The waning days of the Birmingham Water Works Board were marred by several last-ditch efforts by those in control to retain their power and avert the legislature's efforts to reform and restructure the board.
This included a flurry of lawsuits and statements by the City of Birmingham, culminating in members of the already dissolved board voting to sell the utility to the City of Birmingham.
State Rep. Juandalynn Givan (D-Birmingham) told 1819 News at the time of that move, "They have no authority because they’re no longer a board under law, period. Every lawyer in the state of Alabama in Montgomery, from the attorney general’s office, from the governor’s office, every lawyer that has been engaged today has gone through that bill before it was signed with a fine-toothed comb. I’m not sure what kind of foolery…”
That wasn't the only shenanigans the board was up to, though, as reported by WBRC News on Monday, without the moves being properly noticed on their agenda and happening behind closed doors in an "Executive Session," the night before the governor signed the bill into law the board gave sweetheart contracts, with "Golden parachute" provisions to their attorney, Mark Parnell, and assistant general managers Derrick Murphy, Barry Williams, Phillip King and Michael Parker.
AL(dot)com first reported on the contracts in a story explaining that the utlility surprised members of the city council when they took up the employment contracts but not the City's offer to buy the utility.
"Utility leaders met for more than an hour in a closed-door executive session today, returning only to offer contracts to system managers and the board’s executive assistant," per the outlet.
Details of the contracts were not discussed publicly, and officials said the arrangements were still being shored up."
According to the WBRC report, the total of the contracts was $2.6 million. The meeting minutes are not yet available online, and the meeting agenda does not reference the contracts.
WBRC News reports that the contracts given to the general managers will entitle them to "new five-year terms with a one-year salary severance guarantee at a pay rate between $250,000 and $334,000, with at least two of them guaranteed the highest end of that scale."
“I believe the employment agreement is fair given my nearly four decades of representing the Birmingham Water Works Board and my extensive institutional knowledge of the system,” Parnell said in a statement to WBRC. “The agreement was designed to ensure continuity of the management of the water system during a period of transition. The ability of the former Board of Directors to authorize and enter into my employment agreement is not in doubt. The agreement was unanimously approved while the former Board still governed the utility and before SB 330 was signed into law.”
SEE: Ivey signs Birmingham Water Works Board reform bill into law
In an op-ed authored by The Birmingham Water Works Board of Directors on AL(dot)com, the former board members defended the last-minute awarding of unprecedented employment contracts that could cost the new board millions to undo, saying, "We authorized employment contracts for our executive team not out of politics, but out of duty. We knew that SB 330 would bring uncertainty to board governance, and we could not risk losing experienced leadership during a critical period."
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