Mitch Peters, president of the Indiana Dunes Tourism Board for the past 13 years, resigned his post Friday in a letter citing political motivation for unsuccessful efforts to oust him at Tuesday’s Porter County Council meeting.
With one member absent, the board tied when called upon by Council President Mike Brickner, R-At-Large, to vote on removing Peters.
“The reality is they’re just not going to stop,” Peters said by phone Saturday morning. “I didn’t resign for political reasons. It’s just this can’t continue. Every time I think it’s over it starts back up.”
Peters, who attended Tuesday’s council meeting with five members of the IDT executive committee flanking him, as well as new CEO Christine Livingston, said he came to the meeting under false pretenses. “I was lied to,” he said.
Peters said he was told by Board of Commissioners President Jim Biggs, R-North, that all the controversy over the contractual settlement reached with former CEO Lorelei Weimer regarding her departure in January with a $225,000 buy-out could be concluded and the board left intact if IDT did three things.
Those things, which Peters said the board accomplished, were: agreeing to all disciplinary actions being handled by the county’s human resources department, though Peters says they have very little in the way of disciplinary problems; agreeing to have Auditor Karen Martin’s office oversee its payroll, which has been handled internally by vendor ADP; and having Peters come before the council at its meeting to acknowledge his failure to communicate the situation with Weimer in a timely manner and explain changes that were being made in the department.
“At the time they said the council or the commission,” Peters said of the requirement for his presence at a public meeting. “I kind of wish I had chosen the commission now.”
He agreed to the terms and said Biggs told him Council Vice President Red Stone, R-1st, would be giving him a call. He said Stone, who has been vocal about his desire for Peters to step down, did call him. “Red said, ‘This is all behind us. I am not seeking your removal anymore.’”
Brickner, however, did.
“It has nothing to do with politics,” Brickner said Saturday. He said when the council appoints someone to the board it expects accountability, particularly in this case when a director was being removed and a large amount of taxpayer money being spent. The council will continue to communicate its expectation of transparency to the county’s boards, he said.
Brickner said he could not comment on any remarks made to Peters by Biggs or Stone. “I wasn’t privy to those conversations,” he said.
Peters contends Weimer violated her non-disclosure agreement when she spoke at the council meeting Tuesday. He disputes her argument that she was given one day to decide whether to address the IDT board or that votes were illegally lined up to fire her, saying it would take more than a day just to organize a board meeting.
“It wasn’t like we were taking a vote,” he said. “We were reviewing the information. All these accusations and allegations are a little disturbing.”
Peters said state law used to require the makeup of the board to be no more than one over a simple majority of either political party, but got rid of that requirement some time ago.
Biggs said after the last Board of Commissioners meeting that the IDT board has become imbalanced in favor of Democrats, that the board has gotten too large, and should include in its ranks a member of the county council rather than an appointee of the council.
“It sounds like to me Commissioner Biggs’ plan is to restructure the board and get rid of everybody and disenfranchise the community,” Peters said. “It’s set up that way to represent the community, from Hebron to Dune Acres.
“It is sad that our entire focus has turned to political control of a Board that was highly functioning at all levels,” Peters wrote in part in the two-page letter he provided to the IDT board, IDT staff, county council, and all attorneys involved.
Biggs laughed at the contention of political motivation. “It was a dominant number of Republicans that placed Mitch on that board to begin with,” he said Saturday of Peters’ reappointment by the council in January.
“Somebody had to be accountable for this,” he said of the entering into a settlement agreement and the county’s governing bodies not being made aware until the money had to be paid out. “It was almost a quarter of a million dollars that left with an employee they claim they wanted to get rid of.
“It was clear to me there was something else here they did not want everyone else to know, especially the public.”
Shelley Jones is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
