County rejects Simmers for no good reason

Come on! York County Council members who have used a variety of lame excuses to keep Danny Simmers from serving a fourth term on the Catawba Mental Health board should just admit they made a mistake and reinstate him.

Simmers has served for three terms totaling 12 years on the board of the community health center that serves York, Chester and Lancaster counties. He had sought approval from the County Council’s finance and operations committee to serve a fourth term.

But when he applied, he was told that the council had reviewed his old records, including DUIs and an arrest record from more than 30 years ago, with the last arrest occurring in 1982. The council also had reviewed one of his credit reports that showed some problems with his credit history.

Simmers tried to explain that the old criminal records occurred in the 1970s and ’80s, when he was battling alcoholism and depression. That, in fact, was what first motivated him to get involved with Catawba Mental Health.

He also explained that the problems with his credit history stemmed from bill disputes he had with his cell phone carrier and a company from which he rented a piece of machinery. Neither the aged DUIs nor the credit disputes would seem to be serious enough to deny him a seat on the board, especially when he has served with distinction for 12 years and has the endorsement of fellow board members and the director of the agency they represent.

But when Simmers appeared before the committee again on Monday to plead his case, members had devised a Catch-22 to deny him once again. The county, it seems, has an ordinance that limits county board appointments to two consecutive four-year terms, requiring them to wait a year before being reappointed to any board.

Simmers had been able to serve a third term on the mental health board because the same ordinance says members “will serve until their successors are appointed,” and no other candidates applied for his seat. No one has applied for his seat on the board this time, either.

Simmers still would be a member of the board – with no replacement in sight – if the committee hadn’t rescinded his application for a fourth term. That, ironically, made him ineligible under the county’s term limit policy.

Committee Chairman Michael Johnson, when reminded that Simmers had left the board only after the committee rescinded his application, referred back to the ordinance without attempting to further justify the committee’s actions.

Simmers said he bears no ill will toward the committee and might reapply next year when he becomes eligible again. But he does resent being asked to come back to plead his case on Monday when the committee’s decision not to reappointing him was a foregone conclusion.

“I wished they’d just said that before I started my spiel,” Simmers said. “They could have told me that before I drove out here ... It just seems cruel to let me pour my heart out when they’d already made up their minds.”

Term limits for board membership might be a good idea in many situations. The county needs to give a variety of people a chance to serve, and injecting new blood to the boards can be beneficial.

But council members have yet to present Simmers with a legitimate reason for refusing to reappoint him to the board. Perhaps there are reasons for denying Simmers a seat on the board that committee members are not at liberty to share with the public – or ones they simply have chosen not to share. Otherwise, it appears Simmers got a raw deal.

We hope council members don’t make a habit of treating other long-serving board members this way.

This story was originally published December 9, 2015 at 7:51 PM with the headline "County rejects Simmers for no good reason."