Problems are mounting for new councilwoman

Five weeks ago, a beaming Jada Andrews-Sullivan took the oath of office as the new council member for District 2.

Her political honeymoon didn’t last long.

Last week, Andrews-Sullivan, 43, faced accusations that she cheated her campaign field organizer, Sylvia Lopez, out of $4,200 in pay, after four checks to Lopez from the councilwoman’s campaign were returned by Andrews-Sullivan’s bank.

Amanda Meredith, a consultant who Andrews-Sullivan hired in early March to be her campaign manager, also revealed that she quit in May after weeks of waiting for overdue payments from Andrews-Sullivan’s campaign.

Meredith said she finally got paid after writing a letter to Andrews-Sullivan, in which she threatened to sue.

Meredith said Andrews-Sullivan tried to pacify her during the campaign by promising to hire Meredith as her council chief of staff.

“Little did I know, she was promising that position to a lot of people,” Meredith said Monday.

Ultimately, the chief of staff position went to insurance agent Lou Miller, who briefly served as a staff member five years ago for then-Mayor Ivy Taylor. (Taylor sacked Miller three months into her term, allegedly over Miller’s back-channel negotiations with the San Antonio Police Officers Association.)

Miller vehemently denied that Andrews-Sullivan promised a staff position to Meredith or anyone else during a hardfought campaign that ended with Andrews-Sullivan’s June 8 runoff win over former interim Councilman Keith Toney. Andrews-Sullivan declined to comment.

Questions about aide

Multiple sources, including Meredith and campaign consultant Veronica Gonzalez, also have raised questions about the councilwoman’s decision to hire local entrepreneur Eartis Eaglin III as a council aide. AndrewsSullivan and Eaglin are former partners in a local R&B/hip-hop record label called Reservoir Music Company, with Eaglin the president/chairman and Andrews-Sullivan the chief operating officer.

Andrews-Sullivan frequently describes Eaglin as her best friend, often calling him “Bestie” on social media.

Meredith and Gonzalez both say, however, that Eaglin is the councilwoman’s boyfriend, and view his hiring as an ethically dubious move. (During her candidacy, Andrews-Sullivan also paid Eaglin $340 in campaign funds for canvassing work, according to campaign finance reports.)

The city’s Ethics Code prohibits municipal officials from employing spouses “or any member of his or her household.”

That provision comes into play because sources close to Andrews-Sullivan dispute her assertion that her mailing address, an East Side home owned by her mother, is her true place of residence. They contend that she actually lives outside District 2 with Eaglin.

I spoke Tuesday morning to Andrews-Sullivan’s mother, Zinnie Ferguson Andrews, at her home near Dafoste Park. She told me that her daughter “mostly lives here,” but added that the councilwoman hadn’t spent a night at the house in the past two weeks. She declined to say where her daughter has been staying.

“I’m sure the young lady is looking for a place in District 2,” Andrews said of her daughter. “She knows she needs to live in District 2.”

Lien, salary dispute

Andrews-Sullivan also faced a lien in January of this year for $1,229 in unpaid rent at a West Side apartment on Potranco Road. Miller said Andrews-Sullivan’s brother was the tenant of the apartment and she merely co-signed for his lease, which ended in eviction.

Andrews-Sullivan’s dispute with Lopez is particularly puzzling. Lopez has 34 years of block-walking experience and says she never encountered a problem like the one with Andrews-Sullivan.

Lopez was brought onto the campaign by Gonzalez, who handled fundraising for the council hopeful.

Gonzalez said she understood that the campaign had limited resources and agreed to hold off on asking for payments until the beginning of the runoff race, when everyone assumed that Andrews-Sullivan’s fundraising would pick up.

“I really liked Jada and I believed in her, so I told the (campaign) team, ‘I will make sure you get paid before I get my percentage,’ ” Gonzalez said. “Everyone said okay.”

Gonzalez said Andrews-Sullivan eventually began entrusting her with making payments for the campaign, by giving her pre-signed checks to fill out. That led to Andrews-Sullivan encouraging her to endorse campaign checks on the candidate’s behalf, according to Gonzalez.

That’s the source of the controversy over the four returned checks to Lopez. Miller insists that it was Andrews-Sullivan’s bank, and not the candidate herself, who flagged the checks, presumably over an irregularity with the signatures. Gonzalez and Lopez don’t buy it.

No one disputes that Lopez is owed the money. Miller said Andrews-Sullivan intends to pay her the full amount when she has enough in her account. That begs the question of why the candidate handled the situation so poorly.

“I reached out to her right away,” Lopez said. “I have not heard from her. She hasn’t tried to contact me to apologize. Nothing.”