Steve Morelli resigns from Augusta County Board of Supervisors, but questions linger
AUGUSTA COUNTY, Va. — South River supervisor Steven Morelli submitted his resignation from the Augusta County Board of Supervisors on Monday morning, ending a tenure that began in 2020.
County administrator Tim Fitzgerald read a statement at a staff briefing on Monday that stated that Morelli had submitted his resignation due to personal reasons. The term was set to expire at the end of this year.
However, conversation during the board's staff briefing, which was streamed on Facebook, indicated that there could be more to the story than simple resignation.
Supervisor Scott Seaton was confused about the order of the board's work for the afternoon. According to chair Michael Shull, the discussion on Morelli's resignation was part of a closed session that had been moved to the end of the meeting at the request of supervisor Butch Wells. Prior to Seaton's objection, a statement was not planned for the livestream after the closed session.
"I believe it looks really bad when we don't have a public statement," Seaton said, later adding, "I thought we were going to do this at the beginning of the meeting so that we'd have a transparent end to the complete meeting there, and that's my concern."
Supervisor Pam Carter concurred with Seaton that the actions of the board should be included in the livestream for the public.
The board entered into closed session after that discussion, where they remained for around two hours. When they returned from closed session, Fitzgerald read the statement announcing Morelli's resignation.
"On behalf of the Board of Supervisors, I would like to thank and express appreciation for Steve Morelli's service to Augusta County," Fitzgerald said in his statement during the staff briefing.
"I was going to make a statement. However, the board and the victims have asked me to hold off on that, and so I'll choose to hold off right now regarding the South River resignation there," Seaton said during his board comments after Fitzgerald's statement. It is not immediately clear what Seaton was referencing with his "victims" comment.
Fitzgerald said that information on the process for filling the now vacant South River district seat would be forthcoming.
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—Akhil Ganesh is the Government Reporter at The News Leader. You can contact him at aganesh@newsleader.com and follow him on Twitter @akhildoesthings.
This article originally appeared on Staunton News Leader: Steve Morelli resigns from Augusta County Board of Supervisors but questions linger
