MONTGOMERY — Members of the State Board of Veterans Affairs (SBVA) unanimously voted at a Thursday meeting to ask outgoing Alabama Department of Veterans Affairs (ADVA) commissioner Kent Davis to consider rescinding his resignation.
Governor Kay Ivey has maintained that ADVA mishandled ARPA funds. Davis resigned on September 9, effective December 31. An SBVA committee approved a report on Wednesday stating Davis and ADVA did nothing wrong with the funds.
Ivey originally asked for Davis' resignation effective September 30 and removed John Kilpatrick from the Alabama State Board of Veterans Affairs. Davis had previously declined to resign and said, "I respectfully disagree with the inaccurate claims made against the Alabama Department of Veterans Affairs."
Davis filed an ethics complaint in August at the request of board members against Alabama Department of Mental Health (ADMH) commissioner Kim Boswell for allegedly preventing ADVA from obtaining $7 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds. The Alabama Ethics Commission later dismissed the complaint. Davis, who retired from the Navy with the rank of Rear Admiral, has served as ADVA commissioner since 2019. Multiple Alabama veterans organizations opposed Davis' removal.
Davis said earlier in the Thursday board meeting before the vote asking him to consider rescinding his resignation that he didn't have anything to add to his September statement announcing his resignation.
"I'll stand by the public statement. I really don't have any changes to that public statement that I made a few weeks ago," Davis told the board members.
Ken Rollins, an SBVA board member, said he made the motion to ask Davis to reconsider his resignation so the public would know Davis had the support of the board.
During the meeting, SBVA vice chairman Scott Gedling said he was confident there was no wrongdoing with ARPA funds, but the resignation was a private matter between Davis and Ivey.
"Everybody in here is grateful for the commissioner. We don't want to lose him as a commissioner, but we also respect the Governor, her office, and whatever agreements they make," Gedling said.
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