney fees in two months

Woods' attempted resignation comes on the heels of the village attorney's departure.

In March, council member Bolser sued the village for access to public records which she said Woods and Sims refused to provide. The case was formally dismissed on June 5 after being resolved in mediation on May 15, according to records in the Ohio Court of Claims.

After the mediation resolved, village attorney Brodi Conover resigned. Conover first started with the village last fall, according to reporting from FOX19.

The Oxford Free Press requested a copy of the village budget on June 25 and has not yet received a response.

Cason says the village budgets $9,000 per year for attorney fees. However, said Conover billed them $4,000 in March and $9,000 in April, Cason said, including charges for his time listening to media coverage of the village and speaking to a reporter.

"Those were on his terms," Cason said. "The village didn't ask him to do that."

At a meeting June 11, Cason had a potential new attorney visit with council, and she suggested formally hiring him at the June 25 meeting. Some council members pushed back, though, saying the new attorney should go through a formal interview process first. The village will draft a contract before hiring the new attorney.

If Woods successfully resigns, the village council will be left to fill another staff position for the city. Even though the council did not accept her resignation at the June 25 meeting, council member Brian Toothman, who voted in favor of letting her resign, read a statement thanking her for her work at the meeting.

Tensions still high, but changes on the horizon

The mayoral role has been time-consuming, Cason said, especially since she still works a full-time job. Despite challenges with staffing and access to records, though, she said there have been improvements in the village in the past six months.

Until this year, the village council's meetings have taken place once a month at 8:30 a.m. The time made it difficult for residents with full-time jobs to attend, Cason said. During the council's July meeting, the members will vote on an ordinance to formally change the meeting time to 7 p.m.

Justin Singleton, a resident of College Corner since 2020, helps run the College Corner Free Press, a Facebook page which livestreams council meetings and posts information about the village government. He said civic engagement has also improved over the past year, with more residents regularly turning out for and taking part in meetings. Nearly a dozen people attended the June 25 meeting.

At one point, the village required public participants to sign in to the monthly meetings. Singleton said they stopped requiring it after pushback, though.

"They used to not [allow public participation]," Singleton said, "but now they do. That's another one of the big things we've changed."

Singleton said losing the village's only full-time employee could help with spending less, but he does worry about losing Sims' expertise as the village administrator after Woods resigns. He said Woods and Sims have been successful at securing grant funding for the village, which is a time-consuming process.

"They've been really good at that," Singleton said, "and I think that will be something that the council may not be able to do as good as [them] ... All of the problems aside, [Sims] is a very good administrator."

As her term continues, Cason said she hopes trust in the local government improves as they push for more transparency.

"There's a lot of things that are kind of stinky going on, and so I think us bringing it to light has engaged the community to say, hey, this isn't necessarily right," Cason said. "I mean, obviously something was wrong, because I got elected."

College Corner's next village council meeting is scheduled for 8:30 a.m. July 11. The council will vote at that meeting on whether to officially change the meeting time to evenings on the second Thursday of each month.