HART's CEO Adelee Le Grand Wants to Flee Fiscally Failing HART With Big Payout and Demands Report From Investigation of Her Be Concealed

So much smoke has been blowing around HART, that in November last year the HART Board authorized an external investigation of their CEO.

Now HART's CEO Adelee LeGrand, the one being investigated, wants to resign from HART. She wants to flee fiscally failing HART with a big payout and demands that any report from the investigation of her never sees the light of day. 

And what timing....A report from the external investigation is to be made to the HART Board at Monday's (March 6, 2023) Board meeting.

This is a copy of the agenda item for Monday's meeting:

Note this section:  Rather than have Mr. Adams prepare a written report as the initial presentation of his findings, we are going to have him provide a verbal presentation at the regular HART Board Meeting in March. This is advisable because as soon as the report is prepared and delivered to General Counsel, it is a public record and could be disseminated to others upon their request and you may be reading about the report in the newspaper before hearing directly from the attorney who undertook the investigation.

After the agenda item was set, LeGrand's attorney sent this settlement demand to the HART Board members.

LeGrand Resignation Settlement Demands

Apparently, HART's legal counsel David Smith decided that only a verbal report, not a written one, would be provided to the Board Monday. Such action was never agreed upon by the HART Board. 

Investigations are not done to provide "verbal" reports. They are done to document in writing the findings of the investigation. 

The report from the investigation should have been provided to the Board last month. Why wasn't it? 

Something smells. Hasn't too many years of HART's dishonesty and lack of transparency help create the mess they are in?

The delay and Smith's decision to only provide a verbal report Monday helped LeGrand tee up her resignation demands. Le Grand wants the HART Board to agree to her demands Monday BEFORE the verbal report from the investigation is provided to the Board. So the report from the investigation is never made.

LeGrand wants to shut down the investigation of her. She wants to ensure the taxpayers who have been paying her salary never know what the investigation found.

LeGrand also wants to get paid 20 weeks of pay in a lump-sum and receive other financial benefits.

HART fiscally failed under LeGrand. She was hired in January 2020 as the highest paid CEO in the agency's history, with $50,000 in relocation assistance and a starting salary higher than her predecessor.

Then during the pandemic a feckless HART Board gave her a $37,500 pay raise after 1 year on the job. LeGrand's bloated salary got baked into HART's ballooning operating budget.

LeGrand....and the reckless former HART Board....refused to address HART's exploding operating costs. One time COVID relief money intended to help HART weather the pandemic was irresponsibly spent on pay raises to other high paid administrative staff that also got baked into HART's exploding operating expenses.  

LeGrand and the irresponsible former HART Board were banking on HART getting a taxpayer funded bailed out from the All for Transportation (AFT) transit tax. 

Almost all members of the previous HART Board supported the massive $23 Billion AFT tax hike. Do not forget that the Chair of the AFT PAC, Tyler Hudson, still sits on the HART Board.  

HART was banking on taxpayers being forced to hand HART at least 45%, over $10 Billion of AFT tax dollars. Those billions would have provided cover for HART's fiscal mess. 

Instead of a bail out, HART is going insolvent. LeGrand wants to flee HART with a bunch of your tax dollars and assurances that the external investigation of her remains hidden.

It took a new HART Board, with some new members appointed after the November election, to authorize the external investigation last year.

If LeGrand and the HART Board believe in transparency and actually want to fix the mess HART has become, they would welcome the external investigation report.

But according to this Tampa Bay Times article, HART's legal counsel David Smith wants the HART Board to accept Le Grand's demands:

“It is the Board’s decision, but it is the opinion of General Counsel, after consultation with employment counsel, that in light of all the relevant circumstances, acceptance of this proposal is in the best interest of HART,” Smith wrote to board members Thursday.

As we reported here we continue to question why David Smith still has his job. It was Smith who admitted at a HART Board meeting that the 2022 AFT transit tax ballot language was intentionally politically polluted. 

A Circuit Court judge agreed and removed AFT from the ballot. Thankfully AFT was defeated at the ballot box last year when the transit tax was allowed to remain on the ballot during the appeal process. 

HART has spent almost $300K in legal fees trying to defend unlawful AFT transit tax hikes. And apparently, as HART's financial position kept declining, they had no qualms doing so.

Lack of transparency about an investigation the HART Board authorized and taxpayers funded is wrong. Lack of transparency raises more questions and will heighten more distrust of HART. 

HART's credibility is in the tank and their financial position on life support.

On Monday, the HART Board must reject LeGrand's demand to shield herself from the investigation of her. They cannot reward incompetence, fiscal mismanagement, willful neglect or even a whiff of unethical behavior.

We must know who knew what when! 

Censorship of the investigation report is unacceptable!

We must know the findings of the investigation for HART to take measures to never allow such mess to happen again.  

Hillsborough County commissioner Joshua Wostal is absolutely correct in his comment to the Times:

Hillsborough County Commissioner Joshua Wostal called the proposal a “slap in the face” to taxpayers and an attempt to suppress the investigation’s findings.

“The voters paid for it,” he told The Times Thursday. “They deserve to see what’s in it.”

The report from the investigation must be transparently made to the Board. Censorship of the report cannot be allowed.

Because when smoke is blowing, there are often flames. If there is a fire burning at HART, it must be put out.

Transparency and honesty is required for HART to rebuild any sense of trust with the transit agency.

And taxpayers and the HART Board deserve to know whether LeGrand should be allowed to resign with impunity and a big payout or be fired.