An ex-city of Tallahassee Electric Utility manager, who helped oversee the Hurricane Hermine response, accused the city of prioritizing power restoration for family and friends of top city officials and intentionally slowing down repairs at the Governor’s Mansion.

Clinton Smith, the former employee, said that at one point last year in the Hermine response, Rob McGarrah, general manager of the Electric Utility, vowed Gov. Rick Scott would be “the last SOB in the city to get power.” Scott was among the city’s harshest critics over the pace of electric repairs in the wake of Hermine.

Smith's allegations are included in an explosive, 27-page whistle-blower lawsuit filed Saturday in Leon Circuit Court. He described in court documents a culture of nepotism and self-dealing at City Hall and accused city officials of a variety of misdeeds.

The back story:

After the Tallahassee Democrat published news of the lawsuit Saturday, Mayor Andrew Gillum pledged in a written statement to review any evidence brought to the city.

"While the source of these accusations is an employee who was terminated from his position at the city almost a year after Hurricane Hermine, I still take any talk of wrongdoing very seriously," said Gillum, who's running for governor. "I will take at any and all evidence that is provided, though to this point none has been brought to our attention."

The complaint is part of a legal salvo by a group of about a dozen ex-city workers who are suing the city following their layoffs over the summer, according to their attorney, Marie Mattox of Tallahassee. The other plaintiffs’ allegations will be contained in a single lawsuit she expects to file within about a week.

“They blew the whistle from safety violations to improprieties in working on city officials’ property,” she said of the other former employees.

Calls to interim City Manager Reese Goad and city spokeswoman Alison Faris were not immediately returned. But hours after publication, Faris relayed a statement from Goad, who was traveling with limited connectivity.

"From my read of the article, the accusations are unsubstantiated and baseless and appear to be designed to disparage the city and its employees," he said.

The lawsuit says that after Hermine made landfall Sept. 2, 2016, Smith witnessed first-hand “the manner in which agents/representatives of the city of Tallahassee prioritized the interests of their families, friends and/or business associates above those of their citizen constituency.”

Smith, the complaint says, “was charged with the unenviable and/or herculean task of overseeing the restoration of electricity to the majority of the city. During this time, (he) received repeated and/or incessant text messages and other communications from various elected city officials and senior management advising and/or directing him to give priority to and/or address power outages in so-called ‘hot spots.’ ”

He was given a list of street addresses to give “special attention” to above other areas of the city with outages. But on multiple occasions, Smith found the addresses didn’t actually exist.

“Conspicuously ... the non-existent addresses were found to be adjacent and/or in close proximity with relatives and/or friends of highly placed city officials," the lawsuit says.

Hermine, the most destructive storm to hit Tallahassee in three decades, knocked out power to nearly 80,000 city customers. The city was able to restore power to most customers within five days, but the pace prompted public sparring between Scott and Gillum, who defended city efforts.

Smith alleged Rob McGarrah, general manager of the Electric Utility, called Scott the expletive and vowed the governor would be the last in the city to get power back. About five days after landfall, Smith got a call telling him the generator at the Governor’s Mansion was failing.

“After being unable to reach Mr. McGarrah, (Smith) dispatched crews to the Governor’s Mansion to restore power, a decision which was received in a hostile manner once Mr. McGarrah became aware of the same," the lawsuit says. "During this time (Smith) also witnessed Mr. McGarrah turning away (outside) investor-owned restoration crews.”

More back story

Gillum, in his Saturday statement, said he has "full confidence that the men and women who worked during the storm performed their duties fairly and tirelessly to restore power to all citizens in the most effective and efficient way possible, and that will continue to be the policy of our government moving forward."

Clashes over park shocks, power lines

Smith, hired by the city in October 2015, worked as a power engineering manager, a senior management position, and supervised more than 30 employees, according to the lawsuit. He was notified in late July that he was being terminated as part of the layoffs of several dozen city employees.

One of Smith's more bizarre allegations involve city efforts to acquire land outside formal eminent domain proceedings. It says during an exchange with the deputy city manager, Smith was told of a plan to send local businessman J.T. Burnette to a piece of property to pose as a potential buyer.

The guise, the lawsuit says, was “for the purpose of buying/securing options on the property which he could then, in turn, sell directly to the city.” Smith later learned from McGarrah that Burnette had secured an option for at least one property as a “straw purchaser.”

Burnette, the developer of the downtown Gateway building and other big projects, is among local business people named in federal grand jury subpoenas served in July on City Hall and the Community Redevelopment Agency. The subpoenas dropped as part of a long-running FBI investigation into alleged public corruption in Tallahassee.

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Smith also alleged hiring irregularities. Specifically, he said Goad pressured him to hire the son of one of his other employees for an open electrical engineer position. Five other applicants, all electrical engineers, were more qualified, he said.

“The request was problematic by virtue of the fact that the individual in question ... was not even an electrical engineer,” the complaint says. “The candidate’s only meaningful qualification was his familial connection to another employee of the city.”

The lawsuit describes other clashes Smith had with higher-ups. One was over an expensive relocation of transmission lines near Premier Fitness, which Smith surmised was for the benefit of a developer. Another involved a problem with a city park off FAMU Way, where visitors were getting static shocks on the playground’s artificial turf.

The shocks were being caused by the interaction of the turf and overhead electric lines, Smith learned. He recommended moving the lines or replacing the turf. But the city at the recommendation of the turf’s manufacturer instead opted to spray the turf with Downy fabric softener to reduce shocks.

Smith was urged to take a severance package by officials including City Manager Rick Fernandez, who’s on paid leave over allegations he solicited and accepted expensive Florida State football tickets from a lobbyist. However, he declined.

The lawsuit, which names both the city and McGarrah as defendants, seeks unspecified damages for claims including whistle-blower retaliation.

Contact Jeff Burlew at jburlew@tallahassee.com or follow @JeffBurlew on Twitter.