Photo by Jon Anderson
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Hoover City Administrator Allan Rice
Hoover City Administrator Allan Rice has been placed on administrative leave, but the reason for the leave has not been disclosed, Councilman Curt Posey said.
A picture was circulated today of Rice leaving Hoover City Hall amid rumors he had been fired and had to clean out his desk and be escorted out of City Hall.
Rice, who has been Hoover’s city administrator since Frank Brocato took office as mayor in 2016, said he did not clean out his office and was not escorted out of City Hall.
However, Rice said “I don’t think I can comment on anything related to the city at this point.”
Efforts to reach Hoover Mayor Frank Brocato for comment were unsuccessful. Melanie Posey-Joseph, the city’s public information officer, said all she could say is that Rice had not been terminated and that the city does not discuss personnel matters.
Hoover Council President John Lyda said he wouldn't discuss personnel matters because those are under the purview of the mayor. "This is an executive level issue, and Frank is really the one as far as I am concerned who makes the calls," Lyda said.
Rice made a Facebook post Thursday, commenting that “Calera has an excellent police chief who possesses superior character. I only wish that my city’s police department was led by someone like David Hyche [Calera’s police chief]." The second sentence of the post later was edited to say “All police departments should be led by someone like David Hyche.”
Several City Council members also confirmed that the mayor within the past month or so had taken oversight of the Hoover police and fire departments and emergency communications department away from Rice and is now having those departments report directly to the mayor.
This followed a reported incident of hazing in the Hoover Fire Department in which some firefighters stuck a new recruit’s head in the toilet, giving him what is often referred to as a “swirly.”
People in city government said Rice, who himself is a former Hoover firefighter, was upset with the way the incident was handled in the Fire Department and tried to get some firefighters fired. City government sources say Rice was overruled by the mayor, who preferred for the matter to be handled with discipline internally.
Rice had a meeting with the leadership of the Fire Department and representatives from the Human Resources Department in mid-May and spoke to firefighters very frankly about the incident. It was soon after that meeting that the mayor took supervision of the public safety departments away from Rice, Posey said.
Hoover fire Chief Clay Bentley declined to comment about Rice’s personnel status, and efforts to reach Hoover police Chief Nick Derzis about Rice’s social media post on Thursday were unsuccessful.
Hoover’s Human Resources Department referred questions to the city’s public information officer.
Rice also took a lot of heat from some members of the Hoover police and fire departments over the past year due to problems with a new city payroll system that delayed proper paycheck amounts for multiple people in those departments. Some employees complained that Rice and the payroll department were not doing enough to correct the problem. Rice said at the time he was just as frustrated as them about the problems and that the payroll department and software experts were doing everything they could to try to fix them.
Rice has made multiple posts on his personal social media page in the past month, some with statements about people who are hated and at least one referencing hazing in fire departments. See some of those posts below:
The Hoover Sun will post more information about this issue as it becomes available.
