BELLE — Belle Mayor Daryl White, Jr., responded July 18 to the Missouri Attorney General’s Office (AGO) to allegations by Maries County Sheriff Chris Heitman that he was violating Sunshine Law when he canceled the city’s police services contract during a Sept. 21, 2022, budget meeting without posting the topic on an open agenda.

“Bringing back the police department was discussed in our publicly announced budget meeting,” White wrote. “We thought it was a proper time to discuss since we would have to establish a department budget.”

Heitman alleged in a December 2022 whistle blower letter to the AGO that the mayor neither informed the public nor the sheriff’s department that a discussion was eminent during the budget meeting, and furthermore did not discuss it during the time that his representative was present.

“The City advertised they would be hosting a budget meeting (to pass a budget which was supposed to be approved July 1, 2022),” Heitman said in his letter to the AGO. “The city board also determined they would not Facebook Live the special meeting as they had been doing since it was only a work session. No members of the public were present according to the minutes, however, the chief deputy of the sheriff’s office was present for more than an hour. During the meeting, and after the chief deputy left, aldermen took action to dissolve the city’s contract for police services with Maries County Sheriff’s Office without telling the citizens or the sheriff they would be discussing the item.”

Heitman added eight additional line items that were also decided and added to the budget, one of which, a side-by-side purchase, was directly correlated to the cancellation of the police services contract, according to former public works director Tony Baretich.

“(White) was throwing a fit and wanting them to re-vote,” Baretich said about the board. “He didn’t agree with it and didn’t think it was needed. Me and Jeanette (Struemph, former alderman) said it was a done deal and the check just needed to be signed. He said the only way to do it would be to cancel Maries County and start up the police department. His angle was to have the police services contract canceled to purchase the side-by-side.”

Kayla Bray, who was an alderman at the time of the meeting, told a similar story, adding that White’s statement to the AGO is true, but it is not how he presented it to the board at the meeting.

“That is true, but he was trying to cancel that (side-by-side purchase),” Bray said. “In the meeting, he said if we wanted to continue to purchase the side-by-side then we had to agree to get rid of the sheriff’s office. He was dead set against the side-by-side.”

She also confirmed that the board was unaware the discussion about the sheriff’s police services contract would be discussed.

“The discussion on the sheriff’s department contract was not on the agenda,” Bray said. “They didn’t discuss it. They just got rid of it. There should have been proper meetings with the sheriff and Scott John, but they didn’t.”

Bray said that the board regularly discussed items that were not on the agenda for open or closed meetings, directly refuting White’s 7th point regarding amendments to the agenda.

“We do occasionally amend the agenda, this is done at the3 beginning of the council meetings, and normally for time-sensitive or emergency situations,” White wrote in his 7th bullet point. “It is always voted on before any item is discussed.”

Bray said there were multiple occasions when she was on the board that the agenda was not officially changed before items were discussed and decided.

“I know there was several occasions where we got the meeting started where (White) would add things after the fact to discuss in public session after the time had passed to add it to the agenda,” Bray said. “When we would go into closed session it would just say ‘personnel,’ but we would discuss the police department the sheriff’s department, what we were going to do for Halloween candy. Just stupid stuff. There are times where they amended the agenda but there is still stuff that he added afterwards. Especially in closed sessions.”