1 week Ago
WALDPORT, Ore. — The former mayor of Waldport, Heidi Lambert, was briefly arrested Thursday when she attempted to force her way into a city council meeting, one week after the council voted 6-0 to remove her from office for violating the city charter. Lambert was elected mayor of the coastal city in November and took office in January.
In a lengthy statement posted to the city's website ahead of the meeting, the councilors said that Lambert's ouster the week before was prompted by a March 25 incident in which they said Lambert came to city hall and "aggressively demanded staff follow her direction and created a hostile work environment for them." Newport's form of government uses a city manager to run day-to-day affairs, and city staff report to the manager rather than directly to the mayor. The council wrote in its letter that Lambert's actions were unlawful and violated the city charter.
"We have never had an elected city official treat staff this way. What may seem like a minor incident is actually a serious legal concern," the council wrote, adding that a hostile work environment complaint could result in a lawsuit against the city. In their first statement ahead of the Thursday meeting, the councilors said they initially responded to the March 25 incident by asking Lambert to explain herself, but she replied by "expressing her concerns regarding a larger issue" and did not apologize or commit to following the charter.
The council then held a closed hearing, where they asked the city attorney for advice and were told that their three options were to do nothing, censure Lambert or expel her. The councilors said they concluded that censure "would have had no effect," so they asked Lambert to resign. When she refused, they voted to remove her.
"We did not do so lightly," the council said in part. "We understood many of you might be angry at first. We are six individuals from diverse backgrounds and life experiences who volunteer our time without pay for the betterment of the city.
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on that day we made what each of us believe was the best decision we could for the city of Waldport." Council meeting disruption In another statement posted Friday morning, the councilors said Lambert had emailed them ahead of the Thursday meeting and declared that she "will be sitting at the dais and running the meeting as usual." The councilors said they considered canceling the meeting but decided that they needed to get business done.
The councilors said that after consulting with the Lincoln County Sheriff Adam Shanks and the county's legal counsel, they obtained an exclusion order that was given to Lambert, informing her that she "cannot enter city hall representing herself as anything other than a general citizen." Lambert "chose to ignore that order" and "insisted on forcing the issue, disrupting the city's ability to conduct the necessary business of the day," according to the council statement. City Manager Dann Cutter then requested that Shanks "resolve the situation," and "the end result was that Ms.
Lambert was escorted from the room." "Much like the events that lead to her expulsion from office, this did not have to happen," the council said in its statement. "Ms.
Lambert absolutely could have followed the law then, and again yesterday, and no consequences would have ever been taken. The entire situation is unfortunate and of her own making." In a separate statement released Thursday, the sheriff's office said Shanks had been asked to attend the meeting for an unrelated agenda item about renewing the city's police services contract.
After Shanks warned Lambert that she could face legal consequences if she didn't voluntarily leave, she was "escorted outside and cited for disorderly conduct," the sheriff's office said, before being released and allowed to return as part of the meeting audience. Thursday's meeting was apparently also held without the usual public comment period; the meeting agenda states that the council had opted to skip it "due to a plethora of misinformation and statements of intended disruption" and in order to "allow cooler heads to prevail and preserve public safety." Dispute with Beachcomber Days The underlying issue was a dispute between Cutter and a group called Waldport Beachcomber Days, according to reporting in the Lincoln Chronicle .
The nonprofit manages a weekly community market during the summer and organizes an annual community festival in June, along with other events throughout the year. The dispute originated last year; in another statement posted Oct. 10, the city said it had received a request from the organization to use city property, but had found conflicting information in the nonprofit's financial filings and requested a third-party audit before agreeing to provide permits.
Another Lincoln Chronicle story that same day reported that more than 50 Beachcomber volunteers attended the next city council meeting and criticized Cutter for the decision. In another statement in December, the city said that the nonprofit had provided an accounting review for the prior year which found no fraud, but confirmed the errors that the city had flagged. The city said the council had opted to lift a suspension of Beachcomber activities within the city limits, but would not renew an agreement with the organization for the weekly market and would search instead for a new partner operator.
Lambert was ousted at an emergency meeting that had been called for the council to evaluate complaints against both her and Cutter. In a separate Thursday statement , the council said that the city had received 12 letters with complaints about Cutter, all of which came from people associated with Beachcombers. After Lambert's ouster, the Lincoln Chronicle reported that Beachcomber Days had called for Cutter to be investigated for misconduct, and that the city employees in the March 25 incident had filed complaints alleging that Lambert had ordered them to specifically scan the 12 letters about Cutter and email them to the council.
The council's Thursday statement said it found all the complaints to be meritless, adding that the "attacks continue to come from outside the community" against Cutter and referring to the campaign against him as a "witch hunt." The statement said the council cannot say more because the Beachcombers group has threatened to sue the city..
