Report: Bannister offered resignation to avoid indictment
Gwinnett Daily Post Article October 27, 2010
LAWRENCEVILLE — Charles Bannister asked a grand jury if they would excuse a crime if he resigned from office, a report released Tuesday said. The grand jury presentments: Now available in text or PDF.
Posted: 8:13 AM Oct 26, 2010
Reporter: By Camie Young, Senior Writer
Email Address: [email protected]AWRENCEVILLE — Charles Bannister asked a grand jury if they would excuse a crime if he resigned from office, a report released Tuesday said.
Bannister resigned as chairman of the Board of Commissioners that day, Oct. 8, and the grand jury decided to return a “no bill” of indictment on a charge of perjury — which could have carried a 10-year prison sentence.
“The Grand Jury weighed the possible outcomes,” the report said, after noting that the proposed charge was based upon contradictions in testimony, not the Palm Creek park site purchase in question. “If we had returned an indictment then removal from office would have depended upon the outcome of the criminal trial. The Grand Jury decided that assured, permanent removal from office was the appropriate solution to one of the problems we uncovered in our investigation.”
Phone messages left for Bannister were not returned Tuesday.
The report gives little information about the indictment released last week against Commissioner Kevin Kenerly, who is accused of accepting a bribe from a developer for negotiating a favorable deal in the county’s purchase of land for an expansion to Rabbit Hill Park.
“The Grand Jury believes that a presentment or report is not the appropriate forum to report our findings,” the report said in a section detailing the Rabbit Hill purchase, one of five investigated.
Kenerly declined to comment.
The report was expected to be sealed until next week but was released Tuesday after it had been leaked to media outlets.
‘Pure politics’
The 23-member grand jury, which began investigating the land deals last ear, had plenty of criticism for the county’s land acquisition procedures, especially decrying the practice of “district courtesy,” where the board defers to the commissioner who represents the area in question.
In the Palm Creek purchase, the grand jury said Bannister testified that he took the lead on the process to get the attention of Commissioner Mike Beaudreau to teach him a lesson.
“It was pure politics,” the report quotes his testimony, adding that Kenerly believed Bannister was pushing the purchase to “stick it to Mike.”
“(Kenerly) stated that he disregarded district courtesy in his vote because Commissioner Beaudreau had benefited from previous Board actions but then publicly criticized those actions,” the report said.
In general, the report said, district courtesy is “at the root of the problems with each land transaction we examined.”
The practice allowed commissioners to avoid responsibility and placed control with one person. For example, an account of the purchase of land on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard showed that Kenerly did not bring the purchase forward for months, causing the property owner to sell to a developer, who later sold it to the county at a price $4 million higher.
“These are transactions that involve millions of dollars and affect all citizens of Gwinnett County,” the report said. “All commissioners should be involved and held responsible for all phases of these types of projects.”
Recriminations and recommendations
For years, purchases at inflated prices have been reported by the media, and often they have been typified as unethical but not necessarily illegal.
The grand jury report documented some atypical actions in many of the cases, including the apparent leak from a commissioner of the top negotiable price of potential parkland to then-Senior Court Judge James Oxendine, who was acting on the part of a developer in the negotiation.
And grand jurists lambasted Commissioner Shirley Lasseter, recommending she “develop at least a basic understanding of the land acquisition process, ... become more engaged in issues which affect her district and the entire county (and) ... understand her role as a policy maker and decision maker rather than relying on the county staff to do her work for her.”
But the only criminal issues to come forth are the bribery case against Kenerly and the decision not to indict Bannister for inconsistencies told to the grand jury.
Kenerly has said he will not resign, although the governor is expected to impanel a commission to consider suspending the four-term commissioner next month. His term concludes at the end of the year.
The grand jury blasts county officials for the procedures that have caused millions of dollars to be spent, and recommends a reorganization of county government.
“The current system with its reliance on district courtesy and its over-reliance on county staff provides too many opportunities for conflicts of interest and fosters a culture of inappropriate business relationships which have been the common thread running through our investigation,” the report said, recommending that all commission seats be made full-time positions so that commissioners would have an opportunity to be better informed and to eliminate potential conflicts.
Noting the impact to the county’s finances, the report said, “if just one of the land transactions we investigated could have been prevented by a wiser decision, that would more than pay for the salaries of full-time commissioners.”
As an alternative, some grand jurists said the government should be restructured to include more county commissioners representing smaller districts.
During the investigation, the grand jury found “serious pervasive lack of communication, information sharing and even trust between the county commissioners and the heads of the major departments of county government.”
The land purchasing procedures of the county “is ruled more by custom and by the whims of individual commissioners than it is by sound business decisions and economic considerations.”
In addition to changes to the land purchase procedure, the grand jury recommends ethics reform for the Board of Commissioners, including disclosure of business interests and prohibitions of receiving gifts.
“Without these basics, truth cannot exist,” the report said.
Gwinnett Daily Post Article October 27, 2010
LAWRENCEVILLE — Charles Bannister asked a grand jury if they would excuse a crime if he resigned from office, a report released Tuesday said. The grand jury presentments: Now available in text or PDF.
Posted: 8:13 AM Oct 26, 2010
Reporter: By Camie Young, Senior Writer
Email Address: [email protected]AWRENCEVILLE — Charles Bannister asked a grand jury if they would excuse a crime if he resigned from office, a report released Tuesday said.
Bannister resigned as chairman of the Board of Commissioners that day, Oct. 8, and the grand jury decided to return a “no bill” of indictment on a charge of perjury — which could have carried a 10-year prison sentence.
“The Grand Jury weighed the possible outcomes,” the report said, after noting that the proposed charge was based upon contradictions in testimony, not the Palm Creek park site purchase in question. “If we had returned an indictment then removal from office would have depended upon the outcome of the criminal trial. The Grand Jury decided that assured, permanent removal from office was the appropriate solution to one of the problems we uncovered in our investigation.”
Phone messages left for Bannister were not returned Tuesday.
The report gives little information about the indictment released last week against Commissioner Kevin Kenerly, who is accused of accepting a bribe from a developer for negotiating a favorable deal in the county’s purchase of land for an expansion to Rabbit Hill Park.
“The Grand Jury believes that a presentment or report is not the appropriate forum to report our findings,” the report said in a section detailing the Rabbit Hill purchase, one of five investigated.
Kenerly declined to comment.
The report was expected to be sealed until next week but was released Tuesday after it had been leaked to media outlets.
‘Pure politics’
The 23-member grand jury, which began investigating the land deals last ear, had plenty of criticism for the county’s land acquisition procedures, especially decrying the practice of “district courtesy,” where the board defers to the commissioner who represents the area in question.
In the Palm Creek purchase, the grand jury said Bannister testified that he took the lead on the process to get the attention of Commissioner Mike Beaudreau to teach him a lesson.
“It was pure politics,” the report quotes his testimony, adding that Kenerly believed Bannister was pushing the purchase to “stick it to Mike.”
“(Kenerly) stated that he disregarded district courtesy in his vote because Commissioner Beaudreau had benefited from previous Board actions but then publicly criticized those actions,” the report said.
In general, the report said, district courtesy is “at the root of the problems with each land transaction we examined.”
The practice allowed commissioners to avoid responsibility and placed control with one person. For example, an account of the purchase of land on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard showed that Kenerly did not bring the purchase forward for months, causing the property owner to sell to a developer, who later sold it to the county at a price $4 million higher.
“These are transactions that involve millions of dollars and affect all citizens of Gwinnett County,” the report said. “All commissioners should be involved and held responsible for all phases of these types of projects.”
Recriminations and recommendations
For years, purchases at inflated prices have been reported by the media, and often they have been typified as unethical but not necessarily illegal.
The grand jury report documented some atypical actions in many of the cases, including the apparent leak from a commissioner of the top negotiable price of potential parkland to then-Senior Court Judge James Oxendine, who was acting on the part of a developer in the negotiation.
And grand jurists lambasted Commissioner Shirley Lasseter, recommending she “develop at least a basic understanding of the land acquisition process, ... become more engaged in issues which affect her district and the entire county (and) ... understand her role as a policy maker and decision maker rather than relying on the county staff to do her work for her.”
But the only criminal issues to come forth are the bribery case against Kenerly and the decision not to indict Bannister for inconsistencies told to the grand jury.
Kenerly has said he will not resign, although the governor is expected to impanel a commission to consider suspending the four-term commissioner next month. His term concludes at the end of the year.
The grand jury blasts county officials for the procedures that have caused millions of dollars to be spent, and recommends a reorganization of county government.
“The current system with its reliance on district courtesy and its over-reliance on county staff provides too many opportunities for conflicts of interest and fosters a culture of inappropriate business relationships which have been the common thread running through our investigation,” the report said, recommending that all commission seats be made full-time positions so that commissioners would have an opportunity to be better informed and to eliminate potential conflicts.
Noting the impact to the county’s finances, the report said, “if just one of the land transactions we investigated could have been prevented by a wiser decision, that would more than pay for the salaries of full-time commissioners.”
As an alternative, some grand jurists said the government should be restructured to include more county commissioners representing smaller districts.
During the investigation, the grand jury found “serious pervasive lack of communication, information sharing and even trust between the county commissioners and the heads of the major departments of county government.”
The land purchasing procedures of the county “is ruled more by custom and by the whims of individual commissioners than it is by sound business decisions and economic considerations.”
In addition to changes to the land purchase procedure, the grand jury recommends ethics reform for the Board of Commissioners, including disclosure of business interests and prohibitions of receiving gifts.
“Without these basics, truth cannot exist,” the report said.