Fired police chief says Forest Hill discriminated, retaliated against him: EEOC complaint
Former Forest Hill police chief Eddie Burns faced discrimination and retaliation after raising concerns about problems, including potentially criminal problems, with city leadership, he alleged in a complaint filed before his termination.
Burns was fired Feb. 17. Supporters in the city have suggested his termination was a result of the EEOC complaint being filed. They protested the decision to fire him outside Forest Hill City Hall on March 1. Some people later showed up at a city council meeting to demand his reinstatement and criticize the city during public comments.
The city said in a news release after his termination that Burns was fired because of “a series of substantiated policy violations and a sustained lack of confidence in Burns’ ability to effectively perform in the position.”
He filed the complaint, obtained by the Star-Telegram, with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Texas Workforce Commission on Jan. 30.
In the document, Burns, who is Black and 63 years old, wrote that he faced discrimination from city leadership based on his race and age and that he was a target of retaliation for protected action. He wrote that the work environment in Forest Hill became so hostile he began experiencing adverse health effects and was advised by his doctor to take medical leave as a result.
City Manager Venus Wehle said in a news release Thursday that the city denies the allegations in the complaint. She said Burns was not discriminated against by the city “when it hired Burns as Chief of Police nor was he discriminated against during his tenure with the City or in the termination of his employment.”
“Over the course of his employment, a pattern of disregard for City policies and directives caused City administration to lose confidence in his ability to manage the department,” Wehle wrote in the release.
She said the loss of confidence was also seen in a Texas Municipal Police Association survey of officers in the department.
Burns, who was hired in 2021, wrote in the complaint that problems started last year when he challenged Mayor Stephanie Boardingham by telling council members she “was attempting to pass resolutions without their authority,” had failed to add prospective ordinances to council meeting agendas, and had asked him to “make tickets disappear.”
Burns also said in the complaint that Boardingham’s desire to end a Citizens on Patrol program came after and because members of that patrol openly criticized her.
Boardingham declined to comment Thursday, saying she hasn’t seen the complaint and wouldn’t feel comfortable speaking about it until she has seen it herself.
Burns wrote that Forest Hill government became “such a hostile work environment that they are attempting to issue and document multiple infractions that never occurred and did not exist.”
A copy of Burns’ personnel file obtained by the Star-Telegram included three written reprimands, all from 2023. The first reprimand, from March 10, related to a meeting Burns had with an officer who was on leave and filing a complaint against the city. He challenged the reprimand and attempted to have it removed from his file.
Wehle charged in the reprimand that Burns’ actions in the meeting, including allowing the officer to record a portion of the exchange, “evidence an extraordinary lack of good judgment and thus evidence incompetence in the performance of the general duties of a department head.”
Burns wrote in his rebuttal to the reprimand that orders not to speak to employees who had made complaints came after he met with the officer and that he tried several times to contact Wehle and the director of the city’s human resources department before the meeting.
Burns wrote that he told the HR director after the meeting that the officer was going on unpaid leave and wanted to know if there was anything Burns could do for her. He told her she would be able to cash in on vacation and sick leave and allowed her to record a portion of the meeting to maintain transparency, he said.
Burns was also criticized in a June 13 reprimand for hiring an attorney related to the employee’s complaint. Wehle wrote in the reprimand that Burns hired the attorney without approval of the city council but that the invoices were sent to the city.
Burns was also given a written discipline Oct. 18, for responding to an email from a city council member. The reprimand does not include details about the email but Burns wrote in his EEOC complaint that he was responding to a council member who had questions about why it took so long to release information on a murder investigation.
The reprimand notes the email exchange happened Oct. 17, 2023, six days after a shooting outside David K Sellars Elementary School in Forest Hill, before the school opened. The shooting killed Yolanda Gibbs, a cafeteria worker at the school. Police and city leaders were slow to release any details about what happened.
Boardingham held a news conference that afternoon. After reading a prepared statement calling the community to come together and support each other, she told reporters she didn’t know what happened, including whether there was a shooting or if there was an ongoing threat to the public.
Burns wrote in the complaint that the retaliation against him included Wehle turning down a U.S. Department of Justice grant that would have helped the department hire more officers. The city was notified of the grant award by Sept. 20, 2023, according to the DOJ website.
Forest Hill saw 10 officers quit the department and only three hired from January 2022 to Nov. 1, 2023, according to public records obtained by the Star-Telegram. The city confirmed Feb. 8 that it had not hired any more officers or had any additional police leave the department since. With Burns’ termination, the department currently has 17 officers.
With a population of 13,701 in 2022 according to the U.S. Census Bureau, Forest Hill has about 1.2 officers for every 1,000 residents. According to statistics from the FBI, the national average number of police officers per 1,000 residents in a city was 2.4 in 2019, the latest year data was available.
Because of staffing issues, Wehle, the city manager, said in a previous interview that she decided the department would stop providing school resource officers in August of last year, meaning there were no officers on campus the day of the shooting in the parking lot.
Burns wrote in the complaint that the grant of over $500,000, which would have provided 75% of funding from the Department of Justice and 25% from the city, was declined by Wehle.
“The City Manager said I didn’t follow protocol, there was not any protocol in writing to follow,” Burns wrote in the complaint. “The city manager turned the grant down as a retaliation against me.”
Termination letter
A copy of Burns’ termination letter shared with the Star-Telegram by the city says Burns violated several policies during his time with the department.
Burns’ attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the contents of the letter.
In the termination letter, Wehle highlights the Department of Justice grant and alleges that Burns may have even committed fraud by submitting the application without the approval of the city manager, mayor and council. Burns wrote in his complaint that there were no written policies regarding submitting grant proposals. The Star-Telegram has requested a copy of any policies or protocols that existed and would have applied when the grants were submitted.
The letter also accuses him of unprofessionalism, favoritism and failing to inspire police department employees.
It outlines some results from a Texas Municipal Police Association management survey in which officers in the department expressed low confidence in Burns as the chief. The survey had participation from 14 of the 15 officers who qualified to participate.
In the results included in the letter, 92% of officers in the department disagreed that they were inspired to “excell” in the workplace. Also 93% of officers said their stress level in the department is “bad” or “very bad,” and the same percentage said they would not recommend the police department as a place to work and that they disagree it “is a better place to work now than two years ago.”
In the survey 100% of employees said morale was not high and 22% said they had confidence in Burns’ ability to lead.
The letter also mentions a crash Burns had while in a police vehicle. Details on the crash were not provided in the letter.
The Star-Telegram has requested a copy of the full survey results, along with more information on the crash from the city.
This story was originally published March 28, 2024 at 5:35 PM.