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CSEA calls out Kingston lawmakers over Noble investigation
Jul 20, 2020 1:30 pm
Ariél Zangla is reporting for the Daily Freeman a representative for CSEA Local 1000 is speaking out against four Kingston lawmakers for the way they called for an investigation of city employee Julie Noble and her husband, Mayor Stephen Noble. Julie Noble is the city's environmental education and sustainability coordinator. In a July 16 letter, Howard Baul, a labor relations specialist for CSEA, said Kingston Common Council President Andrea Shaut, Majority Leader Reynolds Scott-Childress, Alderperson Jeffrey Ventura Morell and Alderperson Rita Worthington, have "forever publicly tarnished" Julie Noble's reputation based on rumor and suspicion and without awaiting the outcome of an independent investigation they requested be conducted by the state Attorney General's Office. Baul said the quartet's July 10 press release about the matter was "reprehensible, immoral and unethical at best." In that release, the four said they had "become concerned about potentially inappropriate and perhaps even illegal behavior by Mayor Noble and Ms. Noble in their roles as Kingston city officials..." Baul noted that while Morell has acknowledged that he and his colleagues could not speak publicly about personnel matters, but they ignored that policy when they issued a press release "destroying the reputation and character of a 20-year city employee with an exemplary work record." In an emailed statement provided to the Daily Freeman on July 19, the four lawmakers said they "understand it is the obligation of union leaders to defend their members. We value the CSEA letter as an assertion of due process. We want nothing less than a fair process." The Civil Service Employees Association, or CSEA, is the city's largest employee union. Read the full story in the Daily Freeman.