Palm Coast City Attorney Jeremiah Blocker last week told Mayor Mike Norris that his conduct with the city’s two attorneys was “unprofessional and inappropriate” following a suggestion by Norris that the attorneys were ignoring him.
It was the latest in a series of incidents involving Norris’s often brusque conduct involving city staffers, council members or members of the business community, in this case deepening a mostly self-quarried chasm that has grown between Norris and the city administration.
The conduct is revealed through a batch of internal electronic communications in early May, obtained by FlaglerLive. It is notable for having occurred after Norris was censured by the rest of the City Council for his conduct (an independent investigation found him to have violated the charter with unilateral actions against top staffers, and to have behaved unprofessionally, degrading several members of the staff), and after Norris himself professed an apology of sorts that hinted he might mend his ways. “If I offended anybody in this city, in this organization, I’m sorry. I am,” he said on May 1.
That was around the time he was seeking to have the acting city manager and chief of staff “reprimanded.”
“What we have here is insubordination,” he’d written in a May 7 text to Blocker, referring to Acting City Manager Lauren Johnston and an April 30 text in a group chat that included Norris, Johnston, City Attorney Marcus Duffy and Chief of Staff Jason DeLorenzo.
One of the last two remaining candidates for city manager had just dropped out. Johnston informed Norris of the fact. “We move forward with the process, did Mr. Hough agree to submit a white paper?” the mayor texted, referring to Rich Hough, the last remaining candidate. “No he did not,” Johnston texted back. “I would suggest speaking with Mr. Thomas.”
It had been Doug Thomas, the city’s consultant in recruiting for city manager candidates, who had suggested to Hough to pause writing a “white paper” on his budget skills that the council had requested of both candidates days earlier. But Norris wanted the attorney to draft “reprimands for those staff members that violated the city council’s direct instruction” in the manager search.
It was a premature demand, improperly lodged with the attorney, who cannot issue reprimands to city staff. But it pointed to Norris’s tendency, frequently repeated, to shoot first and ask questions later, and to continue to misunderstand his and others’ roles in the organization. “If I have to demand this action with the rest of the council so be it,” he texted moments later. “Need your legal direction in this matter ASAP.”
There was no reprimand. It became clear that the consultant, not the executive staff, had paused the white paper request, and Hough, unsurprisingly, withdrew his candidacy anyway despite Norris urging him on May 4 to send him the white paper still.
Norris was only ramping up, fighting a two-front war: one about a developer’s alleged attempt to corrupt him in exchange for a “yes” vote on the new comprehensive plan, and one against Council member Charles Gambaro: Norris filed a lawsuit against the city and Gambaro, seeking Gambaro’s ouster from the council on May 5.
Norris had agreed to discuss the alleged corruption at a council meeting. He reversed himself as suddenly as he’d made the accusation, saying on May 7 that he’d take his case to the sheriff. He did not. After the sheriff suggested that Norris had tainted any hopes of an investigation’s integrity and questioned the he-said-he-said nature of the allegation, Norris took his case to the local State Attorney’s Office.
Some time later–the voice mail is undated–Noel Griffin, the chief investigator at the State Attorney’s Office, told Norris that he’d been in contact with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, “and they’re going to be reaching out to you probably today or tomorrow at the latest, to arrange an opportunity to sit down with them and they’re going to do an interview with you.”
That appears to be the voice mail Norris had in mind when he contacted the two city attorneys, Blocker and Marcus Dufffy, the morning of May 14, asking for a discussion. “Roger that sir,” Blocker texted him.
Around 10:26 p.m. the same day, Norris texted the attorneys again: “I don’t appreciate that neither of you guys had the courtesy to call back today…. That’s a very serious issue and you both know it.” Blocker was not pleased with Norris’s tone or implication. One of the attorneys texted him at 1:42 a.m. May 15: “Mayor, you and I will speak tomorrow morning. I will address your concerns then. Also, I have some concerns that I’ll raise with you then.”
Later that morning, Blocker wrote Norris an email “as a recap of our communications the last 24 hours.” Blocker told him he’d had multiple conversations during the day with the State Attorney’s Office and legal counsel on the contents of a voicemail Norris had sent him. Blocker’s plan was to call him when he had all the facts and information relevant to the matter, only to receive Norris’s curt text.
“As you are fully aware, myself and Mr. Duffy always make ourselves available to Council Members as needed,” Blocker wrote the mayor. “Always within 24 hours of a requested call. However, yesterday, myself and Mr. Duffy were dealing with multiple legal matters requiring our immediate attention. Including your request for a call back regarding the matter contained in your voicemail message.”
Blocker noted that he’d tried contacting Norris that morning by phone and text, getting no response. “Going forward we ask that you do not contact myself or Mr. Duffy after hours unless it is an emergency,” he wrote Norris. “Further, the text message at 10:26pm last night was unprofessional and inappropriate implying we ignored you. That is false, incorrect, and inappropriate for an elected official to communicate in such a manner. We represent the City of Palm Coast and we have track record of professionalism. Your communication last night were unreasonable and are inappropriate.”
He added: “We look forward to continuing working with you and the City.”
The next day Norris was bothered and somehow surprised by the fact that he would be excluded from any closed-door meeting the council would hold to discuss strategy in response to the lawsuit be brought against the city. He’d read an item in the Observer where a city spokesperson had said he would not be part of those meetings. He asked Duffy to “advise” on that, and “annotate court precedence and state law that allows the council to exclude a sitting mayor.”
“Based on your status as an adversarial party who is currently suing the City of Palm Coast, the legal recommendation is that you be barred from the meeting as an adverse party,” Duffy wrote him. “Furthermore, based on your status as a plaintiff represented by counsel in your lawsuit against the City, any further discussions surrounding this matter would be inappropriate. If any further questions arise on this specific litigation, please have your attorney reach out directly.”
Norris, who refuses to speak to FlaglerLive, has been on vacation since.
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