Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin took the spotlight during Monday’s meeting of the Central Alabama Water board of directors as he chastised members for operating behind a veil of secrecy.

The mayor said he went to the meeting, the first since the board appointed Jeffrey Thompson as the utility’s chief executive officer, because his emails and a letter have received no response.

During a five-minute speech, he admonished board members for actions taken since they were appointed in May, after a state law restructured the board, taking majority representation from the city of Birmingham and giving it to suburban areas.

Legislators approved the law under the argument that the state wanted more transparency from board members, Woodfin said. “Ever since y’all been on board, every action it takes has been the opposite of that,” he said. “None of it has been transparent. There’s been no accountability.”

Birmingham officials in May filed a federal lawsuit challenging the state law that restructured the water works board.

A focus of Woodfin’s remarks was the process that preceded the board’s 4-2 vote Thursday to hire Thompson, who promptly placed all the utility’s senior managers on paid administrative leave. The four-month search process produced only one candidate for the full board to consider and didn’t involve any public meetings.

Woodfin said he knows some board members have held meetings, including with the new CEO before the board voted to hire him, at Vestavia Country Club.

“It makes all of us question, is there already a cooked, baked agenda that you are rolling out,” Woodfin said. “And it seems to be that way, if a person can come in and just get rid of people.”

Board member Sheila Tyson also presented a letter with questions to CAW and her fellow board members seeking information about the hiring process, saying, “This is the minimum I as a director of this organization deserve.” She asked that answers be provided within 10 days.

After the meeting, board Chair Tommy Hudson said every CEO has their own team. He didn’t answer whether Thompson’s team has been named. The state law that restructured the board also required it to hire a CEO and gives that person “full authority to manage the operations of the regional board.” But it requires the CEO to recommend to the board candidates to serve in executive positions.

CAW has not officially announced the five managers were placed on leave. A table where they previously sat, facing board members at the front of the room, was absent Monday. Thompson sat at a small table to the side of the directors’ table.

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“It makes all of us question, is there already a cooked, baked agenda that you are rolling out?  — Mayor Randall Woodfin

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Rumors about the managers began circulating Thursday, and CAW’s public relations manager did not confirm them that day or afterward. Board Vice Chairman Phillip Wiedmeyer said on Friday that he had been able to confirm the managers were placed on paid administrative leave.

The only item on the agenda Monday involved banking services. The board terminated a contract with PNC Bank and designated Thompson and Sharon Mahaffey, assistant accounting manager, as people authorized to execute banking transactions at three others.

“This is to enable us to pay our bills,” Hudson said.

Thompson did not speak during the meeting and would not answer questions from reporters afterward, including a question about why the managers were put on leave.

He did give a brief statement to the press.

“I wanted to let everybody know that I am committed to ensuring that our customers get the greatest service they can get, that we become a world-class utility, and really moving forward with improving our financial situation and our customer-service situation for all of our customers here in the region,” Thompson said.

A former assistant general manager for the water works himself, Thompson signed an agreement when he resigned in 2023 that included a clause stating he would not be eligible for rehire. Questions BirminghamWatch has submitted to CAW about how Thompson’s selection fits with that agreement have not been answered.

All five managers, including General Manager Mac Underwood, who headed the utility’s operations, had employment contracts.

Underwood’s contract ends Dec. 31, 2030, and if the board terminates the agreement, it will have to pay him a lump sum equal to the compensation in the remaining term. With a salary of $446,118 and five years remaining in the contract, that amounts to more than $2.2 million. The contracts of the four assistant general managers require them to be paid one year’s salary if the board terminates their contracts. Ending those contracts would cost the board at least $1.1 million.

Woodfin said ratepayers shouldn’t have to shoulder those costs.

“Why should that senior elder who has a crazy water bill, an incorrect water bill, a too-high water bill, a wrong water bill, have to front $3 million for people to just sit at home?” he asked. “It’s not right.”

CAW, known as Birmingham Water Works before the state law required a name change, is the state’s largest water utility and has been plagued for years with customer complaints about inaccurate bills.

Woodfin said placing senior managers on leave has hurt employee morale and he would be concerned and afraid, if he were an employee, about the board hiring someone who had been put on a no-hire list.

“On behalf of rate payers and on behalf of the employees, we’re ready to organize ourselves if board members refuse to be responsive to us, because the behavior is unacceptable at this point,” he told the board.

Board members listened attentively, but the only response during the meeting to Woodfin’s comments came from Bill Morris.

“I’m not a member of a country club,” he said. “My wife drives a school bus.”

Hudson said after the meeting that there was a reason the new board was set up. “And this board was working on the very problems that he (Woodfin) discussed,” Hudson said.

Wiedmeyer, who voted “present” during Thursday’s vote to hire Thompson, said he agreed with the mayor’s comments about the CEO search.

“I think the mayor was correct to voice those concerns,” he said.

Wiedmeyer, a member of the three-person CEO search committee that also included Hudson and board member David Standridge, said last week that he had concerns about the search process.

Two board members who last week filed a lawsuit over that process, asking a judge to block Thompson’s appointment, have now asked that the suit be withdrawn, based on technicalities, said Jarvis Patton Sr., who was the mayor’s appointee to the board and who filed the suit along with Tyson.

The lawsuit was filed Thursday, after the board already had voted to hire Thompson.

“We just were a day late and a dollar short,” Patton said. “The fight is not over.”

More action will follow, he said.

Woodfin asked on social media Monday morning for CAW customers to attend the meeting held at 4 p.m. But there was not a large crowd.

Courtney Paulding, a resident of Birmingham’s Pratt City community, said he’s been watching CAW meetings streamed on Facebook and decided he needed to show up in person Monday.

“Everything, I feel like, is being done almost in an abuse-of-power-type manner,” Paulding said. “But at least with the mayor calling them out, I hope something will change.”