BOC approves undisclosed amount of funding to bring the Levent investigation to a conclusion

FORSYTH COUNTY, Ga. – Forsyth County Commissioners voted 3-0 (with Commissioners Cindy Mills and Todd Levent having recused themselves) Tuesday to spend an unspecified amount of money to take its investigation of District 3 Commissioner Todd Levent to what Chairwoman Laura Semanson called “its natural conclusion.”

The Board began the investigation, which centered on Levent’s accessing Commissioner Cindy Mills emails without her knowledge and without having filed an open records request. Emails to and from county-owned computers are a matter of public record that can be obtained by filing an open records request. However, some exemptions are allowed under Georgia’s Open Records Act and certain personal identifiers can be redacted.

The investigation, which was initially capped at $20,000, was completed on July 14.  Tuesday’s vote was on a resolution to approve an undisclosed amount of supplemental funding to pay an attorney to present the results to an independent body, possibly a Board of Ethics.

The amount of the supplemental funding was not discussed, although one commissioner said later, it is estimated to be about $18,000.

Commissioner Dennis Brown questioned the cost during Tuesday’s meeting. “Does this have a specific amount or limit,” he asked?

Semanson said the cost is not known yet.

“Theoretically then they could come back for more money,” he said.

“I look at it like this,” Semanson said. “We’ve already rounded third base. At this point if we want to take this to it’s final conclusion, we need to have that ability.”

 

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