INGALLS — Ingalls Town Council voted Monday to fire town manager Tim Millikan, a move that followed months of confrontation between him and longtime council member Tim Green.
The town council conducted an executive session Monday night then called Millikan into a special session where they voted 4-1 to fire him, effective immediately.
Millikan and Green have been openly at odds with each other about the enforcement of various ordinances and regulations in town.
The firing comes just a few days after Millikan had filed a seven-page complaint against Green.
During previous public meetings, Millikan has discussed issues he’s had with Green. Some of those issues include differences about code enforcement, emails from Green and phone calls after hours, and Green telling Millikan to do personal work for him on company time.
Green said most of Millikan’s complaints are false, including the one about asking him to do personal work while on the clock.
Council president Chris Bradshaw refused to comment on Millikan’s firing but did say firing Millikan had nothing to do with Millikan’s complaint against Green and that an investigation into the complaint filed would be forthcoming.
Millikan, who worked for the town council, was let go in the third year of his four year contract with the town and will not receive severance, he said.
Millikan, who said he feels he was wrongly fired, said he was not stressed about the firing but didn’t want to give a statement about the situation until he had a chance to talk with his lawyers.
Millikan did release a statement to the residents of the town, saying he enjoyed being the town manager and was pleased with the work he had accomplished.
Longtime council member Georgia Parker was the only council member who voted against firing Millikan. She said she feels the council was in the wrong letting Millikan go, because he was only trying to do the job he was hired to do.
“Tim Millikan is a person who is a perfectionist, and he does things by the book, and people don’t like that around here,” Parker said. “They want to do their own thing without any kind of regulations whatsoever.”
Parker praised Millikan for his work ethic, always putting in more than 40 hours per week and going the extra mile, she said, doing such things as shoveling snow in the middle of the night, to make sure people were safe and that things around town were done correctly.
Parker said she was surprised other council members — Bradshaw, Justin Gardner and Teresa Egerton — didn’t stand up for Millikan.
“He’s brought thousands and thousands of dollars into our town through grants he’s researched on his own, and we have better streets than we’ve ever had all thanks to him,” Parker said.
Green, who also voted to fire Millikan, said in an email to the paper, he liked Millikan “very much” and the firing did not make him happy.
Millikan’s downfall started at the first of the year when he had the first of many run-in’s with Green on ordinance and regulations compliance, including one that ended in a business, Aaron’s Auction Headquarters, leaving town.
Millikan also recently questioned Green’s compliance on his election and business sign’s bringing their deputes to a heated confrontation during a recent council meeting.
Bradshaw said he didn’t know when the council will start searching for Millikan’s replacement and that there was no timeline established to fill the position.
