The position of permanent city attorney remains unfilled at city hall, since the late April departure of former city attorney Ron Ramsingh following his indictment and arrest stemming from a corruption-related investigation that is ongoing by the state attorney’s office.
Ramsingh was terminated without cause and walked away with a $221,000 payout. Kendal Hardin has been working as interim city attorney since then.
Only four people applied for the position of permanent city attorney, according to a screening committee, whose members each were appointed by a commissioner and the mayor.
Former Key West city attorney Shawn Smith, who preceded Ramsingh in the position for more than a decade, is chairing that selection committee and spoke to the commissioners at their Aug. 6 meeting.
Smith related the committee’s suggestion that the commission hire an outside law firm to act as city attorney for 12 to 18 months until an experienced and qualified candidate can be found and hired.
“Quite frankly, the city needs some stability,” Smith said. “You have an interim attorney here who hasn’t even applied for the job because watching you guys is not fun. We want someone to stabilize things for a while, to take the bullets the city attorney is supposed to take but not to the degree that they’re coming now. Our hope is that an experienced attorney will mentor those currently in that office and maybe in a year we’ll get more experienced applicants who have sat in that seat and are willing to come here.”
The commission ultimately voted unanimously to support the screening committee’s recommendation. That committee will bring forward recommendations for potential outside legal firms at the September commission meeting.
In other commission news, Key West lawmakers declined to pass a resolution expressing the city’s opposition to the immigrant detention center known as Alligator Alcatraz, despite urging by Commissioner Monica Haskell, who proposed the measure.
Haskell said she wanted the city commission to keep due process and people’s human rights at the forefront of their minds, along with the environmental concerns posed by a 5,000-person detention center in the protected Everglades.
“We’re in hurricane season now, and there’s no hurricane evacuation plan for that facility,” Haskell said, adding that the Everglades provide fresh water to the Biscayne Aquifer, which provides drinking water to the Florida Keys.
Haskell detailed lawsuits that have been filed against the detention facility by two environmental groups.
In response to Haskell, commissioner Lissette Carey said, “I respect you, commissioner Haskell, for supporting those environmental groups, but I support our state and federal government and for that reason, I can’t support this resolution. The city of Key West keeps giving the state and federal government the proverbial middle finger, and then opening our hand and asking for funding. I think we have to be respectful to our leadership. … Many times our city takes a position against what the state and federal leaders are doing, and at this point, that facility is needed in order to support the efforts of our state and federal government, in my opinion.”
Lastly, city manager Brian L. Barroso alerted the commission and all Key West residents to new efforts at transparency and accessibility on the city’s website. The site now features regular updates about efforts the city has undertaken to fulfill the recommendations of a recent grand jury report that was the result of the corruption scandal involving the city’s former attorney and his brother, Raj Ramsingh, the city’s former chief building official.
The city is planning a comprehensive review of all building permits issued between 2020 and 2025, but Barroso acknowledged that the state attorney’s investigation into many of those permits is ongoing, so the city doesn’t want to duplicate efforts and spend unnecessary taxpayer money until the state attorney’s investigation is concluded.
