YATES CENTER — It took Yates Center City Council members just about as much time to undo what they’d done just a day earlier, quickly voting 3-1 in a special meeting Wednesday to “quash and set aside” a prior vote to shrink the police force to a single, full-time employee.
Wednesday’s vote “is not to preclude us from having further discussions about this topic,” Councilman Johnny Atkin said in front of a jam-packed meeting room. “It is to ensure that our democratic process is followed and that our citizenry has an opportunity to provide input.”
Atkin and fellow Council members Jason Cathcard and Charyl Stewart voted in favor of reversing Tuesday’s vote, while Councilman Chris Cavender stood behind his vote a night earlier.
THE MAGNITUDE of Tuesday’s vote, which came with no advance warning as Council members were discussing city spending, sent shockwaves throughout the community.
Unlike a night earlier, when nobody was in the audience, a crowd of at least 50 was on hand for Wednesday’s special session, although a full count was nearly impossible because people were crammed into different rooms and offices at City Hall to follow the proceedings.
A reversal was virtually a foregone conclusion from the outset, because two of the Council members who voted to shrink the force were not in attendance, including Councilman and former long-time police chief Lyle Kee.
In fact, Kee had tendered his resignation from the Council prior to Wednesday’s meeting, City Clerk Janet Thompson told the Register.
Kee — who made the motion on Tuesday to shrink the department to a single, 40-hour-a-week police chief — told the Register afterward the rising costs to keep a department that size had become too expensive for a shrinking community.
The department has four full-time officers and two part-time employees, with an operating budget of $397,000.
His motion to transform the department was backed by Cavender and Councilwoman Tammy Porter in a 3-2 vote, with Atkin and Cathcard opposed.
Cathcard said he was blindsided by Tuesday’s vote. “We have a way of doing business, and this is the first time I’d ever seen business conducted around this table the way it was done.”
Cathcard was so incensed by Tuesday’s decision, that he left the meeting immediately afterward.
He apologized at the onset of Wednesday’s special session, but it was clear his emotions had not subsided.
Not only was the decision done with zero advance notice, Cathcard noted, it was done while Police Chief Michael Strode was in Arkansas this week for advanced training. (Strode was unable to make it to either of this week’s meetings.)
“Our chief of police has done an excellent job, and the disrespect to disband a police department when the man is not even in town to defend his department or his men is shameful, and it just really bothers me,” Cathcard said. “What happened (Tuesday) night was just wrong in every way.”
Atkin concurred.
“I’m not embarrassed because something came across the table that I didn’t fully support,” Atkin said. “I’m embarrassed because of the manner in which that came across the table, that myself and my fellow council members were blindsided by something which would so drastically change the shape and the security of our community.
