City tells Dr. Billy Ray Lewis to stop bringing up chamber money at public meetings

For several months now Dr. Billy Ray Lewis and Becky Myers have addressed the Harrison City Council and the Boone County Quorum Court regarding the tax dollars that each entity has given to the Harrison Regional Chamber of Commerce. The city and county have indicated that they are no longer going to allow Dr. Lewis to speak on this matter at public meetings.

Over the last few years, the city and county have given the chamber money in exchange for work in economic development. Both city and county governments have agreed to treat the chamber as a vendor for economic development work in lieu of hiring their own economic development departments at a much higher cost.

Since 2019 the total money given to the chamber from the city and county has amounted to approximately $140,000.

Dr. Lewis has asked for detailed accounting and receipts of what the public money given to the chamber has been used for and strongly urged the city and county to demand those documents from the chamber’s CEO, Bob Largent. Lewis has also threatened to file a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act against the chamber and Largent himself if the documents were not produced. After many attempts to persuade local leaders to take a closer look at this matter both have indicated to him that they do not want him to bring this matter back before the council or the quorum court again.

The final meeting regarding the matter occurred on December 12^th at Harrison City Hall, but outside of the city council meeting. Mayor Jerry Jackson along with Dr. Lewis, Bob Largent, Boone County Quorum Court Member Jim Harp, and other officials were present at the meeting in which Dr. Lewis had indicated he had new developments he wanted to present.

The meeting lasted nearly an hour and little information was presented that had not already been brought before the council.

At the heart of the dispute seemed to be two main points. First is a question of how much public money is put into the salary for the Chamber President/CEO, Bob Largent. Second is the accounting of public dollars versus other chamber funds.

As for the first matter, regarding Largent’s salary, Myers read from the contract between the city and the chamber saying, “It is agreed that the president/CEO of the chamber shall only be employed and responsible to the chamber.” Myers then said she interprets that to say any compensation to Largent should come only from the chamber funds, not from public money given to them by the government for economic development.

In response Largent pointed out another stipulation of the contract that says the chamber is supposed to provide and maintain personnel to carry out all the components of the contract and the chamber employs a CEO to see that those things are done.

“It is clear the chamber provides services and hires an individual to do economic development for the city and the county. The chamber does hire that individual, okay,” Largent said.

Dr. Lewis asked who that individual was, and Largent responded that it is the chamber’s CEO. Lewis asked Largent if any of the public money goes toward his salary to which Largent responded, “yes, it certainly is.”

Largent’s point is that to fulfill the requirements of the agreement the chamber employs a CEO who is compensated for fulfilling that contract and other matters related to the chamber, so there is nothing wrong with a portion of the public money being used to provide compensation to the chamber’s CEO.

This ties in with the second point of contention, which is the accounting of public dollars. Myers said that to present an accounting of what the public money is being used for by the chamber there must be a separate ledger or account that gives exact receipts of what public money is used for and that public money cannot be mixed with other chamber funds.

Largent said that he has complied with the FOIA request made by Dr. Lewis and provided all receipts for public money spent by the chamber. Dr. Lewis says that for that list to be complete there must be a receipt for the portion of public money going to Largent’s salary. No such receipt was provided, and Largent said no such receipt will be provided because the only form of receipt for a salary would be his paystub which he refused to give.

Near the end of the meeting Largent asked his attorney, who was present via video conference, to weigh in on this matter. He said, “if you believe that there’s been some violation of the law then file your lawsuit and we will defend it.”

“Until then we will respond in no way about salary for staff or myself in anyway further until you file a lawsuit,” Largent added.

Dr. Lewis made no indication of whether he would go ahead with a lawsuit, which he has threatened in the past, but did vow to submit more FOIA requests in the future.

Mayor Jackson and Justice Harp both indicated during the meeting that they were satisfied with the accounting the chamber has done to show what the tax dollars have been used for. When asked if he thought there was any wrongdoing being done with public money Dr. Lewis responded, “don’t want to comment on that.”