Columbus Public Information Officer Joe Dillon has resigned.
Dillon emailed his resignation to city officials around midday Tuesday. His last day on the job will be Jan. 15.
Dillon told The Dispatch Tuesday afternoon he felt his relationship with the city had run its course.
“In February it will have been eight years, and in politics that’s several lifetimes,” Dillon said. “… It was just time. It’s not (because of) one single thing, and it’s been a great eight years.”
Dillon has worked on contract for the city since 2016, during Robert Smith’s mayoral administration. Originally he was tasked with PIO duties, issuing press releases for the mayor’s office and police department as well as organizing press conferences. Over time his duties expanded to assembling and deploying CPD’s surveillance cameras, helping with technology, running the live streams of city meetings and overseeing paperwork relating to disaster claims eligible for Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursement.
He was paid about $32,000 a year for his PIO work.
Dillon said he relished the at-time unpredictable nature of the job.
“I loved the different things that came up,” Dillon said. “I remember when the barge hit the pedestrian bridge, (City Attorney Jeff Turnage) and I got in a fire department boat and went down the river and found the barge. That wasn’t on the agenda for my Friday.”
FEMA dispute
Dillon is currently engaged in a dispute with the city overhazard mitigation work he did on its behalf between 2019 and 2023 at a rate of $90 per hour. Through that work, he submitted applications for reimbursements from federal and state agencies.
Dillon submitted an invoice late last year for $56,773 he claims the city owes him for work he did documenting damage from the February 2019 tornado and flooding events.
The city got around $1 million in reimbursement for those projects, Dillon said.
However, the council decided in December 2021 to not seek reimbursement for about $250,000 in work done at Sim Scott after questions arose about whether state bid laws had been followed.
Turnage previously told The Dispatch Dillon did not have a contract with the city to do the work, and so it would be illegal for the city to pay him.
Tuesday night the council took up that request in executive session, but Mayor Keith Gaskin said it took no action on the invoice.
Dillon said he still hopes the dispute can be resolved, but all options — including a lawsuit — are on the table.
“I’m disappointed,” Dillon said. “I hoped the council would see they owed the money. I never thought there would be any question about payment. This does give me a clear decision on what their intent is.”
Dillon said it was too early to say what his next steps were going to be.
“I’m not going to rule anything out,” Dillon said. “The city got almost $1 million in their bank account from work that I did. … For the city to so quickly take the federal and state help and then run from a clean obligation is just unfathomable to me.”
Gaskin declined to comment on the situation.
Dillon owns a business, Digital Safety Services, which runs closed-circuit camera systems, and Dillon said that he will continue to do that work.
Brian Jones is the local government reporter for Columbus and Lowndes County.
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