The Alachua City Commission voted during a regular meeting on Monday to resolicit outside attorneys to investigate the resignation of three of its four city planners in February. 

Resident Bryan Buescher suggested the commission add the item to the agenda, which followed a joint meeting with the Alachua County Board of County Commissioners. 

He referenced Commissioner Dayna Williams’ original motion from Feb. 10 that directed City Attorney Marian Rush to pursue outside attorneys to do an independent investigation into the resignations of principal planners Justin Tabor and Adam Hall, as well as Planning and Community Development Director Kathy Winburn.  

The commission canceled pursuing the investigation later in February following a recommendation of an attorney from Rush, and also voted against staff’s recommendations in March to hire Jacobs Engineering Group, Inc., to help fill the gap left in the planning department. 

In March, Tabor published a public letter citing external influence and pressure from former City Manager Adam Boukari for his resignation, and said City Manager Mike DaRoza enabled the influences.  

Boukari’s law office and Alachua Today next door are also currently under investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for alleged crimes against minors.  

Beuscher said an investigation into the resignations could help assure citizens that no outside influences were, or are, at play as suggested in Tabor’s letter, and would be timely considering active interviews of planner applicants and new developments being pushed through the planning and zoning board. 

DaRoza said of the open positions, the planning director’s position had been filled, and they also interviewed and made an offer for a principal planner, whose acceptance arrived on Monday. Both positions are expected to start in June. 

Rush said that while it would be her preference to find two to three attorneys to do the investigation with planning backgrounds and from outside the immediate area where there’s been “a lot more publicity,” they will be difficult to find.  

Rush also asked if she was allowed to share Tabor’s open letter, and DaRoza said it should be encouraged that she do so. 

“Me being a part of this, I have no problem with that letter,” he said. “In fact, I would suggest that that letter be part of [the investigation].” 

Commissioner Shirley Green Brown said she believed the commission had “left this hanging long enough” and made the motion to pursue an investigation, which Commissioner Jacob Fletcher seconded. The motion passed 4-1 with Williams in dissent. 

“We talk about moving forward, but we can’t move forward in the right direction if we don’t know where we’ve been,” said Fletcher, who also moved to waive the meeting past the 11 p.m. cutoff in order to address the item. “I think we still have the time to right our ship on this. I would really encourage the commissioners to think about how we strive to reach transparency and accountability by acknowledging it.” 

Alachua’s Human Resources Director, Tara Malone, approached the podium during public comment and said, through tears, that the commission’s actions teetered on infringement of operations of the organization under the purview of DaRoza and would have ramifications extending beyond the investigation.  

During Monday’s meeting, the City Commission also voted down a voluntary annexation of Livingston Farms, 3-2, with Commissioner Jennifer Ringersen, Fletcher and Mayor Walter Welch in dissent.  

City staff and the applicant said the roughly 222-acre property met the voluntary annexation requirements by being contiguous to the existing municipal boundary, reasonably compact and not creating an enclave. 

However, Fletcher requested Rush research and confirm in writing that the annexation would not create an enclave, contrary to what he said he saw on the map in the staff’s presentation. 

Multiple residents also pointed out during public comment that the presentation falsely claimed the land surrounding the property was on city water when it’s on wells.  

One person said he’d seen the property listed on Zillow for $4 million and that a sale was pending, scrutinizing the ambiguity that the goal of annexation would not be to rezone and commercially develop the property. 

“If the city doesn’t currently have its city planners, I don’t know how we can move forward with something like this that’s going to require significant planning,” said resident Suzy Wise. “Everything that’s on that property is at risk by bringing this into the city for the purpose of then changing the zoning and the development.”