The fate of METRO RTA Executive Director Richard Enty remains unknown.
Enty has been on paid administrative leave -- his third suspension in his five years heading the public transit agency -- since November.
The agency’s board held a special meeting today to discuss “a personnel matter.” Immediately after assembling, the Board went into executive session. It adjourned without comment about an hour later. Legal counsel Karen Adinolfi would only say that no decisions were made.
Enty is under investigation by the Ohio Ethics Commission following board complaints against him. Adinolfi said "we don’t know what their timetable is. We’ve received no notification of any decision from the Ethics Commission at this point.”
The transit agency also has brought in a third party to do an internal investigation and the FBI also has made inquiries.
Regarding the FBI, Adinolfi said she is unable to verify that the FBI is looking into Enty’s case based on the ethics complaints.
“That’s what they said--that that’s where their allegations are coming from. [But] I can’t speak to what they’re looking at.”
She says, however, that the FBI has made public information requests for documents.
Enty's most recent suspension came after gifts and other favors he gave to the former RTA board president, Saundra Foster, came to light. She's quit the board.
He's also accused of sending inappropriate memos to staff and ignoring a board directive not to have contact with an employee who had filed complaints against him.
His attorney, Edward Gilbert, says the contact was mischaracterized and Enty has been targeted by unfair attacks from people who want his job. He says Enty's favors for Foster simply extended what had been practice at the agency under previous directors.
Copyright 2021 WKSU. To see more, visit WKSU. 9(MDA5NTM4MTIyMDE0MTg3NDc2MTVlZjdmNQ001))
