Members of the Fulton Housing Authority Board of Commissioners voted to terminate the employment of FHA Executive Director Chris Garrett last week.
Harold Siebert made the motion to terminate Garrett, according to newly released minutes from the Sept. 21 executive session during which the decision was made. The vote was unanimous.
Board President Tim Wilkerson did not respond to a request for comment Friday.
Longtime FHA maintenance technician Thomas Branch is serving as interim director after being appointed to the role in early September.
"There are a lot of things going on, but we still have tenants to take care of," Branch said shortly after his appointment. "I'll try to form a plan and see where I can help out."
Also in September, Wilkerson told the Fulton Sun that if Garrett were to be terminated, the board would seek applications for a new executive director.
Several former residents of the Fulton Housing Authority have alleged that while Garrett was executive director, the agency used unusual, unfair and illegal eviction practices including locking tenants out of their units. One former tenant, Mark Howard, brought a lawsuit against the FHA over an alleged self-help eviction in July.
Garrett was put on paid administrative leave Aug. 28 while the FHA board conducted an internal investigation into the complaints brought forth by three tenants and alleged in the lawsuit, according to Wilkerson.
Background
The practice of a landlord changing a tenant's locks, known as a "self-help eviction," is illegal under Missouri law.
Howard was arrested in July while riding in a car with another FHA tenant, Joseph Wilhite, who is currently fighting his eviction in court. Both had their leases terminated by the FHA shortly after their July 12 arrest.
Howard's lawsuit named both the FHA and Garrett as defendants, and claims on July 31, Garrett "unlawfully and without notice entered and changed the locks at the premises and destroyed (Howard's) personal property without lawful cause." It states Howard was unable to regain access to the residence or his personal property. A separate court filing by his lawyer Mary Beth Mueller described Howard as a 58-year-old with limited speech and mobility.
On Sept. 24, Mueller filed a motion to dismiss in the case. It was dismissed "with prejudice," each party bearing their own court costs. According to Mueller, a settlement was reached in the case; she declined to comment further because negotiations were still ongoing in a number of other cases relating to the Fulton Housing Authority's tenants.
"We're at five or six cases," she said Friday. "They keep coming out of the woodwork once they hear there's somebody trying to help them."
Negotiations in Wilhite's case are ongoing, according to a Sept. 23 update on Missouri Casenet. Wilhite alleges the Fulton Housing Authority delivered a notice of lease termination to him July 23. The notice cited Wilhite's alleged criminal activity. It gave Wilhite three days to vacate the premises and forbade him from returning to FHA property for five years.
"Fulton Housing Authority will be changing the locks and taking possession of the unit to protect your property as well as ours on July 26," the notice added. "We will dispose of any unclaimed property left in the unit."
Wilhite claims July 27, he went out to get breakfast at McDonald's. When he returned home, his key didn't work. The locks had been changed, he said, and he couldn't access his medication and other property for several days, during which he lived in a nearby park.
The FHA's standard lease agreement lays out situations in which the FHA may - but is not required to - terminate a lease.
Those include any criminal activity by the tenant, a household member or guest, on or off FHA premises, that threatens the "health, safety or right to peaceful enjoyment" of FHA property by other residents or employees; and any drug-related criminal activity. The lease agreement specifies no criminal conviction or even arrest has to take place so long as the "FHA believes, in good faith, that a breach of this section has occurred."
Regardless of the circumstances of a lease termination, if a tenant doesn't leave by the end of the notice period, under Missouri law, there are steps a landlord must take. They have to file with the court to begin eviction proceedings. Missouri law requires the tenant be notified an eviction lawsuit has been filed; the tenant must also be given an opportunity to be heard in court.