Ousted county manager falsified HR review, misused employee’s time, investigation says

Former Sedgwick County Manager Michael Scholes had county staff falsify a personnel record to help a friend get a job and misused county resources by having a public employee produce photos of him and his family for their personal use, according to an investigation that eventually cost him his job.

Those actions violated county policies and were considered to be the most damaging evidence against Scholes, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the investigation and its aftermath.

The sources shared findings from the report with The Eagle on the condition that neither they nor the employees who provided information be publicly named, because participants in the investigation were promised confidentiality.

Efforts to contact Scholes over more than two weeks were unsuccessful. He left the state and could not be reached by phone, through social media messaging, or through the law firm that represented him in his negotiations with the county.

Scholes resigned effective Nov. 30 in exchange for a settlement payment of $205,427.

He was the second high-profile county official to resign by settlement under fire. On Nov. 19, County Counselor Eric Yost parted ways with the county after the commission approved a $77,077 settlement.

Friction with staff

The findings on Scholes are from a report by lawyer Stephanie Scheck, who was hired by the County Commission as an outside counsel to investigate complaints from county staff members about Scholes’ management style.

Dozens of county employees, city officials and other community stakeholders were interviewed about their interactions with the manager.

The bulk of the final report consisted of complaints that Scholes, a former Army brigadier general, had an autocratic management style and showed favoritism toward certain employees.

One finding of the investigation was that Scholes irritated the staff almost from the start with his first all-employee meeting, a “brown bag” lunch held at the Intrust Bank Arena in December 2015.

While employees had expected a collegial meet-and-greet event, it consisted mostly of Scholes talking about himself and his military career. Several employees reported that he shared what they considered an off-putting quote to the effect that if they were loyal to him, he’d support them, but if they stood against him, he’d destroy them, according to the report.

Also, multiple employees complained to interviewers that Scholes’ new hires received perks that weren’t offered to other employees at similar levels in the organization, including car allowances and salaries higher than what was posted when open jobs were advertised.

False review alleged

The allegations of creating a false personnel document stemmed from the relatively brief tenure of former Deputy County Manager Tom Golden, a retired military helicopter and airplane pilot who Scholes was friends with in the service, according to the report.

As part of a reorganization, Scholes hired Golden to a newly created position of deputy county manager, which he also referred to by the military title “chief of staff.”

Golden worked for the county from September 2016 to May 2017, when he was forced out after friction with the staff and comments about a commissioner, according to the report. He received a $40,000 settlement.

The Scholes investigation said that six months after Golden left, he was seeking a job that required him to provide a letter of reference and performance reviews from his previous job as part of his application. Because Scholes hadn’t done a performance review on Golden, he assigned three members of the staff to create one, according to the report.

The after-the-fact-review gave Golden the highest possible mark of “outstanding” in every performance category listed on the form.

Scholes, who was out of town when the document was prepared, had staff back-date it and put his signature on it electronically, the report said.

Golden has left the state and could not be reached for comment. His page on the social media site Linked In indicates that he currently has two jobs, as an air ambulance pilot and as an associate in Saudi Arabia for an international consulting firm.

Family photos

The allegation that Scholes misused county resources involved him dispatching a member of the county staff to take pictures of him and his family for their personal use.

On three separate occasions, Scholes directed the staff member to photograph him, his wife, his son-in-law and his father, according to the report.

Only one of those instances was at a public event, a military veterans’ exposition in August 2017, where his father was the featured speaker.

Because the exposition was held on a Saturday, Scholes gave the county employee half a day off from work for going to it and taking the pictures, the investigation found.

The report concluded that that type of public function could have fallen within the scope of Scholes’ role of representing the county in the community. But the pictures he directed to be taken were not used in any county publications or documents and the employee felt it was a misuse of his time, the investigation concluded.

In each case, the photos taken were printed out and/or burned to a DVD by the county employee, who provided them directly to the county manager for his and his family’s own use, the report said.

Lost support

Three county commissioners — David Dennis, David Unruh and Michael O’Donnell — had ordered the investigation, saying the county had lost several key employees and was at risk of losing more because of Scholes’ management practices.

Commissioners Richard Ranzau and Jim Howell supported the manager and resisted hiring outside counsel to look into his job performance.

Ranzau and Unruh have since left the commission.

Ranzau lost his seat to Lacey Cruse in the November election. Unruh, who didn’t seek re-election, was replaced by former Wichita City Council member Pete Meitzner.

The local investigation took place against a backdrop of federal investigations into county practices and some of its officials.

Scholes was one of several individuals interviewed in 2017 in an FBI investigation of O’Donnell.

O’Donnell has since been charged with wire fraud and money laundering in connection with his handling of campaign funds. A trial on those charges has been delayed three times and is now scheduled for Feb. 25.

In late 2017, Unruh asked then-County Counselor Eric Yost if the commission could fire Scholes for disloyalty, for providing information about the commissioners to the FBI.

Yost initially said yes, but then sent Unruh a memo reversing that opinion and telling Unruh that firing Scholes for that reason could violate federal laws protecting governmental whistleblowers.

Unruh didn’t pursue the matter further, but it did later prompt a round of questioning by the FBI that is known to have included members of the county commission and Yost.

In October, Dennis, then the commission chairman, gave Scholes a quit-or-be-fired ultimatum, telling him he’d lost the support of a majority of the commissioners.

At that point, Yost called Scholes and told him that Unruh had asked about firing him for cooperating with the FBI. Unknown to Yost, Scholes recorded their conversation.

Dennis publicly accused Yost of violating attorney-client confidentiality during a commission meeting on Oct. 24.

About a week later, Yost’s attorney held a news conference where he disclosed the existence of the recording and read a statement in which Yost defended his actions. In the statement, Yost said he informed Scholes to prevent the commission from committing an illegal act, which is an exception to attorney-client privilege rules.

The recording and the county’s investigation report have since been provided to federal investigators.

No further interviews between county officials and the FBI have been reported for more than three months and in their settlements, both Scholes and Yost agreed not to file any legal actions against the county.

Although the investigation report was not publicly released, commissioners opposed to Scholes said it confirmed a toxic work environment where employees felt disrespected and at times threatened by the manager’s style.

But while Dennis, Unruh and O’Donnell had pushed to get rid of Scholes, it was Ranzau and Howell, the two commissioners who supported the manager, who voted with Unruh to accept the settlement.

Dennis and O’Donnell voted no, saying they thought the settlement was too much.

Scholes’ contract specified he would be paid six months salary if he were fired without cause, while the settlement was equivalent to about 13 months salary.

Ranzau and Howell said they voted to settle largely because they thought Scholes had a case against the county and it would have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars more to fight it.

This story was originally published January 27, 2019 at 5:11 AM.