Williamson County Commissioners Court Legal Advisor Hal Hawes announced his candidacy this week for Williamson County Attorney in the March 2012 primary. Hawes, a former Assistant Williamson County Attorney, was appointed to his current position by the county commissioners in October 2010. The legality of procedural actions taken in Hawes replacing County Attorney Jana Duty as the court’s legal counsel is the subject of a lawsuit the commissioners currently have on appeal before the Third Court of Appeals.
Hawes cites “problems now facing incumbent Jana Duty” as prompting his bid for the county attorney spot. “Duty has become enmeshed in a series of spats and serious legal disputes with numerous Williamson County elected officials and a state official,” a Hawes campaign statement says. “Duty’s leadership led to the Williamson County Attorney’s Office being sanctioned by a State District Court and Duty will go to trial over grievances filed against her with the State Bar of Texas.”
Duty’s history with the Williamson County Commissioners is well documented . “Spats and serious legal disputes” with other unnamed county elected officials or the unnamed state official are not quite so readily apparent while the sanction referenced has to do with $3,000 levied by a judge against an assistant county attorney who is now deceased.
And indeed Duty is set to go to trial over grievances the county commissioners filed against her with the State Bar of Texas. But, in contrast to the commissioners court request for a private hearing, Duty is seeking a public trial – a position viewed favorably by many taxpayers and advocates of transparent, open government.
The commissioners filed their complaint with the State Bar in the weeks following the dismissal of Duty’s lawsuit seeking to remove County Judge Dan Gattis from office for acts of alleged misconduct. Bell County District Judge Rick Morris declined reviewing the case merits and instead dismissed the lawsuit based on a motion filed by Gattis attorney Martha S. Dickie calling for invocation of the “forgiveness doctrine,” a Texas Local Government Code section that states “An officer may not be removed under this chapter for an act the officer committed before election to office.”
Though the suit’s dismissal precluded an open review of allegations that Gattis abused open meetings requirements and procedures for expending taxpayer funds, some of the same issues could be revisited in the State Bar of Texas grievance proceedings. Eighteen out of the original 24 complaints have already been dismissed, but six are moving forward to the next procedural stage in which county commissioners court members will be required to answer questions, requests for relevant documents substantiating the allegations and oral depositions in which participants testify under oath.
One of the final six claims appears to have already been reviewed and dismissed when Georgetown attorney Kerry E. Russell earlier this year filed a professional conduct violation claim against Duty, a claim that was subsequently dismissed as per the Feb. 20 edition of The Williamson County Sun .
In response to Hawes’ campaign allegations, Duty recently told Community Impact Newspaper that “her legal disputes with commissioners were the result of her properly doing her job” and explained how this performance supported her prior campaign platform “of being tough on crime, reforming and modernizing the county attorney’s office and being a watchdog over the ‘good old boy’ system at the courthouse.”
The Williamson County Attorney’s office handles domestic violence and juvenile cases plus operates a hot check division that serves as a clearinghouse for reporting worthless checks writers. While the District Attorney’s office handles felony criminal offenses, the County Attorney’s office prosecutes all misdemeanor cases, typically more than 11,000 new cases each year.
The Williamson County Sun provides this perspective from Hawes: “We have one person who doesn’t get along with all the elected officials in the county,” Mr. Hawes said. “We’ve got to take the county attorney out of the newspaper and only have us be in the newspaper when we’re doing good things, not spats and disputes.”
Meanwhile, Duty stands by her actions saying “I will run for re-election based on my record, and I look forward to next year’s primary and the opportunity to discuss these important issues with the voters of Williamson County.”
In today’s political climate, the public is tired of style over substance, “rainbows” over reality and deception over decency. Truth be told, our country was founded and derived enduring strength based on spats and disputes while media reporting nothing but good news is generally known as propaganda.
We’ll take perhaps flawed, but strong advocates of open, transparent government any day. Whether Williamson County voters agree remains to be seen. Two distinct choices are being offered. What an interesting race this promises to be!