Council Votes To Move Forward With Outside Counsel

Cookeville City Council voted 4-0 Thursday night to have the city manager hire an outside counsel to provide information on the Ricky Shelton-CRMC hiring.

“The public has questions and I believe it is our duty to find the answers,” Council Member Eric Walker said. “The city council (are) the representatives of the people and with the city being the owner of the CRMC hospital facility, we certainly have an interest in how it’s run and operated. And this council does owe the public a thorough examination of any appearance of impropriety as we decide how to move forward on this matter.”

In his first public comments since council members brought up the issue, Shelton said he did nothing wrong and the council members know that.

“Every member of our council already knows the facts because hospital leadership has met independently with each one and has shared the process as well as answered any other questions they had,” Shelton said. “These are the facts. The position I now hold was publicly advertised, there were lots of applicants who applied. I was interviewed and I accepted it when it was offered.”

“It wasn’t unethical. Just because you don’t like something doesn’t make it wrong or even unethical.”

Council Member Charles Womack made the motion last Thursday to ask for outside legal counsel to investigate the hiring because of an appearance of impropriety. City Attorney Dan Rader told the council he welcomes another viewpoint.

“I want the council to be satisfied that everything was done correctly,” Rader said. “I certainly think that it was once Mr. Shelton did get off the board of trust. I feel very confident that whoever looks at this is going to agree.”

Shelton served on the Board of Trustees, which oversees the hospital, since he became mayor. He resigned and appointed Vice Mayor Laurin Wheaton to take his position. Shelton took the job as CRMC’s Chief Strategy Officer in December, nearly a month after he was offered the position. Shelton began work in January.

“What I’m concerned about is that this position was offered to the mayor while he was on the hospital board back in October, November, from what I can gather of the history of this,” Womack said. “That’s disturbing that negotiating with someone who had been on the hospital board for six years and was then offered a position on executive position, a high-level position at the hospital. That has an appearance of impropriety to me.”

“The only issue I had was that Mr. Shelton could not be employed at the hospital as long as he was on the board of trustees of the hospital,” Rader said. “And he resigned from that and designated Miss Wheaton to take his place before his actual employment began.”

Rader said he thought some public misconceptions about how the hospital operates have fueled questions about the hiring. Cookeville Regional Medical Center is a private act hospital meaning its operations are totally separate from the city. Rader said the city council has no real oversight of the hospital.

“The Board of Trustees of the Private Act Hospital are exclusively responsible for the management and operation of the hospital, period” Rader said. “And they’ve hired CEO Paul Korth to be their chief executive officer. And under the hospital bylaws, he is exclusively responsible for hiring and firing all of the employees at the hospital, not just the high executive employees, but all the employees. I think he did that.”

“The city council did not hire Mr. Shelton and in my opinion, if the city council board voted four to one to terminate Mr. Shelton’s employment at the hospital, that would not be an appropriate act because the city council has no authority to hire or fire anybody over at the hospital.”

Shelton said the investigation would be a waste of taxpayer money.

“The vote tonight is whether or not to pay a lawyer to reach inside the hospital, which is not a city department, and investigate who has what jobs there, why and how,” Shelton said. “CRMC is not a city department. Hiring a lawyer to examine who CRMC hires and how they do it would be like spending taxpayer dollars to determine how Tennessee Tech is hiring.”

Shelton recused himself from the vote, but he challenged Womack and Council Member Mark Miller, who seconded the motion last week, for what he called personal attacks.

“(They) are using politics to slander my name and destroy my reputation and my family,” Shelton said. “Their accusations of impropriety have no merit or legitimacy.”

Wheaton said she hoped the council could address the issue and move forward.

“My hope is that this is the first step to provide the community with clarity on the situation,” Wheaton said. “I’ll be voting on this with optimism that this process leads us down the path of transparency for everyone involved and leads the citizens of Cookeville and the Upper Cumberland with a renewed sense of confidence in their local officials and their community hospital.”