Key West elected officers on Thursday, April 24 terminated the employment contract of twice-indicted metropolis legal professional Ron Ramsingh with out trigger. The subsequent day, Code Compliance director Jim Younger, who was additionally indicted, submitted his retirement paperwork. Constructing official Raj Ramsingh, who’s indicted on eight felony costs, is awaiting an employment pre-determination listening to at metropolis corridor this week. He has been on paid administrative depart because the preliminary indictments have been introduced on April 15.
Town fee’s April 24 without-cause termination vote for Ron Ramsingh, that means no particular examples of wrongdoing have been cited, entitles the legal professional to a $221,000 payout — roughly equal to a 12 months’s wage.
By refusing to terminate Ramsingh’s contract with trigger, by specifying metropolis insurance policies Ramsingh violated, the legal professional is entitled to twenty weeks pay, plus all accrued depart and advantages.
Termination with out trigger was the end result Ron Ramsingh requested of the commissioners in a handwritten letter he submitted to them via attorneys 90 minutes earlier than the termination assembly.
“I write to you humbly requesting that you simply contemplate and approve a termination of my employment contract with out trigger. I’m hopeful that if it’s the will of the fee, this may be completed with as little vitriol as doable. Sadly, there was a shift in our city and gone are the times of considerate, realized, peaceable, however spirited debate. It has been changed with shouting, keyboard warriors and individuals who love to make use of our beloved motto, ‘One Human Household,’ as a sword and a protect. Individuals who suppose that if they’ve the bumper sticker and a Conch Republic license plate, then they’re a real native…That’s not it in any respect. Being a real native of Key West is a frame of mind. It’s a state of caring about your neighbor on a mobile stage. It’s about service above self and fascinated by the larger good of this particular little life raft of an island 150 miles out to sea….Do you have to determine to terminate me with out trigger, please accomplish that shortly to spare additional damage in my household to listen to and skim these feedback, and albeit, loss of life threats. Key West ought to transfer on and it will likely be with love for everybody working at 1300 White St. that I want you properly.”
Mayor Dee Dee Henriquez and Commissioner Sam Kaufman have been steadfast in voting repeatedly to terminate Ramsingh for trigger, emphasizing that Ramsingh had violated two particular metropolis rules.
“From my perspective, termination for trigger is greater than justified,” Kaufman stated on the April 24 assembly. “It’s the proper factor to do. These are very severe violations involving breach of public belief, conflicts of curiosity, destroying proof and withholding info from some commissioners.”
The 2 offenses listed within the metropolis’s worker insurance policies guide, which Kaufman and Henriquez each cited of their causes for voting to terminate with trigger, are offense numbers 9 and 12.
Offense 9 is: “Illegal or improper conduct or indecency both on or off the job which might have an effect on the worker’s relationship to the job, their coworkers, or the worker’s or Metropolis’s popularity or good will in the neighborhood.”
Offense 12 is: “ Deliberate falsification or mishandling of private, personnel, monetary, or Metropolis data, together with employment purposes, accident reviews, work data, buy orders, attendance data, income receipts, or another report, document, or doc.”
Ron Ramsingh has been indicted on 4 felony costs — official misconduct for allegedly “interfering with the reporting of a felony dedicated by his brother,” the indictment states; plus obstructing justice by tampering with proof, and illegal assortment and distribution of digital communications.
What in regards to the different 2 indicted officers?
Along with legal professional Ron Ramsingh, a grand jury not too long ago indicted his brother, Raj Ramsingh, town’s chief constructing official, and Jim Younger, town’s code compliance director.
Raj Ramsingh faces eight felony costs — seven counts of official misconduct for allegedly falsifying constructing permits and one depend of obstructing justice by tampering with proof in deleting or altering textual content messages from his city-owned mobile phone that have been subpoenaed as a part of the continuing investigation.
Raj Ramsingh and Jim Younger have been positioned on paid administrative depart when the indictments have been introduced on April 15. Raj Ramsingh is scheduled to have a pre-determination listening to at metropolis corridor this coming week, Mayor Dee Dee Henriquez stated on Saturday.
Code Compliance director Jim Younger, who’s 68, submitted his retirement paperwork to town on Friday, April 25, Henriquez stated.
The Keys Weekly has requested the personnel recordsdata for all three workers.
Younger and each Ramsinghs have pre-trial hearings scheduled for July 31 in entrance of Choose Mark Jones, in line with on-line courtroom data. All have retained authorized counsel.
How did we get right here?
The indictments and ongoing investigation stem from the contentious firing of former metropolis supervisor Al Childress in June 2024, inside days of Childress taking disciplinary motion towards constructing official Raj Ramsingh.
A evaluate of town’s planning and constructing departments by outdoors consultants, often known as the Corradino Report, had revealed that Raj Ramsingh allegedly had made a apply of improperly issuing permits, variances and approvals for tasks that have been by no means seen or reviewed by town’s planning division, which is chargeable for such approvals.
Shortly after Childress took disciplinary motion towards Raj Ramsingh, in line with the indictments, Ron Ramsingh started an orchestrated effort to oust Childress.
The state legal professional’s evaluate of textual content messages amongst metropolis officers obtained via public document requests “appeared to point metropolis legal professional Ronald Ramsingh was orchestrating an effort amongst commissioners Jimmy Weekley, Lissette Cuervo, Clayton Lopez and Billy Wardlow to both pressure Albert Childress to voluntarily resign from his place or name a particular assembly of the Key West Metropolis Fee and vote to terminate his employment contract with out trigger by a majority vote,” state legal professional investigator Tom Walker wrote in his utility for a search warrant for mobile phone data.
“This effort to oust Albert Childress was attributed to an out of doors, impartial report he had commissioned which centered on points inside the Constructing Division of which Rajindar (Raj) Ramsingh is the Chief Constructing Official and the brother of Ronald Ramsingh,” Walker writes. “In totality, there may be possible trigger to imagine the inspiration of this effort was an try by Ronald Ramsingh to protect his brother Rajindhar Ramsingh, who’s the Metropolis of Key West Chief Constructing Official, from being disciplined by Albert Childress and permit for him to proceed in a protracted apply of improper acts as they pertain to the allowing course of,” investigator Walker writes in his utility for a search warrant for the Ramsinghs’ mobile phone data.