Details alleged to be left out of EOC meeting

CONWAY -- The lawyer for the former executive director of the Waccamaw Economic Opportunity Council said Wednesday that EOC board member David Eagleton did not give a complete account of her client's hearing before the agency's grievance committee at the last board meeting.

Eagleton, the board's first vice chairman and chairman of the grievance committee, told board members that neither an ex-employee nor her representative showed up at a scheduled meeting and that the committee recommended her firing be upheld.

Eagleton did not name the employee, but Henrietta Golding, attorney for former agency executive director Beth Fryar, said it could be her.

Golding said the hearing Eagleton apparently referred to at the board meeting was in her opinion a rerun of an October grievance committee hearing at which evidence in Fryar's case was presented.

No mention of the earlier hearing was given to board members in a 11/2-hour closed session that preceded the vote to uphold the firing, said Tommy Mitchum, a new EOC board member from Williamsburg County.

Eagleton could not be reached for comment Wednesday afternoon.

Fryar was fired from the agency's top job last summer while she was on family medical leave, which is not legal according to federal law. It was the second time members of the board had tried to oust Fryar. The first time, they did not follow their own bylaws in doing so and withdrew the action.

Members of the board have been under fire since March, when a state audit found a number of irregularities and submitted a list of actions they must take to comply with regulations. For months, board members resisted making the changes, denying they had done anything wrong and charging that the state oversight office had no right to do the audit or to demand the changes it did.

At one point, the state changed the agency's funding status, but rescinded that action when it was found to create hardship among the agency's thousands of low-income clients in Horry, Georgetown and Williamsburg counties. The board oversees the agency's spending of about $15 million in federal funds for Head Start programs, weatherization work on homes and assistance for rent, mortgage and utility bills.

State legislators from the three counties asked all board members to resign to try to resolve problems on the board, and all but three did so. At full strength, the board has 15 members.

Most recently, the board has taken to conducting much of its business in closed sessions, the legality of which has been questioned by the S.C. Press Association. The state oversight office, the Office of Economic Opportunity, also has expressed concern about the closed sessions.

Board chairman Zacharius Grate refuses and also has instructed staff to refuse to answer any questions concerning agency business unless a formal Freedom of Information Act request is filed. The Sun News has filed two such requests since then, and to date, the agency has not been forthcoming with any of the information that is sought, including the amount of money the agency has paid lawyers since April 1 and the content of two bylaw amendments that the board approved at its last meeting.

Golding said the grievance committee meetings at which she presented evidence why Fryar shouldn't have been fired was held Oct. 8.

She said that there was not a quorum of committee members present at the meeting and that she objected to moving forward. Golding is recognized as an expert in labor law by the S.C. Supreme Court.

She said that the meeting continued despite her objection and that she presented testimony and exhibits. Because committee members continued the meeting despite not having a quorum, she presumed that they had waived the need to have a quorum to conduct business.

A week later, Golding said, she received a letter from the committee that stated a new hearing would be scheduled because there was no quorum at the Oct. 8 meeting. The earlier hearing had been taped, Golding said.

Eagleton did not mention the earlier hearing in his comments during the public portion of the board's last meeting.

Mitchum said he was not aware that Fryar was fired while she was on family medical leave.

Mitchum said it was his absence at the Oct. 8 meeting that likely resulted in the lack of a quorum. He couldn't go because of the funeral of his two sisters, who had been murdered, he said.

Mitchum said he had told Eagleton that he planned to abstain on votes concerning Fryar because he didn't feel that he knew enough about the situation.

Golding has said she believes the six board members who voted to fire Fryar are personally liable in the action. That means that their personal assets could be taken should damages be awarded in a lawsuit over the firing.