ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, January 31, 1996 TAG: 9601310040
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN AND BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
A Montgomery County treasurer's office clerk whom Treasurer Ellis Meredith fired in November was cleared Tuesday of a charge of curse and abuse of her ex-boss.
Meredith had alleged Cindy O. Vanhoozier cursed and abused him after he fired her Nov. 8. The firing occurred after a confrontation over whether Vanhoozier took a treasurer's office document to the commissioner of revenue office, Meredith said.
On her way out of the office, the treasurer alleged, Vanhoozier said in front of seven employees and taxpayers that she hoped "they did not have to put up with the s--- she had to and that they did not have to work for that a Montgomery General District Judge John Quigley dismissed the charge after a motion by Bob Viar, Vanhoozier's attorney.
The "curse and abuse" statute provides that the profanity must be directed to someone or in their presence in a way that is "reasonably calculated to provoke a breach of peace," Viar said.
Because Meredith was still in his back office when Vanhoozier made her comments, Viar said, "he didn't hear it so it couldn't be directed at him."
Meredith had no comment on the judge's decision. But he outlined his version of what led up to Vanhoozier's dismissal. And he said it had nothing to do with the heated commissioner of revenue election. That race ended the day before the firing with the defeat of his Republican protege, Helen St. Clair, by Democrat Nancy Miller, the long-time chief deputy commissioner. The race caused considerable tension between the two offices, located across a hallway from each other.
"The only reason that she was dismissed had nothing to do with her going to the commissioner's office, it had to do with her attitude to me," Meredith said.
Vanhoozier said Tuesday that Meredith "feels like it's his right to know anything that goes across the hall." But her understanding was that "we do not have to have permission every time we go over there.
"Whatever I had to do on my lunch hour is my business," Vanhoozier said.
Meredith said he called a Nov. 8 meeting between himself and five of his 17 employees, including Vanhoozier, after he heard a rumor that two employees had taken documents out of the treasurer's office and into the commissioner's office the day before. That was Election Day, when Meredith won an unopposed seventh term.
Meredith said he learned after the fact that the document was an addendum to his office's work manual that required all employees to re-apply for their jobs after an election.
"Anytime that an employee in this office takes anything out of this office that relates to this office, they always come to either me or one of the supervisors and clarify on whether they need to take it to the commissioner's office" or elsewhere, Meredith said.
When he asked the group about the rumor, Vanhoozier "immediately responded to me that what she did, she did it on her lunch hour and it wasn't anybody's business what she had taken," Meredith said.
The treasurer said he asked Vanhoozier a second time and then a third what she had taken out of the office. After the same response, he told her she was dismissed.
Vanhoozier said she successfully appealed a denial of unemployment benefits. She said Meredith had originally denied her claim, citing insubordination. Meredith said he hasn't decided whether to appeal that decision, made after a Jan. 23 hearing.
Vanhoozier, 30, went to work in the treasurer's office in October 1994 as a part-time clerk. She entered Montgomery County payroll records as a full-time employee in March 1995.
The treasurer's office is responsible for collecting county taxes, and holding and disbursing county funds. The commissioner's office, on the other hand, is responsible for assessing land and vehicles so the treasurer can prepare tax tickets.
Besides his duties as a constitutional officer, Meredith serves as pastor of Riverview Holiness Church in the Ellett Valley.
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