By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter
A lawyer representing the Bronson Town Council, its attorney, and a former interim clerk has removed a lawsuit filed by Town Councilman Berlon Weeks from state court and filed the litigation in federal court.
Weeks is challenging his removal from the council and is asking to be reinstated to his elected position.
Attorney Norm Fugate and his son Blake Fugate represent Weeks and have offered to drop the lawsuit if Weeks is given back his seat on the town council. The verbal offer was made to Susan Erdelyi, the attorney representing the town, but there has been no response.
“We have definitely made an offer to end the lawsuit right away – just put him back on the council,” Fugate said.
It’s unclear whether Erdelyi ever passed that settlement offer to her clients. The council voted on March 15 to begin accepting applications from qualified town residents to fill Weeks’ seat.
Erdelyi was hired by the Florida League of Cities, the city’s liability insurer to represent the town. Named in the lawsuit are Mayor Beatrice Roberts, Councilmen Aaron Edmondson, Robert Partin, and Jason Hunt, former interim Clerk Melisa Thompson, and Town Attorney Steven Warm.
Norm Fugate sat through the March 15 council meeting and didn’t speak when the council discussed filling Weeks seat. Fugate said it would have been inappropriate for him to speak to the council without permission from his client.
Weeks didn’t attend the meeting.
Weeks’ legal team hasn’t backed away from their basic argument that the council had no legal authority to remove Weeks from a post that was awarded to him by the voters in a town election.
“The reality is a Bronson Town Council seat is control of the voters, not the town council. It’s the voters who decide if they want to get rid of Berlon,” Fugate said. “A council seat on the town council is like an agreement between the voters and Berlon and they put him in to represent them. There is a mechanism for the voters to remove him in midstream if they wanted to. Of course, he has to be a willing participant for him to drop out in midstream, but the decision to drop out is not the town council’s decision. It is his decision and he is clearly saying he did not intend to resign. That’s the end of the story. Our point is the town council has no power to prohibit him from sitting in his duly elected seat.”
Weeks made statements at a council meeting last year that the council interpreted as being a resignation. It’s unclear where they derived the power to make the decision to remove him.
At the meeting where Weeks allegedly resigned, he was continuously berated by Edmondson for the turmoil in town hall, a charge Weeks repeatedly challenged until he became fed up with the chaos in the council meeting and the repeated allegations by Edmondson. Roberts made no effort to stop the verbal attacks on Weeks. Weeks walked out saying he would submit his resignation the next morning, which he never did, but earlier in the heated battle that night, he said wouldn’t run again for his seat in the September 2021 town election. On the following morning, Weeks told Warm he wasn’t resigning and never intended to resign, but Mayor Beatrice Roberts told Warm she was accepting his resignation that morning. She later received formal approval from the council to accept the resignation on a 3-1 vote.
In the weeks following the resignation, Weeks attempted one time to take back his seat on the council. Roberts ended the meeting at the 11-minute mark due to his presence. At the next council meeting, a sheriff’s deputy, who had been requested by the mayor, sat at the back of the council chambers. Whether Roberts possessed the power to have Weeks arrested if he had been present and tried to take back his seat again isn’t known, but the implied threat was there and Weeks never returned to the council chambers.
The council has an election in September. Qualifying takes place in July. Technically Weeks could run for his seat by qualifying in July, or, if he wins the lawsuit, he possibly could displace the person appointed by the council to replace him. But lawsuits tend to drag on for months at a time it is doubtful the lawsuit would end unless the council chooses to reinstate weeks. His attorneys say the lawsuit would be dropped at that point. The offer is on the table.
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Enterprise Reporting by Terry Witt March 24, 2021; Posted March 24, 2021
