Lawsuit: College Park councilman pushed employee to carry out ‘vendettas’
College Park City Councilman Roderick Gay intimidated a former code enforcement official, demanded special treatment for Gay’s friends and tried to use the official to carry out the councilman’s “unlawful private agendas and vendettas,” the former employee claims in a lawsuit against the city.
Beginning in early 2024, Gay demanded the plaintiff, Jerry Silver, recently hired as a city code enforcement supervisor, accompany Gay on monthly “ride-alongs” in the councilman’s Ward IV, according to the lawsuit filed Friday in Fulton County Superior Court.
On those rides, Gay pointed out properties he wanted Silver to cite for code violations even when no such violations existed, and identified other properties Silver was to “leave alone” because they were owned or occupied by Gay’s friends, the lawsuit alleges.
Silver’s complaint says the city fired him in retaliation for refusing to participate. The complaint alleges City Manager Lindell Miller fired Silver on May 20 at Gay’s direction.
Gay said Tuesday he could not comment on the pending lawsuit. Miller and College Park Mayor Bianca Motley Broom did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
In one of several instances mentioned in the lawsuit, Gay complained to Silver about trash outside a dollar store, demanding Silver issue citations and require the store to place trash cans throughout the parking lot.
Gay told Silver he had wanted a grocery store at that location and was unhappy the dollar store opened there, the complaint says.
When Silver told Gay the city had no ordinance that could compel the property owner to place trash cans throughout the parking lot, Gay “expressed his animosity” for the owner and directed Silver to “‘just find a way to cite him,’” the complaint says.
Other allegations in the lawsuit include:
- Gay directed Silver’s attention to a property the councilman claimed was an illegal boarding house and complained about vehicles parked outside the home, the lawsuit says. Silver told him the property didn’t meet the code’s definition of a boarding house, and the cars were parked legally by nurses caring for disabled residents, drawing Gay’s ire and further demands that Silver issue citations, the lawsuit says.
- Gay told owners of an apartment complex they did not need to comply with an agreement they had reached with Silver to bring some units into code compliance, a privilege Gay granted because he was friends with the company’s head of maintenance, the lawsuit says.
- Gay demanded Silver issue citations to a group of homes on Herschel Road and said he wanted the properties boarded up, the lawsuit says. Silver reported back the buildings were structurally sound and the city had no authority to board them up. Silver later learned Gay tried to buy the properties in June 2023 but the owner had a contract with a different buyer that was contingent on the properties being rezoned, the lawsuit says. The complaint alleges the contract fell through because College Park’s Department of Economic Development informed the buyer the City Council would never approve the rezoning.
“The Department of Economic Development was doing Councilman Gay’s bidding either because he still wanted to purchase the property for himself or because he was retaliating against the seller for not selling to him two years earlier,” the complaint says, adding that Gay told Silver he would never support the rezoning because the buyer did not have “real money.”
Silver’s lawsuit seeks back pay and unspecified compensatory damages for “future lost earnings, diminished future earning capacity, mental anguish, humiliation, and such other damages.”
About the Author
Reed Williams is an enterprise reporter on the Local team at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
