Carey Mayor Rathburn resigns, council president Kin takes over

By WILLIAM FRANCISCUS
Staff writer

CAREY — Mayor Jennifer Rathburn is the latest in a string of resignations in Carey, as her decision was announced at Village of Carey council meeting Monday night, with Council President Chad Kin being elevated into the mayor role.

Rathburn was noticeably absent at the beginning of meeting Monday night. In a letter that was delivered halfway through the meeting from Carey Fire Chief Chad Snyder, Rathburn announced her immediate resignation from the position. Kin read the letter aloud to the full crowd at the meeting.

Rathburn started off by talking about her journey in Carey village politics, talking about her role in the council and then moving on to her position of mayor.

“The role of Mayor in our community is a Jennifer Rathburn part-time position with the daily operations being run by our full-time Village Administrator,” Rathburn said. “I have gladly stayed a contracted employee at my full-time job to allow flexibility I needed to come to meetings or handle any issues when-ever needed. I have literally structured my career and life around my love for this community.”

Rathburn continued by talking about how certain members of the council questioned the love she has for the Carey community.

“Imagine my shock when Mr. [Evaristo] Hernandez stated this week via email that ‘I don’t know if you truly care about this community the way you state you do.’ If my number one priority wasn’t pulling Council together to work through the issues,” Rathburn said. “We have tried … so many times. The amount of times [former Village Administrator] Scott Washburn and I sat and tried to brainstorm how to best work with this group of people are too many to count. But, how do you work with people that thrive on causing chaos?”

Rathburn then talked about how there were issues with council members not knowing their role and questioning her authority. She mentioned by name Kin and Hernandez as being two members make accusations about several village employees and issues.

“How do two council men, who have zero education or experience in safety service, construction management or finance feel they can critique the work of those who are experts in their field?” Rathburn said.

Rathburn continued in her letter discussion Kin’s poor behavior during his time on council and talked about some of the stances he has such as that he will never support the school.

“This boils down to one thing for Mr. Kin,” Rathburn said. “In two elections he has not been able to garner enough votes to be Mayor, so he has decided to force his way in.

Kin finished four votes behind Rathburn in the November 2023 election, losing 533-529.

Rathburn wrapped up her letter announcing her resignation by calling on Kin and Hernandez to do the same.

“Chad and Vady, I am stepping down effective today and so should you,” Rathburn said. Our town deserves better than this chaos. Chad, our residents have spoken in two different elections that they did not want you to be Mayor. If you step into this role, you will essentially be throwing up the finger at them and the election process.”

Both Kin and Hernandez said they will not resign.

“I’m not stepping down,” Kin said. “I mean, I have in the past when I moved out of town and had to step down. But I heard plenty of residents out there today saying please don’t step down.”

Several residents during the meeting expressed the opposite sentiment, with one saying, “If you were a man of honor, you would resign tonight, Mr. Kin.”

Rathburn concluded her letter by thanking the Carey residents for their support during her time as mayor.

“I cannot thank you enough for your support you have given over my time as Mayor, especially in the last few weeks,” Rathburn said. “I have had so many people stop me recently to say, ‘Don’t quit.’ I understand the sentiment. I didn’t want to quit. My plan has always been to finish my current term and then not run again, as I believe in term limits. However, this has become too much. Our staff doesn’t deserve this, [Fiscal Officer] Laura [Ewing] didn’t deserve this, and Scott didn’t deserve this.”

After the finishing of Rathburn’s letter, Hernandez motioned for an executive session to discuss personnel, but it was not seconded.

Washburn resigned at the last council meeting, Sept. 16, citing many of the same reasons as Rathburn. Since then, council members Randy Schreiner and Chase Fletcher also have submit-ted letters of resignations.

There was a common sen-timent that the council had chased away another hard-working person who cared about Carey.

“I’m deeply saddened to see her leave,” Council member Derek Puchta said. “I thought she served our community very well, and she really cares. I’m not a fan of some of the things said about her.”

Police Chief Ryan Doe also shared the sentiment that Rathburn was a good mayor to work under.

“I will say Mayor Rathburn has been a great mayor to serve under,” Doe said. “My time at Findlay I had the opportunity to serve under numerous mayors, and she has been great.”

Doe also shared a letter with the public stating that Officer John Dunbar will resign due to concerns of the work environment creat-ed by council members. Doe spoke glowingly about Dunbar’s impact on the other officers.
Many citizens voiced concern that there might be more village employees that might resign due to the turmoil and Kin taking power as mayor.

At the beginning of the meeting, council approved Natasha Hatfield to be the new fiscal officer for the village. Hatfield was made aware of Washburn’s resignation but did not know Rathburn was resigning.

“I think her intention was not to scare me off,” Hatfield said. “I have a lot of thoughts right now and just have to sort them out.”

It was then brought up by citizen Anthony Fletcher about the possibility of there being an investigation to try to find the root of why there have been all these sudden resignations of several village employees.

Later in the meeting, Puchta motioned for the council to have legal counsel start an investigation and was seconded by Hernandez.

It was alleged by multiple citizens that Hernandez has been spying on village employees and trying to catch village employees for violations. Hernandez stated that the claims against him were “totally false. I have better things to do with my time.”

A large topic of discussion after the Rathburn resignation was the council member voids that need to be filled. There are three open spots with Kin taking over as mayor, and Chase Fletcher and Schreiner resigning.

Citizens have until Oct. 16 to submit their applications, and new members will be voted at the Oct. 21 meeting. Several citizens expressed interest at the meeting of becoming council members.

It also was discussed that there are several applicants for the village administrator position and the council stated it is trying to get someone in that position as soon as possible.

The next council meeting is 7 p.m. Oct. 21.