Some

of the 17 Fayetteville City Hall workers

interviewed in an investigation of former city

manager Mike Bryant accused him of sexual

harassment and failure to follow city policy in

dealing with discipline problems.

Others

said they had no knowledge of anything of the

sort.

Bryant

signed a termination agreement with the city Feb.

17 following a month-long investigation into

sexual harassment and hostile work place charges

against him brought by Main Street director

Sherri Anderson and accounting clerk Amanda

Jones.

The

city agreed to end its investigation and Bryant

resigned, receiving 14 weeks pay and other

considerations.

In

a March 1 letter, Anderson's attorney, Lee Parks,

offered to settle Anderson's ongoing complaint

against the city for $125,000.

In

response to an open records request from The

Citizen, the city has released 92 pages of

testimony and other documents gathered by

investigating attorney Greg Futch following

allegations by Anderson and Jones.

Futch

listed 34 city employees, former employees and

local residents as "witnesses to informally

interview," singling out 13 witnesses for

formal depositions.

Of

the 34, check marks appeared by 17 names, seeming

to indicate they had been interviewed.

Anderson

and Jones had alleged that Bryant made numerous

sexually suggestive remarks to them and

repeatedly asked them to join him for after-hours

social activities, and Anderson accused him of

retaliating when she refused his advances by

humiliating her and withholding her pay.

Witnesses also said Bryant touched Jones in ways

some of them considered inappropriate, including

"patting on leg, playing with hair, rubbing

shoulders, hugging her close."

Bryant

said casual jokes around the office were taken

out of context in the women's complaints. In his

interview with Futch, Bryant also suggested that

Anderson's charges were motivated by revenge

after he disciplined her for failing to show up

for work. One city hall worker, finance director

Lynn Raven, said Bryant had "run-ins"

with Anderson over Anderson's "failure to

follow policy and procedures about reimbursements

or use of vendors, etc.," according to the

investigator's notes.

In

the interviews with Futch, city employees also

accused Bryant of showing favoritism to

attractive female employees and, in one case,

directing that a worker be fired in order to make

room for a more attractive one.

City

water and sewer director Rick Eastin said Bryant

"wanted things done outside of city

policy," Futch's notes relate.

"Termination of employee without valid

reason" was given as an explanation of why

Eastin's relationship with Bryant was "bad

to terrible," according to the attorney.

According

to Futch, Eastin related that Bryant last July

told Eastin to fire a worker and then move

another into her position. "Didn't like her

appearance," Futch's notes say.

Eastin

also told Futch that on one occasion, Bryant told

a female employee to turn toward the wall and

said, "Look, she's going to hit the wall

before her nose."

In

an interview with city clerk Judy Stephens, Futch

notes that Stephens told him Bryant "didn't

follow the policies and procedures on

hiring." In the case of the alleged

shuffling of employees to bring on a new,

attractive one, Stephens said that Bryant and

finance director Lynn Raven "had a business

dinner with [the attractive worker] and they

hired her."

He

later moved the attractive worker to a front

office position because "she was more

attractive to look at," according to notes

on Futch's meeting with Stephens.

In

Futch's interview with finance director Raven,

his notes indicate that auditors complained about

Anderson's lack of record-keeping, and Bryant set

up meetings with Anderson and the auditors to

deal with the problem. "this was an ongoing

problem with her," Raven is quoted by Futch.

Raven

said "she hasn't heard Bryant ask [Anderson]

to do anything demeaning," the notes say.

Anderson had accused Bryant of having her clean

out a storage room while a subordinate ushered a

dignitary around town, but Bryant has said the

"dignitary" was a visitor from a small

south Georgia town who wanted information about

the Main Street program, and the cleanup work was

not meant to be demeaning.

Raven

backed him up. "The cleaning out of the

cages is done by other departments also. Lynn and

Judy and others have always had to do the annual

destroying of old records, etc.," Futch's

notes say.

City

personnel director Brenda Hall called the

allegations from both Anderson and Jones

"surprising," according to Futch's

notes.

In

her interview with Futch, Hall blames problems

between Anderson and Bryant on

"communication," and says Anderson

didn't follow proper procedures. She says Jones'

age may have been a factor in her charges.

"Others would laugh off his jokes," the

notes relate.

In

his own interview with Futch, Bryant said

Anderson had disturbing confrontations with her

assistants, made decisions such as changing the

time of a parade without informing key people who

would be affected by the decisions, failed to

document invoices or properly handle payroll, and

failed to show up for work on one occasion.

But

Bryant said he never inappropriately asked

Anderson or Jones out, his jokes with sexual

overtones were no different from those told

commonly around the work place, and never touched

employees inappropriately.

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