The Lee County Board of Commissioners, three individual commissioners and the county attorney will bring a motion to dismiss and a motion to strike a lawsuit brought on by county resident and Democratic advocate Jay Calendine at 10 a.m. on Monday at the Lee County Courthouse.
Calendine’s suit, filed on April 4, seeks a final order from the court that the county refrain from meetings that violate the North Carolina General Statute. The meeting that spawned the lawsuit was a public meeting — attended by a majority of county commissioners — held in March in the gated Carolina Trace subdivision in Sanford. Calendine’s suit also seeks attorney fees from the board and three individual Republican commissioners named in the case — Charlie Parks, Kirk Smith and Andre Knecht.
Links to previous Rant stories on this meeting are below.
- March 4: County revises public notice after legality of meeting is questioned
- March 6: Trace public meeting more resembles GOP rally
- March 12: Email shows commissioners were previously warned of liability of meeting
- March 18: County releases full memo of email warning commissioners
- March 19: Commissioner apologizes for Carolina Trace meeting
- April 4: Lawsuit filed over meeting at Trace subdivision
The county’s “motion to strike” challenges language it classifies as “irrelevant, immaterial and impertinent,” such as the mention of Lloyd Jennings, the chapter leader of the right-leaning Americans for Prosperity who was named by the county as the contact person for admittance into the gated subdivision. It also challenges Calendine’s assertion that the meeting felt more like a “Republican rally” than an open town hall meeting, and that at one point, Republican State Rep. Mike Stone handed out a business card.
The county’s “motion to dismiss” claims Calendine failed to provide “sufficient standing to prosecute The Action” and for something pertaining to Democratic Commissioner Amy Dalrymple, who was also at the meeting. The language is confusing, but it’s all there below.
READ THE COMPLETE MOTIONS TO DISMISS AND STRIKE