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A Frisco resident has filed an ethics complaint with the city against Mayor Jeff Cheney and other City Council members after they were photographed at indoor events not wearing masks or social distancing.
In the complaint, attorney Martin Woodward accuses Cheney, council members John Keating and Brian Livingston and member-elect Dan Stricklin of disregarding the state mask mandate and the city’s COVID-19 emergency ordinance, which remain in effect as the pandemic continues to rage across North Texas and the country.
“Because Cheney, Keating, Livingston and Stricklin have made clear that they would rather behave like adolescent vandals than public fiduciaries, the city must respond appropriately with the severest penalty in the Ethics Code: It must remove them from office,” Woodward wrote in his complaint.
Stricklin, who won a runoff election for his seat last week, posted a photo to his campaign page on Facebook that shows the four elected officials and about 10 other people without masks at a Dec. 10 Christmas event for veterans at Verona Villa in Frisco.
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“I observed everyone wearing masks when moving around and following the restaurant standards as required,” he said.
The News contacted all four officials. Cheney, who said he was speaking for all of them, said they followed the requirements of the governor’s order and the city’s COVID-19 safety guidelines.
He said that night they even joked that they were at the “safest place in Frisco,” because of all the precautions the venue took.
Cheney said that Woodward, who did not attend the event, has created a false narrative and that his complaint has no merit. The city attorney will formally review it and respond, but there is no justification for removing the officials from office, the mayor said.
As of Tuesday, Collin County had 33,522 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 3,965 of them active, and 302 residents had died from the virus, according to state data. Denton County had 25,856 cases, 9,039 active, and 270 deaths.
Collin County’s coronavirus dashboard provides only total hospitalizations, now at 379. It had soared by 57 from Sunday to Monday to 416, a record for the entire pandemic.
Woodward’s complaint also cites a Dec. 4 event, the Frisco Conservative Winter Social at Stonebriar Country Club, from which Stricklin also shared photos on his campaign page. They show him, Keating and Livingston among what the complaint describes as a “maskless, non-distanced crowd” at the indoor event, where people filled a ballroom to hear conservative political commentator Dinesh D’Souza speak.
Cheney did not attend but said that the council members wore masks while entering the building and moving around, following the standards the city has asked venues to follow, and that guests were not required to wear masks while seated.
“While there were some complaints from the venue on others in attendance, they made it clear it was not a complaint on the council members that attended,” he said.
The council members “did take photos with some sharing their tables without masks which is not a violation and their right to do so,” Cheney added.
In the complaint, Woodward referred to Abbott’s July 2 order requiring “every person in Texas” to wear a face covering inside when six feet of social distancing is not feasible, as well as the city’s emergency order, which was amended as recently as Nov. 17.
“In sum, the COVID-19 laws passed by Texas and Frisco could not be any clearer: wear a mask in public, stay six feet apart, or you commit a crime and can be fined by the State of Texas and indicted by the City of Frisco,” he wrote.
Woodward said that before filing the complaint, he reached out to the council members by email with his concerns. He received a single response from Keating, which read: “I was Brian’s date Friday night, but don’t worry, he never made it past second base…. #keepitclassymartin #imnotthatkindaboy.”
Keating also sent his response to several council members and city leaders, but none responded. Cheney told The News that Woodward has a history with council members that likely “warranted the tongue-in-cheek” email from Keating.
In the complaint, Woodward said the photos of the council members without masks send a “chilling message” to the community and tells the public to “‘Go ahead and break the most important public health laws of Texas and Frisco — we do!’”
He told The News that he has no personal vendetta against any of the men, but genuinely cares about the public safety of the city.
“What these four are doing is really wrong — really, really wrong — when all day, every day, people are making such enormous sacrifices to do everything they possibly can to contain and control the spread of COVID,” Woodward said, “often at great risk to themselves, from medical staff to grocery workers.”