The N&R picks up on a story that was reported in last week’s Rhino, that of 59-year-old Edith Culbreth a non-sworn Greensboro Police Department employee who was laid off just weeks before she was able to retire as part of a City council directive to cut costs.
For the moment, I’ll ignore the racial aspects of the case —Culbreth believes Police chief Tim Bellamy laid her off in favor of a younger black employee. The N&R writes that “City department heads and City Manager Mitchell Johnson were adjusting the list of eliminated jobs within hours of when employees were notified,” while the Rhino says:
One of the problems here is the problem that permeates down from the top. The city manager, Mitch Johnson, appears to be unable to admit when he has made a mistake, and that works its way down through the organization. The city could have admitted that after four months of study it was unaware that one of the people being laid off would be eligible for retirement with only another 30 days of work. At that point the city could have offered to allow Culbreth to work another 30 days, or done the smart thing and apologized to her and given her her job back, but no such offer was made.
This seems to be a theme running through Greensboro city government this week. Employees being informed that they’re being let go at the last minute. City Council members receiving crucial information on millions of dollars in bonds 10 minutes before a vote, if they get it at all.
Council member Mike Barber, admittedly the force behind the effort to eliminate positions, summed it up at Monday night’s meeting:
“There’s a lot of unofficial feedback that many of us aren’t privy to, and decisons are made, and we show up to meeting and we don’t have the information not do we know what’s going to happen.”
Citizens and the City Council know what’s going on down on the corner of Market and Eugene. Doing something about it seems to be another matter.
