New filing: Judge agreed $4M settlement was reached, just not enforceable

OTTAWA COUNTY — The chair of the Ottawa County Board of Commissioners claims local media manufactured a $4 million settlement agreement between the board and the county's health officer in November.

More: Judge says vote on $4M settlement wasn't 'clear enough'

A new court filing, however, alleges a circuit court judge found an agreement was, in fact, reached with Health Officer Adeline Hambley and "a majority of board members approved of the terms of (the) agreement" during a closed session Nov. 6.

However, the subsequent motion made that day by Board Chair Joe Moss "was too ambiguous to ratify the ... agreement," Hambley's attorney, Sarah Riley-Howard, wrote in a new filing Friday, Jan. 19.

In the new document, Howard summarized the findings from last week's evidentiary hearing, halted midway through after Muskegon County 14th Circuit Court Judge Jenny McNeill ruled four commissioners Howard subpoenaed didn't have to testify and declared the settlement unenforceable.

The board voted on the motion after a more-than-eight-hour closed session Nov. 6. Details of the agreement included paying Hambley a total of $4 million to step down, plus the resignation of Deputy Health Officer Marcia Mansaray.

Howard planned to elicit testimony last week from County Clerk Justin Roebuck and Commissioners Jacob Bonnema, Doug Zylstra, Roger Bergman and Moss, the leader of Ottawa Impact, a far-right fundamentalist group that assumed a controlling majority of the board in January 2023.

McNeill ruled Dec. 4 she'd privately review the minutes from the closed session and would allow Howard the evidentiary hearing. The proceedings were public at the outset, but the judge later agreed to close the courtroom to take testimony, saying "that bell can't be unrung" if the testimony were made public.

Roebuck gave testimony for approximately three hours; after which McNeill granted Kallman Legal Group's renewed motion to cancel additional testimony.

Kallman described the settlement as "the phantom agreement" and insisted $4 million "was never agreed to or approved" when he addressed reporters Friday.

Moss echoed the statement Monday, Jan. 22, when he appeared on a conservative radio program claiming "truth prevailed," that Hambley was engaging in "lawfare" and that "local media repeated this $4 million lie over and over ... which never existed."

Howard, however, said McNeill agreed a $4 million agreement was reached, but Moss' resolution to approve was simply to vague to be enforced.

Howard's newest filing is called a seven-day order, in which, after the granting of the judgment or order, a party may serve a copy of the proposed judgment to other involved parties. If there are no objections to accuracy or completeness, the document is submitted to the court for signing. Essentially, it's a method to get a written judgement when a judge orders from the bench.

"The court finds the board made offers and counteroffers on Nov. 6 to (Hambley) through the lawyers for the attorneys, and a majority of board members approved of the terms of an agreement which were as plaintiff described ... and directed legal counsel to write up a written agreement with those terms," Howard wrote in the proposed order.

"The court determines that ... (the board's) motion in the open portion of the meeting failed to effectively ratify the agreement the parties reached because it was ambiguous, and because the board is a public entity, even a majority of board members’ agreement to the terms is not enough to make the settlement enforceable without an adequately clear public vote."

Howard told The Sentinel she plans to appeal McNeill's findings, including the decision to close the hearing to the public, not providing the plaintiff a copy of the closed session minutes to review, not allowing testimony to be taken from the subpoenaed commissioners, and the decision not to enforce the settlement agreement.

"I think the public has a right to know what was talked about and the basis for the judge's decision," Howard told reporters Jan. 19. "The judge decided that, after taking the testimony of the first witness ... that the board tended to agree but didn't effectively ratify the decision."

Howard addressed the vagueness in an amended complaint in late November, arguing Moss' resolution in and of itself was illegal because Michigan's Open Meetings Act requires that public bodies be clear about what actions they're taking when voting on resolutions.

She maintained Moss shouldn't be allowed to legally benefit from not following the law.

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"By failing to advise the public about the particulars of the decision they were making after they left closed session on Nov. 6, 2023, instead reflecting only acceptance of recommendation of unidentified legal advice, defendants violated (the Open Meetings Act)," Howard wrote in the amended complaint, which McNeill accepted Dec. 4.

Hambley and Mansaray remain in their positions for now.

— Sarah Leach is the executive editor of The Holland Sentinel. Contact her at sarahleach@hollandsentinel.com. Find her on Twitter @SentinelLeach.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: New filing: Judge agreed $4M settlement was reached, just not enforceable