MEMPHIS – The city of Memphis has fired its public records coordinator just hours after she made her own public records request.
The Commercial Appeal reports Bridgett Handy-Clay filed a request on Friday for payroll records from the City Attorney’s Office. Then City Attorney Herman Morris fired her.
Memphis Chief Administrative Officer George Little said Morris recommended that Handy-Clay be fired for work-performance issues. But Handy-Clay says it is retaliation.
She would not say why she requested the payroll records other than to say it had to do with “nepotism and cronyism.”
Last week, Handy-Clay was named in a lawsuit against the state challenging her refusal to release public records to a resident of another state. State law says that records must be open for inspection by Tennessee residents.