Lula mayor is also a mailman. He's been accused of mishandling mail

Jun. 9—First of two parts

Joe Thomas is the mayor of Lula. He is also the mailman.

Several residents — who are also his political foes — and the city clerk allege Thomas has improperly handled, distributed, or in some cases, withheld mail.

Thomas has denied some of the accusations. He has admitted to others, even calling his method of delivery "excellent service."

And while the local postmaster says Thomas improperly handled mail, the U.S. Postal Service says he didn't do anything wrong — while also refusing to acknowledge whether the matter has ever been investigated at all.

Then there's the Hatch Act, a federal law which says that in most cases, mail carriers are prohibited from holding political office.

It all raises a swirl of questions about Thomas' dual role as mayor and mailman of the small city in northeast Hall.

Complaint of improper mail distribution

Earlier this year, two downtown business owners complained they were no longer receiving mail and named Thomas, their mail carrier, as the alleged culprit.

At the time, Amanda's Farm-to-Fork owner Amanda Browning and several other residents were just gaining momentum in a movement to recall Thomas and Councilman Gene Bramlett, an effort which ultimately failed in April. During the recall effort, Browning told council members she and other business owners had faced acts of "intimidation" and "retaliation" from Thomas and "his known associates."

A total of four residents ultimately filed complaints with the city against Thomas over missing mail. They now believe he was withholding it as retaliation for trying to remove him from office — an accusation Thomas has vehemently denied.

Also during that time, City Clerk Tangee Puckett filed a complaint against Thomas alleging improprieties involving distribution of city mail.

Thomas later admitted some of those actions were true.

The chronology of events which compelled Puckett to file a formal complaint against the mayor began on the morning of March 20. According to the complaint, Puckett said she went into the local post office as she "does every morning." When she opened the city's P.O. Box, she found three anonymous letters — one addressed to Thomas and the others to City Manager Dennis Bergin and Code Enforcement Officer Doug Forrester, the latter of whom she said seemed "disturbed" when he read it.

The envelopes were stamped but had no return address. The recipient address (Lula City Hall) had been typed, printed and taped to the front, and none of the letters had a postmark in accordance with processed mail delivery.

The contents of the three letters were all the same — a strangely worded question regarding city ordinances on RV campers being used as permanent residences.

Suspicious, Puckett returned to the post office and brought the letters to Postmaster Miles Jones for official review. Puckett told Jones that the mayor's wife Patti believed her husband had not been getting mail at Lula City Hall, according to the complaint, and that Patti Thomas made a remark to another city employee that she'd be sending "test mail" to the city.

Patti Thomas said she never mentioned any intention to send "test mail" to Lula City Hall.

The complaint goes on to state that Jones told Puckett the mail "had not gone through the proper distribution" to be in the city's box.

Jones then called Thomas to confront him. Thomas was on his mail route when he took the call, and Jones asked him about the letters. The mayor told Jones he "gets mail there all the time."

"That's not my question," Jones replied. "Did you put the envelopes in the city's P.O. Box?"

The complaint states that Thomas hesitated before he said no, and then Jones told Puckett he suspected the mayor was lying by the way he paused before he answered the question.

Puckett followed up with Jones over the phone two days later, according to the complaint. That's when Jones told Puckett that the mayor later "admitted he was the one who had placed the envelopes in the city's P.O. Box."

"The postmaster explained (to Puckett) this was not the proper way to handle the mail," the complaint states. "All mail had to go through distribution, even if he was handed something and asked for it to be placed in someone's P.O. Box."

Thomas told The Times in May that he did place the anonymous mail in the city's P.O. Box, though he claimed to have no knowledge of the source of the letters and said he'd discovered them in a mailbox along his mailroute.

Thomas said he doesn't recall which mailbox on his route contained the anonymous letters and maintains he did nothing wrong, contending that what he does on his mail route is no business of the city.

"It's a postal matter, I think. It's been resolved," Thomas said. "I'm still doing mail...if I get mail locally, I put it locally. It's excellent service is what it is."

City officials react

Opinions vary on the questions about the mayor and the mail.

For Lula Councilman Tony Cornett, Thomas serving as mayor and mailman in the city of just under 3,000 residents has become problematic.

"In light of Mayor Thomas' admittance regarding the post office box for the City of Lula, one might ask — what was to be gained or hidden by circumventing the normal protocol or distribution process?" Cornett said. "One would think careful adherence to process would be of utmost importance in such an already sensitive circumstance. Some may argue the mayor's actions, in this case, demonstrate an attempt to manipulate and influence the operations of the city directly from his role as U.S. postal carrier."

Councilman Gene Bramlett said the issue should be handled by the post office, not the city.

"It's got nothing to do with the city of Lula," he said. "That's something the city can't control. My main concern is what's done at City Hall."

Lula City Attorney Joey Homans also stated the matter should be left up to the U.S. Postal Service.

"Any issue, from the city's end, is we just don't have control over whatever the internal rules are at the post office. Take that up with the postmaster."

While Puckett said Jones assured her the proper steps would be taken to investigate Thomas' actions, Jones hasn't contacted her since the incident.

Jones declined to comment for this article.

The legality of being both mayor and mailman

Officials with the United States Postal Service have refused requests by The Times to release records of any investigation, citing Exemption 6 of the Freedom of Information Act.

Exemption 6 is intended to "protect information that would clearly constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of privacy."

However, despite refusing to confirm or deny the existence of an investigation — and despite Jones' statement that the mail was delivered to the city through improper channels — the Postal Service did issue a statement.

U.S. Post Office Strategic Communications Specialist Evelina Ramirez said Thomas' actions didn't violate any specific policy on mail distribution.

"Any postal employee can place mail that has proper postage affixed inside any mail receptacle, including post office boxes," she said. "Occasionally, there will be no postmark. What we care about is if there is no postage."

Ramirez declined to say whether the federal agency condones Thomas' actions which led to the complaint in March.

"I've given...all the information I have," she said.

With the question of how the mayor handles the mail came another one: Is he allowed to be mayor at all?

The Hatch Act places firm laws against federal employees carrying out political activity while on the clock, and federal law prohibits U.S. mail carriers from holding political office in governments with partisan elections.

But in Lula, a city with nonpartisan elections, political candidates don't qualify under a certain party ticket, so Thomas can legally hold office as mayor and continue to work as a mail carrier.

And Thomas' alleged improper handling of the mail doesn't appear to violate the Hatch Act, according to Eric Johnson, an attorney with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel's Hatch Act Unit. Johnson stipulated he can't definitively say whether Thomas violated the Hatch Act without a person filing a complaint that leads to a formal investigation.

"That's something that may implicate some ethics laws or USPS rules or regulations about the handling of mail," Johnson said. "But for the Hatch Act, the term that is in the statute is political activity...for Hatch Act purposes, (that term) actually gets narrowed pretty substantially."

Environment at City Hall

Puckett said she now fears retaliation or criticism of her job performance as a result of her complaint against Thomas.

The mayor and his wife, along with Bramlett and Forrester, have been the subject of previous investigations alleging the use of city code enforcement to target political opponents. And allegations of a toxic culture at Lula City Hall first emerged in December after Bramlett was accused of sexual harassment by a city employee.

Puckett told The Times that Thomas' actions with the anonymous letters have further toxified the environment at City Hall.

"The environment it has created — it's almost like (the mayor and his wife) don't trust city employees," Puckett said.

In 2021, Joe Thomas, a longtime resident of Lula, defeated incumbent Jim Grier with 52 percent of the vote. Thomas began facing turmoil in office soon after he was sworn in in 2022. The following are stories involving Thomas.

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An effort to recall Mayor Joe Thomas first began after the release of a 45-page investigation into the city's code enforcement office and a final report that accused him of misconduct. Read more.

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Proponents of the recall became more vocal and gained momentum in their movement against the mayor in December after comments he made during a sexual harassment training seminar. Read more.

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Plans to attempt to recall Mayor Joe Thomas were announced in late January. Read more.

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Tones of hostility and clashes began to dominate Lula City Council meetings in January as residents wage frequent attacks on Mayor Joe Thomas' administration. Read more.

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The movement to recall Mayor Joe Thomas and remove him from office failed in April. Read more.

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In May, Mayor Joe Thomas again tried to implement policy limiting public comments amid continued attacks on his administration during meetings. Read more.