By Reggie Connell, Managing Editor
The Apopka City Council reviewed former city administrator Jacob Smith's contract at its April 2nd meeting, but a vote was never taken, and the reason for the agenda item was never made clear.
"I guess the question is, why is this in front of us at this point?" Commissioner Nick Nesta asked.
"Well, I'm gonna go ahead and just read you a statement," Apopka Mayor Bryan Nelson responded, unmasking what appeared to be the true reason for the agenda item. "This was not what I was looking to do, but some things were said that weren't accurate so I just need to clear the air."
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Nelson began his statement.
"I was made aware of an editorial written by Jacob Smith in a local tabloid, and I quote a portion of his email that states in Jacob's own words, 'as for the Doge letter email, I'm not sure what that refers to, I receive over a hundred emails daily and if it was a letter I never received, if it was an email it may have been blocked by our spam filters, if I somehow missed it the mayor receives the same correspondence from the state or the League of Cities that I do. Usually I get a follow-up email for any urgent matters with deadlines but I never received anything of that sort. If this Doge email is legitimate and the mayor was aware of it, why didn't he simply ask me about it? I would have responded 'what Doge letter?' and we could have figured it out just like I've handled everything else.'
The op/ed written by Smith was published in The Apopka Voice (an online news site, not a tabloid) on March 25th. Keep that date in mind. It will be relevant by the end of Nelson's statement.
Nelson continues.
"So here's my statement to that editorial. First let me be clear that relieving Jacob of his duties by saying a lack of communication was not my idea of the way I hoped this would end, but my goal was not to hurt him in his quest for another government position. With lack of communication as a reason, he could explain his way out of being released from Apopka without losing credibility but this editorial forces me to respond to his inaccuracies. I was not trying to ruin his career but it became evident early on that he wasn't capable of running a city the size of Apopka. Now to his quote about the Doge email, here are the facts. Neither myself nor Blanche Sherman, my finance director, ever received the Doge emails from either the governor's office or the League of Cities. Two, I found out about the letter from the state political blog that had nothing to do with internal communications. Three, Jacob received the executive office of the governor EOG Doge email at 6.34 p.m. on March 18, 2025. Jacob read the email from 8.02 to 8.04 on March 19th. At 8.04 a.m. on the 19th he tried to Google Doge but was unsuccessful. After trying to Google Doge he deleted the EOG email. On March 19th at 11.35 a.m. the Florida League of Cities emailed about the importance of the Doge email about the Doge email was delivered to his inbox. At 11.38 on the 19th Jacob opened and deleted the League of Cities email. That's what happened."
What runs counter to Nelson's statement is the timing.
According to the mayor, Smith was the first to tell his side of the story. However, on Monday, March 24th, a day before Smith's OP/ED, Nelson spoke to The Apopka Chief and said these things about his decision to terminate his city administrator, with the goal of not hurting him of course:
- "I’m his boss, and you’d think he would communicate with me, but yeah, so in four weeks since his daughter got married, he’d been to see me in my office once.”
- “He got two emails, one from the governor’s office and one from the League of Cities about this DOGE requirement, that was it. I was done.”
- “I’ve had numerous conversations with every department head other than him. Every couple of days, I’m having conversations with department heads. So why is he different?”
Vice Mayor Diane Velazquez expressed concern with how Nelson handled Smith's termination.
"I did contact Jacob on Friday (March 21st) evening because I was so concerned," she said. "And I asked him, 'Does he know why he was terminated? What was the reason?' And he gave his version... that the mayor had walked into his office and simply said to him, you're done. And the mayor did not tell him why he was being terminated. He was unaware of the DOGE (emails). That only came to light three days later when The Apopka Chief wrote an entire article that the mayor had shared why he had terminated him. I feel that our chief administrator was not given the courtesy, respect, or civility to let him know on Friday why he was going to be terminated. We are not holding ourselves to a value expected of us as elected officials. We need to conduct ourselves at a much higher standard. The message we are sending to our staff is if they do not do something if they are not aware of something, they will be fired."
Velazquez then returned to the beginning theme.
"Now we have his service package in front of us. We have a contract from him. Let us honor his contract. It is a contract."
Nelson, still clinging to his flawed timeline, blamed Smith for taking his case to a news site.
"I did not start this argument," he said. "He is the one that went to the media. I did not go. I was happy just to let it go into the night."
"He responded because that is what he believed," said Velazquez. "If you had sat him down on Friday and asked why you did not respond to it (the emails), this would not be playing out in the media. The article from The (Apopka) Chief was first (on Monday). The (Apopka) Voice followed (on Tuesday). I am just saying that on Friday, when he was terminated, he should have been told why he was being terminated. Instead, it went into social media... it went into the newspapers, and that is not how the commission should learn why he was terminated."
Nesta returned to the discussion when he asked Joe Patton questions about the human resources aspect of Smith's termination.
"Dr. Patton, with industry norms of handling employees and things of that nature, there are usually best practices that we put into place," Nesta said. "It starts with... if there is any type of infraction that you feel has occurred, or if there is a warning of some kind or discussion, did that take place? Was there a date of that discussion?"
But before Patton, the Apopka Human Resources Director could speak, Commissioner Nadia Anderson and Nelson warned him to answer carefully or not answer at all.
"So let me just say this before you respond," Anderson said. "I just want to make sure that we are not putting staff in a position... I think it is unfair to put any staff in a position, we all are aware, the mayor made a decision, some agree, some don't agree with the decision, how things were handled, but I just want to make sure that we are not going to put another staff member in a position to answer questions about actions that had nothing to do with them."
"If we go down that path, it will happen," Nelson said. "I can assure you that."
"So I just want to make sure that he is not going to be asked questions that he can't answer."
Patton, who is a Doctor of Philosophy—PhD Human Resources Management—must have been thankful for Anderson and Nelson's Council-splaining. He responded and acknowledged he wasn't aware of Nelson's action to terminate Smith until after it happened and that no reprimands or warnings were made during Smith's term.
"Commissioner, I can't answer that because I wasn't aware of anything until Jacob called me down to his office and said the mayor is letting him go," he said. "So there's no formal, informal, written... any of that."
Nesta then returned to his opening observation.
"And in reference to this employment contract, it's a contract, so I don't know why we have it in front of us, we need to just honor what's in there, we don't need to re-vote on it, so I'm not even sure it's appropriate to vote on it. It's a contract, we are bound by it."
City Attorney Cliff Shepard confirmed Nesta's assessment.
"I agree with you," he said. "The contract is fairly clear on what should happen, but I would defer to the labor lawyer.
"Yes, I agree with Commissioner Velazquez and Nesta," said Jeff Mandel, the city's labor attorney. "It is a binding contract and one that we should honor."
After public comments on the agenda item, Nelson moved on without calling for a vote or motion, as if the whole thing was just to allow him to read his time-challenged statement.
