Attorneys presented more than an hour and a half of arguments, affidavits and testimony, as Jackson County Airport Authority members Tom McClure, Jim Rowell and Eldridge Painter sought a preliminary injuction against county commissioners Wednesday morning (April 6).

If granted, the injunction would reinstate McClure as chairman of the Airport Authority and Rowell as secretary-treasurer, prohibit newly appointed members Gary Buchanan and Ed Riley from further participation with the authority, and prohibit county commissioners from attempting to exercise control over the authority contrary to law.

However, county attorney Paul Holt said no injunction should be granted as McClure has exhibited improper conduct, that county commissioners never tried to remove him from his posts and no one is entitled to a post to which they have not been sworn in.

So far neither side has won the argument. District Court Judge Ronald Payne ordered the opposing attorneys to summarize their points in a three-page document, which would be delivered to his office during Monday morning deliberations in Haywood County. A ruling on the injunction would be made anytime between lunch Monday, April 11 and Friday, April 15, he said.

“I want to get this thing ruled on as quick as I can,” Judge Payne said.

McClure, Rowell and Painter filed suit against county commissioners two weeks ago, seeking no damages, only a restoration to positions that are volunteer, unpaid positions. The suit alleges county commissioners committed a series of misdeeds including, but not limited to open meeting law violations, misuse of county employees and stepping beyond the bounds of granted authority, in the course of commissioners’ attempt at launching an investigation into Economic Development Commission practices in January.

In the fallout of that investigation, which failed to turn up any conclusive evidence of wrongdoing on the EDC’s part, commissioners attempted to remove McClure from his posts as the EDC chairman, chairman of the county’s revolving loan committee and chairman of the Airport Authority.

However, commissioners only had the granted authority to remove McClure from the revolving loan committee, which was created by the county.

McClure was appointed to the EDC by Western Carolina University, meaning the school is the only entity with power to remove him from that post.

And the Airport Authority was created by the General Assembly was a self-governing body. Commissioners never provided a reason for attempting to remove McClure from the Airport Authority, as the investigation technically was into the EDC. The only commonalities between the commission and the authority are that McClure chaired them both. At no point was McClure given notification of his pending removal and a chance to be heard regarding the issue.

However, upon commissioners saying they removed McClure from his post on the Airport Authority, they also said that no one on the Authority had been sworn in properly. Commissioners moved to appoint all new members to the authority, replacing McClure.

“Now that’s common law and basically common sense,” Judge Payne said, citing a need for due process and due cause for removing someone from a position.

Then, in what plaintiffs McClure, Rowell and Painter allege was an improperly called and constituted meeting, commissioner Eddie Madden ordered the election of new officers for the authority. In a split vote, Buchanan was elected chairman and Riley elected secretary treasurer. The plaintiffs say neither of these positions was vacant and in need of filling, particularly in the case of Rowell who was acting secretary/treasurer and present at the meeting.

Painter has remained an Authority member throughout, but has joined the suit in support of McClure and Rowell.

Interestingly, the crux of Wednesday’s arguments was whether or not McClure ever was sworn in as an Authority member.

“If you’ve not taken an oath, you’re not being removed,” Judge Payne said.

McClure has maintained that he did indeed take an oath of office, but could not say if that oath was properly recorded. As he remembered it, McClure said, current Clerk of Court Anne Melton swore him in, while she was an assistant clerk in 2000. With that, Judge Payne called for Melton to testify.

“Since this is supposed to be a search for the truth, I would like to conduct that search,” Judge Payne said.

Melton testified that she did not recall issuing McClure an oath of office, but that she had administered several oaths over the years. As an added complication, Melton said that not all oaths were recorded with the clerk’s office. That while assistant she did what the organization to which a person was to be sworn in requested. If the organization did not request the oaths filed, they were not filed. The last oaths for anyone on the Airport Authority on file — aside from those of the newly, but possibly improperly appointed members — are from 1997.

With McClure on the stand, Holt asked whose responsibility it was to see that Airport Authority members get sworn in. McClure said that when he took the position, the Authority chairman orchestrated the swearing in ceremony, a responsibility that presumably would have fallen to McClure once he was elected chairman.

“Did you see that they took their oaths?” Holt asked McClure regarding new authority members.

“No,” said McClure.