Greene County Democrat

Tag: Attorney Zane Willingham

  • Map of the City of Eutaw voting districts for municipal elections


    The City of Eutaw released the official list of candidates who qualified for the August 26, 2025, municipal elections for Mayor and five City Council positions. The qualifying period, which ran from June 10 to 24, is now closed.
    There are three candidates for Mayor. Incumbent Mayor Latasha Johnson is challenged by Corey Cockrell, a current County Commissioner for District 3 and Tyrone Atkins.
    In each of the five City Council districts the current incumbents qualified, except for District 3, where incumbent Tracey Hunter is unopposed in the election. In District 1, incumbent Valerie Brewer- Watkins is challenged by Ke’Undra Quintz Cox. In District 2, Jonathan Woodruff, Jr., the incumbent, is opposed by Charles Naylor, Jr., and Quentin Maurice Walton. In District 4, incumbent Larrie Coleman is challenged by Sarah Duncan Brewer and Lorenzo French. In District 5, incumbent Suzette Powell, is challenged by Carrie Logan, Director of the Eutaw Area Chamber of Commerce.
    If no candidate wins a majority of the votes for Mayor or in their district for City Council member, there will be a Run-off Election scheduled for September 23, 2025, for the top two vote-getters in each race.
    The election is open to all registered voters who have lived in the city or their respective district for 30 days or more prior to the election. The polls will be open from 7:00 AM until 7:00 PM on election day and for the run-off election, if necessary.
    The last day to register to vote in this election is August 15, 2025, for those who recently moved into the city limits, or never registered to vote or are trying to reclaim their voting rights. The newly elected Mayor and Council will take office in November 2025.

    Council Meetings on June 10 and 24

    The Eutaw City Council held its two regular monthly meetings on June 10 and 24, at the City Hall. Councilman Woodruff was absent for the June 10 meeting. All council members were in attendance for the June 24th meeting.
    In the June 10th meeting the Council approved purchase of materials to repair potholes in streets and other roadway repairs. The Mayor said she had a long list of streets to be repaired, and the city staff would work on these when the materials and time were available.
    The Council tabled requests from the Mayor to purchase a tractor and a bush hog and a truck mounted sewer jet to clean out sewer pumping stations.
    The Council approved travel for the Chief of Police to attend the annual conference of police chiefs in August ; travel for officer Jaleel Powell to attend a training in August; payment for poll workers in the upcoming municipal elections and approved payment of bills.
    At the June 24th meeting, the Eutaw City Council approved a new employee health plan from Colonial Life Insurance Company which includes dental and vision coverage not available in the current plan.
    The Council approved a Memorandum of Agreement with United Way of Alabama to install a ‘story walk’ in the city’s Memorial Park on Mesopotamia Street. The walk will tell stories to children when the walk through and will be an addition to the playground and tennis courts in the park.
    The Council also approved for Attorney Zane Willingham to write a letter to the Mayor concerning employee overtime. The Council approved payment of bills.
    The Council received a report from the Water Department listing $158,000 in delinquent bills to the city from 2017 to June 2025. Sarah Leavelle, Water Clerk, explained that these balances include water, sewer, garbage and connection fees owed. The Water Department has negotiated a payment plan for these overdue accounts.
    Leavelle explained, “Sometimes people honor their agreements and sometimes they don’t. We do have the right to cut off water services if people do not pay their bills and past due balances. We try to work with people to get their bills paid.” The Council took this information under consideration in terms of their planning and budgetary decision making.
    Council member Valerie Watkins raised several concerns. One was about large trucks parked by the place where the old swimming pool was located. Mayor Johnson asked her to get the names of the truck owners and license plates of violators to help in getting this problem resolved. Watkins said she was reporting the problem but could not be responsible for the requested information. Chief of Police Johnson said the police would monitor the situation and advise the truck owners of the laws.
    Watkins said the city staff should check and identify streetlights that are not working and make sure they are replaced. She also said residents were complaining about a ditch that runs between Roebuck and Edwards Streets. The Mayor responded that this ditch is owned by the residents and not the city and therefore cleaning the ditch was their responsibility.
    In the public comments section of the meetings, Faye Tyree complained that the bathrooms in the City Hall need to be repaired for use by the employees and the public. Alfonzo Morton complained about flooding from the rains and asked the city to help in cleaning the ditch behind his house.

  • Eutaw City Council approves non-controversial items; tables others for next working session

    Deborah Henderson, Census 2020 staff member addresses the City Council about available jobs as census takers.

    The Eutaw City Council acted on some non-controversial agenda items and pushed the others where there is disagreement and more time is needed for a resolution to its next work session.
    At the beginning of its meeting, the Council heard a presentation from Deborah Henderson, U. S. Census Recruiting Specialist for Greene County indicating that jobs are available for census takers for the 2020 Census. These short-term jobs pay $15.50 an hour with a mileage allowance of 58 cents per mile. Henderson said that the U. S. Census was looking for 100 applicants from Greene County. Persons interested may call: 1-855-JOB-2020 or check on line for information and applications.
    The Eutaw City Council approved an application from Love’s Truck and Travel Center for a license to sell beer and wine.
    The Council approved accepting a $24,000 grant from ADECA for police equipment including computers, cameras and tasers. This grant has no matching funds requirement.
    The Council also approved a travel request for City Judge, Josh Swords to attend a Fall Conference, September 26-28,2019 in Gulf Shores, Alabama.

    Attorney Zane Willingham, in response to questions from Council-members at last week’s working session, reviewed various personnel policies from the Employee Handbook with the City Council especially dealing with overtime pay.
    Willingham said the personnel policies are clear that part-time employees are not entitled to holiday pay. He also explained that overtime pay is only accrued and should only be paid when an employee actually physically performs more than forty (40) hours of work in a weekly period. This means that vacation, sick leave, holidays, administrative leave, PTO hours are not considered hours worked when computing overtime.
    To clarify these policies, the City Council unanimously approved a resolution stating, “Should you be required to work on a holiday, or if your regularly scheduled day off falls on a holiday – you will be given an alternate day off. You must be given an alternate day off within the same fiscal year.”
    The Eutaw City Council voted to approve paying bills that were most needed from a list that was presented. In a previous meeting $200,000 was allocated from the bingo funds earmarked for Branch Heights roads to pay current bills. After these payments were made, using the $200,000, some critical bills remain to be paid.
    Council members asked Mayor Steele to prioritize the bills that needed to be paid. The Mayor urged using more bingo funds to make these payments. Some of these decisions were referred to the next City Council Working Session.
    Mayor Steele asked the Council to approve purchase of a generator, costing $44,763, through FEMA to use at the City Hall in times of emergency when no electricity is available. This FEMA purchase requires an $11,192 match from city funds. The Mayor wants to use bingo funds to pay the match. This decision was tabled for discussion at the next working session.
    Councilman Carpenter brought up the issue of raises for city staff. The Mayor said some staff received a raise because they were promoted to a supervisory position. The Mayor said he was not sure there was enough funding to provide all staff with a raise. The Council said some adjustments in pay were needed for staff with CDL, Heavy Equipment Operator and other skill certifications. The Council then voted to hold a Special Called Meeting to deal with staff salary adjustment on Monday, September 30,2019 at 6:00 PM at City Hall.
    Mayor Steele reported that he purchased an air compressor for $7,500, which was put to work fixing water leaks in Branch Heights and other locations. The Mayor says he still needs to purchase a small tractor for use in street repairs.
    The Council said to bring this request to the next working session.
    Councilwoman Sheila Smith moved to use some of the bingo funds in the earmarked account for resurfacing the roads in King Village. This motion passed over the objections of the Mayor who said this item was not on the agenda and the expenditure might not be needed based on the City’s overall finances and other more critical needs. While the motion passed, it seemed that this long unresolved issue was headed to the next working session before it is resolved.
    Smith also questioned the Mayor about exercise and weight room equipment at the Carver School community center. Steele said this long awaited equipment, donated by the Auburn Cooperative Extension Program, arrived last week and had been set up. Rev. Barton, Director of the Center, will soon send out a press release with information about the hours and usage of this weight equipment by the public.
    In the public comments section, Mary Johnson complained about her water being “milky looking”. Mayor Steele said that was an indication that there was air in the lines from repairs and that she would need to run her water until the air came out of the pipes. He promised to send someone to check on the problem. Councilman Joe Lee Powell suggested that the City purchase a supply of bottled water to give to residents when there were problems with the City water system.

  • Local legislation passed allowing the City of Eutaw to have Sunday liquor sales

    At last night’s Eutaw City Council meeting, Attorney Zane Willingham announced that the Alabama State Legislature passed local legislation, which was signed by the Governor to allow for Sunday liquor sales in the City of Eutaw,
    Willingham said, “This new legislation will allow the city to rewrite its ordinance for liquor sales and create uniformity for both on premises sales and off premises sales. The current laws make distinctions between the sale of beer and wine all of which will be corrected with a new ordinance.”
    Willingham also said he would be drafting a new detailed ordinance for the sale of beer, wine and liquor for the Eutaw City Council to approve at its upcoming meetings. “This ordinance will provide liquor sales 24/6 on Monday through Saturday; but for Sundays the hours for on premise and off premise sales will be 10:00 AM to 12:00 Midnight, “ said Willingham.
    More information on the liquor sales ordinance and other business conducted at the June 25, 2019 meeting of the Eutaw City Council will be covered in next week’s newspaper.