The Association of Inspectors General urged Atlanta’s mayor and city council on Monday to reject outright a bill that it said would incapacitate the city’s Office of Inspector General (OIG). The national group sets best practices for government watchdog agencies.
The group’s president, Will Fletcher, raised “grave concerns” in a letter to the city leaders that the bill would “strip away” investigative powers from Atlanta’s OIG, rendering the independent watchdog agency incapable of providing the oversight function it’s tasked with. The Atlanta City Council established the OIG just five years ago in response to major corruption scandals that rocked City Hall during former Mayor Kasim Reed’s administration.
The Association of Inspectors General (AIG) recommended that the city council reject the proposed legislation “in its entirety.” The bill, which was authored by Councilmember Howard Shook and co-signed by another six of the council’s 15 members, was submitted to the council on Jan. 6.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens’ office rebuffed the notion that it doesn’t support the OIG’s mission. “We’re all aligned with ensuring that we root out waste, fraud and abuse,” said Dickens’ Chief of Staff Odie Donald in a call that included City Attorney Patrise Perkins-Hooker and the mayor’s policy chief, Courtney English.
Donald characterized the legislation’s proposed changes to the OIG’s purview as merely formalizing “common sense things that are in place, that most folks thought were already in place.”
The bill incorporates recommendations from a task force that the city council appointed last fall to propose reforms to the OIG. It needs just one additional councilmember’s vote to pass, assuming all seven co-signers vote in favor. (City Council President Doug Shipman only votes in the case of a tie among the council’s 15 voting members, due to an absence or abstention.)
The council’s Finance and Executive Committee will address the proposed changes on Wednesday. After that, the Committee on Council will weigh in Jan. 21, just before the next full city council meeting. The city council must vote twice on the bill, because it is an amendment to the city’s charter that established the OIG. That means Feb. 3 is the soonest the bill could become law.
An OIG under the mayor’s control?
In his letter, the Association of Inspectors General president highlighted three main concerns with the proposed legislation.
First, the bill removes “corruption” from the OIG’s investigative scope of authority and replaces that with an undefined threshold of “gross” or “substantial” wrongdoing or misconduct to trigger an investigation, the letter said.
“There are no definitions of what these higher thresholds mean and perhaps that’s the point,” Fletcher wrote. “Put another way, investigations into public corruption that should be opened, won’t get opened.”
Second, the bill would give the mayor the power to appoint the OIG’s governing board, which hires and oversees Atlanta’s inspector general. Currently, local citizens’ groups appoint the members of the OIG governing board, which is considered an optimal model for oversight.
“The legislation would create an OIG that is effectively under the control of the Mayor’s Office,” Fletcher wrote.
Asked whether the bill’s intent is to give the mayor control of the OIG, the mayor’s chief of staff, Donald, replied, “the intent of the legislation is to ensure that all of our employees have protections, that we know what the rights and the responsibilities are in complying, and that we really, truly support rooting out any waste, fraud, and abuse.”
“We’re excited to stand with the OIG in ensuring we all gain clarity and responsibility and, really, confidence in the process,” Donald added.
Third, the bill would hobble the OIG’s access to city records, Fletcher’s letter said. The OIG currently can independently subpoena city records for an investigation. The proposed changes would instead require the OIG to notify an investigation’s subjects of the records it seeks, thus “compromising the investigation in the process,” Fletcher wrote.
The Association of Inspectors General president urged city leaders to work together with his group to craft better legislation.
Fletcher added that the city council’s task force conducted a review of the Atlanta OIG’s investigative scope that was “disappointing, hasty, and incomplete.” He also pointed out that inspectors general across the country have publicly criticized the proposed legislation, which incorporates recommendations from the task force’s Nov. 6 report.
Task force chair Leah Ward Sears, a former Georgia Supreme Court Justice, declined to comment on the letter. Shook did not return requests for comment.
Atlanta Inspector General Shannon Manigault opposes the proposed legislation, saying that it would prevent her office from exposing wrongdoing among city employees the way it has over the last year.
Fletcher raised the same concern. “It won’t escape anyone’s notice that the proposed legislation follows several high-profile Atlanta OIG investigations that have demonstrated the office’s effectiveness in revealing misconduct at all levels of government,” his letter said. “If passed, this proposed ordinance would strip the OIG’s ability to perform the kind of work that was widely reported on throughout 2024.”
In the past year, Atlanta’s OIG has uncovered hiring nepotism in the city’s Human Resources Department, causing the city to fire the department’s commissioner. It also found that employees in the City Planning Department’s Office of Buildings had solicited bribes to expedite permits, which also resulted in firings.
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