- May 4, 2024
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Three members of the Southeast Volusia Advertising Authority were accused of violating the Sunshine Law at last week's Volusia County Council meeting.
BY EMILY BLACKWOOD | STAFF WRITER
Tensions rose at the last week's Volusia County Council Meeting, when Chairman Jason Davis called for the resignation of three sub-board members for accused violation of the Sunshine Law.
According to Davis, Tom Clapsaddle, Tony Stagni and Eugene Sheldon of the Southeast Volusia Advertising Authority were commenting about government matters in an email between the executive director of SVAA and a County Council member.
According to the Sunshine Law Manual, communication between board members via email is only a violation when it results in the responses of other board members. If the email is just between two people, it is considered public record and not a violation.
The original email went from Executive Director Carl Watson to council member Deb Denys regarding SVAA money Watson spent on lunches. Davis originally discovered the way the board was spending its money, and Denys asked Watson for an explanation on what had happened.
Four emails total were found. Watson copied other board members, who responded.
Eugene Sheldon responded with, “Who is the rat? I was hoping we as a board we would stop this and work as one. Thank you, Carl, and you are doing great.”
During the VCC meeting, Davis publicly declared himself the "rat." It was over Christmas break that he found out about the emails and said spending money for bicycle tours and lunches put them on his radar.
“I called for their resignations,” Davis said. “I want this council to do something and the answer from all of them is, ‘That’s a little extreme, don’t you think, Mr. Davis?’ No, it’s not. There is a zero-tolerance for Sunshine violation, but they refuse to enforce it.”
Watson defended his actions. In the email, he told Denys he apologized for his misunderstanding of policy and reimbursed the SVAA account for the money he spent on lunches. In a phone interview with the Ormond Beach Observer, he said the violation of Sunshine Law was a small technical error the accused board members were not aware of.
“I responded to a request from County Councilwoman Deb Denys to give her a full rundown on what transpired, ” Watson said. “I CC’d the whole board as a matter of courtesy. Unfortunately, one of our board members hit the respond all button. It was not done purposely.”
Watson said he found Davis’ call for resignation a little extreme. Davis argues that the law needs to be enforced or it won’t be followed. The VCC voted 4-3 against the resignation of SVAA board members Tom Clapsaddle, Tony Stagni and Eugene Sheldon.
Council member Doug Daniels voted against their resignation because he didn’t consider the email a violation.
“It sounded to me like what they were talking about was something that occurred in the past.” Daniels said. “You’ll find some real sticklers on Sunshine Law that think that things that occurred in the past are things that officials cannot talk about. But I think they are carrying it a little too far.”
Daniels also said the council needs to understand that volunteer board members aren’t always familiar with Sunshine Law and governments policies.
"The thing that the County Council needs to watch is, we need to be careful on how we treat people we appoint to boards,” Daniels said. “If we start treating them like this, dragging them through the mud for basically nothing, then who are we going to get to serve on these boards? You have to consider that.”
