What started as a fairly routine discussion about hiring policies turned into another tense conversation about transparency and public trust at the most recent Escambia County Commission meeting.
For much of the night, the focus stayed on the county’s controversial library director hiring process and whether officials became too involved behind the scenes.
Commissioners approved Christal Bell-Rivera as director of West Florida Public Libraries back in March. But criticism over how the decision was made has continued to grow.
The Library Board of Governance had unanimously recommended another candidate, Bradley Vinson, who has more than 20 years of library experience and a master’s degree in library science. County Administrator Wes Moreno ultimately selected Bell-Rivera instead.
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Then, public records requests uncovered text messages between Commission Chair Ashlee Hofberger and her aide discussing the hiring process while it was still underway.
That is what brought a room full of frustrated residents to the commission meeting.
“This is not about a person,” Robin Reshard told commissioners. “This is about how the process to gain a position was co-opted for a particular outcome.”
Reshard warned commissioners that allowing those actions to continue would eventually become “standard operating procedure.”
Resident Julie Patton told commissioners the original library vote was “one of the worst meetings I’ve ever attended in my life.”
She accused county leaders of interfering with established hiring procedures and said she was disturbed by what she described as “the amount of money that is spent in these situations where policies are clearly violated.”
Lilly Eubanks referenced text messages obtained through public records requests.
“It is very unethical, possibly even illegal for a county commissioner and her aide to use government phones to influence and brag about the hiring of a friend for a government job,” Eubanks said.
Derrick Scott called the controversy a public trust issue.
“When the public sees unanimous professional recommendations disregarded while private communications are occurring behind the scenes, confidence in government collapses,” Scott said.
Moreno spent much of the meeting defending the hiring decision and rejecting accusations that commissioners influenced him.
“There’s not a single commissioner sitting on this dais that told me who to hire,” Moreno said. “Not one commissioner told me who to hire.”
Moreno also confirmed a text message discussed during the meeting accurately described him as being “firm” in his decision to hire Bell-Rivera. “My decision was firm,” he added.
He told commissioners that selecting department leaders is part of his job as county administrator.
“If I’m going to be accountable for success, I am going to have some say so in who leads those different departments,” Moreno said.
Moreno also acknowledged that the controversy has raised concerns about how the process looked to the public.
“If there’s been some optics that don’t look that great, I apologize for that,” he said.
The discussion took another turn when commissioners learned a directive approved by the board back in 2011 apparently was never formally added to county policy.
That directive was meant to keep commissioners and their aides from influencing hiring decisions during active recruitment periods. It also stated that applicants could not list sitting commissioners as references and warned that commissioners or their staff should not contact human resources or hiring committees while a position was being filled.
But during the meeting, Deputy County Attorney Kristen Huell told commissioners the directive was approved by the board at the time “but it was never incorporated into any of the policy manuals.”
Commissioner Lumon May questioned why commissioners are even asked to ratify department head hires if they are expected to stay out of personnel decisions altogether.
“I don’t want to be in the hiring business,” May said. “I want to be in the policy business because that’s why I got elected.”
Hofberger mostly stayed quiet during the discussion and did not directly respond to criticism from residents.
Hofberger declined to answer questions from WUWF.
Commissioners are now expected to revisit the county’s hiring policies in the coming weeks.
