Jon Tupper’s hearing may be first in city history w/ Notice of Hearing charges, city code and charter excerpts

By Debby Woodin

dwoodin@joplinglobe.com

City Councilman Jon Tupper will face allegations of six specific instances of unethical conduct in office when the only known disciplinary case of its kind in recent memory is held Monday by the Joplin City Council.

While some council members in the past were subjects of disciplinary action, including Tupper, none required an evidentiary hearing.

“I don’t ever remember any type of situation like what’s coming up,” said former mayor Don Goetz. “We had the one little problem in 1985, I believe, where we had five councilmen on a recall, but that was a whole different situation.”

City Manager Mark Rohr alleges Tupper said he intended to fire Rohr if Rohr did not fire parks director Jerry Calvin and two other employees, and that Tupper gave instructions or criticized other city employees in violation of the City Home Rule Charter and council code of ethics.

Goetz said he knows there have been instances with past councils in which a member said something he shouldn’t have said to a city employee.

“Normally, through the years, since they’re not professional politicians, council members may have talked to city employees and said something when they didn’t mean to give them instructions. After we talked to them, they realize they’ve gone astray and they ceased and apologized for any action that could have been construed as giving orders to a city employee.”

Past trouble

There have been past investigations, disciplinary actions and recall efforts involving council members.

In the 1985 case cited by Goetz, five council members resigned after residents gathered enough signatures to force a recall election.

The recall was sought by a group led by Jack Stults after the council forced the resignation of then-City Manager Strib Boynton. Council members alleged that Boynton gave out information about city issues to reporters before giving it to council members and failed to comply with council decisions on raises for certain employees and how they were to be recorded in the budget.

Bill Scearce, a current council member, was serving on the council then and was mayor pro tem. He was not a target of that recall.

There also was a recall effort in 1971 by residents of an organization called the Good Government League that accused some council members of wasteful spending.

Two of the council’s current nine members — Tupper and Jim West — have been subjects of disciplinary action or investigations in the past.