Cohutta Town Council reinstates police department, tables decision on mayor’s future

The Cohutta Town Council dealing with a power outage in the middle of a special meeting discussing the ongoing controversy over Cohutta mayor Ron Shinnick and his disbandment of the town’s police department.

COHUTTA, Ga. (WDEF)- “So that’s it? We don’t get any answers or anything?”

The controversy in a small Whitfield County town took another turn Friday evening, as residents say they are still uncertain about what things will head next.

Cohutta Mayor Ron Shinnick has been under fire for continuing to employ his wife as the town’s clerk after her termination, and was called out by most of the Cohutta Police Department in a letter regarding that situation.

They accused the mayor’s wife of having paychecks be late and private data being unsecure.

Despite a resolution seemingly having been reached in that situation last week, the mayor reversed course on Wednesday and fired the entire department after he accused them of disrespect, claiming it was time for a change in the town.

However, the town’s council decided to immediately called for an emergency meeting to deal with the situation.

The beginning of that meeting got off to a rocky start as power went out to most of the town for roughly 10 minutes.

While the lights came back on after that brief power outage, several Cohutta residents say they still feel in the dark about what has transpired after an hour-long executive session where Mayor Shinnick and the town’s council had a discussion behind closed doors.

When the council came back, the mayor had left the building.

Cohutta Vice Mayor Shane Kornberg explained, “The mayor voluntarily decided he was going to leave so there’s really no drama there other than I’m going to preside over the rest of the meeting.”

The council then unanimously voted to reinstate the Police Department after the town’s attorney, Bryan Rayburn, found that Mayor Shinnick did not follow the town’s ordinances when he made that decision unilaterally.

Rayburn told us that a transition will have to take place between the Whitfield County Sheriff’s Office and Cohutta Police as the Sheriff secured evidence and other items to ensure they’d be protected, as the county has been providing law enforcement services exclusively for the town since Wednesday.

The attorney says he expects Cohutta officers to be back on patrol as soon as Saturday.

The council also prohibited the mayor from being able to disband the department for the next 30 days in an emergency ordinance. 

Rayburn explained, “I think what was shown tonight was that the council stood up for what the charter stands for and it was brought to life that the mayor didn’t follow the procedures that he needed to and that the council took corrective action.”

However, the council did not decide to ask Mayor Shinnick to resign or explore possibly removing him, tabling those resolutions indefinitely.

Rayburn says the council could pursue that action at any time.

However, with the uncertainty over the mayor’s future, it left residents wondering when this saga, which has prompted national attention, will finally come to its end.

One resident, Greg Hasty, said of how this situation has been handled, “You just don’t allow these kinds of things. It should’ve been handled in private. It should’ve been taken care of with council meetings and the council should’ve been talking to one another along with the mayor. They should’ve worked all of this out behind closed doors instead of allowing this to be a nationwide thing now.”

The next meeting of the Cohutta Town council will be on Tuesday evening at 6.