Photo by Jon Anderson
Hoover Councilman Steve McClinton listens to discussion during a council meeting on Monday, Aug. 5, 2024.
The Hoover City Council on Monday night balked at paying $4,100 in legal fees incurred by Councilman Steve McClinton to defend against a report of potential sexual harassment of a city employee.
Instead, the council tabled the matter until it can obtain opinions from the Alabama attorney general’s office and Alabama Ethics Commission as to whether paying the legal bills is permissible.
City records show that McClinton asked a female city employee to meet him at a restaurant outside of work hours in April of last year. McClinton maintains he wanted to discuss policies and procedures of her department and that there were never any sexual overtures toward her.
The employee reported the invitation to former City Administrator Allan Rice, indicating it made her uncomfortable and that she felt she couldn’t say no because of his position as a City Council member, according to a report Rice filed with the city’s Human Resources Department, Mayor Frank Brocato and Council President John Lyda.
Rice, in the report, said the woman did not ask him to file the report, nor did she know that he had filed it, but he believed he was required to do so to comply with the city’s policies and procedures regarding harassment.
Almost two weeks later, Rice filed a second report with the Human Resources Department, saying that he met with the woman again and she informed him that McClinton had sent her an email wanting to meet.
“I asked her if this was an unwanted request. She told me that it was not, and that she intended to meet with him,” Rice wrote in the email to the Human Resources Department, again copying the mayor and council president.
McClinton did have breakfast with the woman at Biscuit Belly in The Village at Brock’s Gap in early May 2023, and she later reported to Rice and the Human Resources Department that she enjoyed the meeting with McClinton and didn’t need anything further from the city regarding the matter, records show. The Human Resources Department considered the matter resolved, records show.
City Attorney Philip Corley on Monday night said the woman reported she no longer felt uncomfortable about the situation. “Based on this, HR concluded that no further action was necessary and Councilor McClinton was informed there was no further investigation or action pending related to this matter,” Corley said.
McClinton sought the advice of an attorney, who wrote a letter to the city attorney, calling Rice’s report to the Human Resources Department a “false and malicious report of sexual harassment.”
“It is clear that Mr. Rice made the false report of sexual harassment in retaliation for Mr. McClinton not coordinating the meeting through him and for political purposes,” the letter from McClinton’s attorney, Kimberly Geisler, said. “Apparently, there is an unwritten rule that all meetings by City Council members with city employees are to be coordinated through Mr. Rice.”
McClinton was unaware of that rule, the letter said. The female employee expressed anger and frustration that Rice had reported the matter to the Human Resources Department, Geisler wrote.
“There was nothing overtly sexual or even inappropriate about a request to meet to discuss city business,” Geisler said in the letter.
McClinton, after hearing through the grapevine about Rice’s report, in an email to the city indicated he was upset he had not been informed about the charges against him and felt his good name and character had been tarnished by Rice’s report and Rice’s decision to share that report with the mayor and City Council members as well.
In a later email to the city attorney, mayor and council in October, McClinton said “what Alan Rice falsely accused me of was highly unethical and unfounded. It is grounds for a significant lawsuit. Yet I don't want to give Hoover a black eye and endure that trauma. This 'process' has lasted almost four grueling months, and my family has been through enough. Make this a priority and get this done. The least the city can do is admit that their rogue employee behaved badly and, as a human courtesy, pay my legal fees.”
Rice, when contacted about the matter Monday, replied in a text that “I have never filed a complaint against any elected official. I am unable to discuss confidential matters that occurred during my employment with the city of Hoover.”
Some City Council members suggested that McClinton seek an attorney general’s opinion as to whether the city could pay his legal bills in this matter. A formal request was drafted but never sent.
The city attorney wrote in an email to Lyda in October that he had spoken to the executive director of the Alabama Ethics Commission, Tom Albritton, and the assistant attorney general and chief of the Opinions Division Office of the attorney general, Ben Baxley. “Both confirmed to me that the question of whether to pay Steve’s legal fees would be a factual question for the City Council,” Corley wrote.
Corley also maintained that the city’s payment of McClinton’s legal bills would be legal if the council found that he “acted in good faith and within the line and scope of [his] official duties, city policies, and all existing laws and regulations and thus, the payment of such legal fees would serve a public purpose. The council is the proper trier of fact of public purpose according to the law.”
McClinton said Corley and Brocato persuaded him not to seek an attorney general’s opinion and that they instead would come up with a process by which he could seek reimbursement from the city. That process involved a vetting process by a committee made up of the mayor, council president and president pro tempore (Curt Posey).
Brocato and Lyda then voted against reimbursing McClinton’s legal costs. Brocato, when asked after Monday’s meeting why he voted against paying McClinton’s bills, said he couldn’t speak freely on the matter because he has to protect an employee.
“But I will say this — Mr. McClinton is not the victim here. The city of Hoover is the victim here. It’s my responsibility as the mayor to protect our citizens and to protect our employees,” Brocato said. He would not elaborate.
Lyda said he voted against paying McClinton’s bills in the committee meeting because he doesn’t believe there would be a “corporate purpose” in doing so. “It’s a personal legal bill. A unilateral decision was made to hire ‘em. A unilateral decision was made on who to hire.”
Posey said he, too, at first was against paying McClinton’s legal bills, but when the matter came up a second time, he voted in favor of it because he believed the city has some potential liability if sued by McClinton, the female employee or Rice regarding the matter. Rice ended up being put on administrative leave for undisclosed reasons and retired from his position.
Also, Posey said it made sense to him that McClinton needed outside legal counsel because the city attorney was representing the city and couldn’t also represent McClinton if another official with the city had made an accusation against him.
Posey also said if the committee had approved payment of McClinton’s legal bills, it could have been done in a more quiet manner along with other city bills instead of a separate vote by the council.
Councilman Casey Middlebrooks said he believed McClinton was acting within his duties and in good faith. Corley said it’s up to the council whether there is a “corporate purpose” in paying the bills.
Councilman Sam Swiney made the motion to table the matter until the city can get opinions from the attorney general’s office and Ethics Commission, and it was approved.
See the video from Monday night's Hoover City Council meeting on The Hoover Channel YouTube page.
