Ethics board to hold meeting on Gwinnett commissioner

Incomplete panel to discuss Facebook post complaint.

The first Gwinnett County ethics board is scheduled to hold its first-ever meeting this week — with or without a full panel.

County officials confirmed this week that the board, which is being assembled to investigate an ethics complaint related to Commissioner Tommy Hunter’s “John Lewis is a racist pig” Facebook post, is scheduled to meet at 10 a.m. Friday.

The meeting, held in a conference room at the Gwinnett County Justice and Administration Center, is expected to be of the organizational variety. The four already assembled board members are expected to establish “procedural rules” and elect a chairman and vice-chairman of the panel.

A fifth member — one set aside to be appointed by Hunter himself — is unlikely to be present.

Hunter has thus far opted not to make the appointment granted to him in the county’s ethics ordinance.

According to the ordinance, appointments are to be made within 30 days of the involved parties being notified of the need to do so, “or as soon thereafter as practicable.” The 30-day mark passed on March 19.

Hunter’s spokesman has not responded to multiple inquiries about the commissioner’s appointment. Commission Chairman Charlotte Nash, meanwhile, has said she doesn’t see any reason why the ethics board can’t proceed without it.

“Four people have (been) seated. That’s a majority of the board,” Nash told The AJC last week. “My anticipation is that it would proceed unless there’s some type of court challenge.”

The four already appointed ethics board members are:

Herman Pennamon, a longtime community leader and volunteer, who was appointed by the county’s Board of Commissioners;

David Will, a longtime Lawrenceville attorney, who was appointed by the Gwinnett Bar Association;

Gwinnett grand juror Terri Duncan, who was appointed by the Gwinnett County district attorney’s office;

Fayette County Commissioner Charles Rousseau, who was appointed by the Association of County Commissioners of Georgia.

The ethics complaint against Hunter was filed Feb. 6 on behalf of Atlanta resident Nancie Turner. It alleges that, with Hunter’s now infamous Jan. 14 Facebook post about Lewis, he violated several portions of Gwinnett’s 2011 ethics ordinance.

The ordinance is primarily meant to target shady land deals and other corruption, but one section highlighted in the complaint against Hunter urges elected officials and county employees to “never engage in conduct which is unbecoming to a member or which constitutes a breach of public trust.”

The ethics ordinance, which applies to all county employees, technically gives the ethics board the power to recommend penalties ranging from written reprimand to removal from office. But state law makes it very difficult to remove elected officials unless a criminal offense is involved.