THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 9, 1994 TAG: 9409090606
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY LANE DeGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MANTEO LENGTH: Medium: 90 lines
Shirley Hassell, who won the May Democratic primary for a seat on Dare County's Board of Commissioners, was fired from her $18,180 commercial cleaning contract with the county Thursday.
Hassell had been cleaning county offices since 1981.
Her termination letter from County Manager Terry Wheeler was dated Tuesday - the day that Hassell asked the commissioners to reprimand Wheeler.
Wheeler said he fired Hassell because the five county offices she was hired to take care of were not being properly cleaned.
Hassell claimed it was a personal matter.
``Terry Wheeler and I have never gotten along. He's been trying to get rid of me since 1990,'' Hassell said Thursday afternoon, a few hours after receiving the termination notice, which takes effect in 30 days. ``I feel like I'm being set up as an example for the rest of Dare County employees to show them, hey, if you don't do what Terry Wheeler tells you to do, you'll be out.
``I do not feel that we've been remiss in our cleaning duties,'' said Hassell. ``I feel, instead, that my civil rights have been violated.
``Because I spoke out publicly against a county official, I lost my job.''
In a letter dated Sept. 6, Wheeler said he was terminating Hassell's Outer Banks Cleaning Service contract for the courthouse, recreation department, public works facility, commissioners' annex and Department of Motor Vehicles because of ``complaints we had received about the lack of cleaning in . . . buildings under contract to you.''
The county manager sent Hassell five letters of complaint dating from 1984 - one a 1991 correspondence which he had written. The most recent letter, from Sheriff's Department Chief Deputy Rodney Midgett, was dated Aug. 8. It said that the courthouse floors ``were very dirty and the Judge's Chambers needed cleaning.''
Hassell said Thursday she was ``very angry and upset. That contract was a significant business loss for me. I've already hired an attorney and I'm going to fight.''
Throughout her campaign for commissioner, Hassell has been persistent in asking for information about county salaries, contracts, policies, payments and virtually every other aspect of the government. Prompted by her copious requests, the Board of Commissioners adopted a rule in July requiring all inquiries from the public to flow through Wheeler. Hassell said she has sent Wheeler questions almost every day - some days as many as a dozen at a time.
``But he has responded to few of my faxes,'' Hassell said Thursday. ``It was all just a ploy to head me off at the pass.
``I'm trying to get information that the people want to know, so I can talk to them about county government. I'm tired of the commissioners hiding things from the public. This just shows the voters what kind of intimidation goes on.''
Last month, Hassell approached commissioners about accounting methods which showed that dozens of county checks had been issued to one woman. At the meeting, Hassell asked who the woman was. Wheeler said the computerized check registry to which Hassell was referring was erroneous. Those checks all went to different people but were logged under one woman's name, he said, and he didn't know the woman's identity.
A couple weeks later - Hassell reported during the commissioners' meeting Tuesday - she asked again for the identity. Wheeler called the woman and told her that Hassell wanted to know who she was, Hassell said, an account that Wheeler does not dispute.
``He had no right to do that,'' Hassell said. ``Terry Wheeler had no right to go to that woman and use my name. That's why I went to the Board Tuesday and asked them to reprimand him.''
Of the cleaning contract, Hassell admitted that ``there are times you don't clean as well as others. That's human nature.'' But she denied that the courthouse had been left in disarray.
``That last letter was dated an entire month ago, and today was the first I've heard of it,'' Hassell said. ``If this has been a problem, why weren't we notified sooner? If we needed to correct our cleaning practices in that building, why weren't we given a chance to before we were fired?
``Is five complaints in 13 years really enough reason to fire someone?''
Wheeler was out of town Thursday and unavailable for comment. But he left a brief statement with County Attorney H. Al Cole Jr.: ``In my opinion,'' Wheeler said, ``it is clear that the county has been paying for services it isn't getting.''
``I'm probably never going to get that cleaning contract back,'' said Hassell, who in November will run for commissioner against Republican Charles Elms. ``But I'm not going to lay down and take this. And I'm not going to stop asking for public information - information that the public really needs to have about their government.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
Shirley Hassell
by CNB