A seat on the Fort Oglethorpe planning and zoning department is open - again.
Mike Fowler, whom the City Council unanimously voted to hire Feb. 13 as the building inspector, answered the phone Friday at his old job with Gordon County. Asked why he didn't come to work for Fort Oglethorpe, Fowler said, "I'd rather not comment."
Multiple sources within the small city government, who asked for anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk to the media, said Fowler called last week to say he was turning down the job after previously accepting it. One city employee said city administrators had not explained why Fowler didn't show up to work.
City Manager Jennifer Payne-Simpkins, who was hired at the same council meeting as Fowler, did not return multiple calls seeking comment. Neither did Mayor Earl Gray or four of the five council members.
Mark Lindsay, who had worked for the city for 14 years before a November 2010 arrest, said he interviewed for the job, only to learn the council had already offered the post to Fowler.
Earlier this month, Councilwoman Paula Stinnett said Fowler had the best credentials among the applicants for the job. Asked about Lindsay, Councilman Derek Rogers told the Times Free Press at the time, "There's no drama; there's no drama, thank you," before hanging up the phone.
Days later, Fowler was no longer taking the job. Lindsay said he's still interested in working for the city.
"I'm afraid I don't have a shot," he said. "I probably got them so upset [by talking to the Times Free Press in a March 2 story]. Don't get me wrong: I'd still love to have it."
This is actually the second time Fowler has rebuffed Fort Oglethorpe. Both times have been tied to Lindsay.
After the Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested Lindsay on a theft by receiving charge in November 2010, the City Council hired Fowler as its building inspector in 2013. Months later, Ron Goulart returned to his old job as city manager. Goulart had worked with Lindsay for years and promised to rehire him if he was found not guilty.
Weeks after Goulart's return, with Lindsay's case still pending, Fowler left the city government. But Goulart said Friday that Fowler's first exit had nothing to do with Goulart's loyalty to Lindsay. He said he met with Fowler soon after the two started working together.
"I said, 'I have no agenda to fire you, contrary to any rumors you heard; that's not true,'" Goulart, now a Catoosa County State Court judge, recalled of his conversation three years ago. "I personally brought him in and said, 'That is not the case.' He left on his own volition. As far as I knew, we left on good terms."
"There would have been room for the two of them anyway. He was a director at the time. If Lindsay did some back, he would have been working for [Fowler]."
The GBI arrested Lindsay because a woman gave him a slew of expensive gifts bought with money embezzled from her boss. Lindsay said he never knew where the woman's money came from. But prosecutors argued any reasonable person should have known the woman could not afford flat-screen TVs, riding lawn mowers and guns on her salary.
A Catoosa County Superior Court judge convicted Lindsay in a January 2015 bench trial. But last year, the Georgia Court of Appeals overturned that conviction, arguing the gifts themselves were not stolen.
The Fort Oglethorpe City Council meets at 6 p.m. Monday. A discussion of the building inspector position is not on the agenda.
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at 423-7576476 or tjett@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @LetsJett.