Money allocated for new cop salaries was used to hire the Florence police chief’s son

FLORENCE, Colo. (KRDO) -- 13 Investigates has uncovered more turmoil between Florence city leaders months before the entire city council resigned in March.

New recordings of an executive session from Janaury reveal council members were questioning how taxpayer money was being spent behind closed doors.

A few months later, the entire council resigned en masse telling 13 Investigates they could not get Florence's interim city manager and police chief to bring a higher law enforcement agency to investigate.

Those executive session recordings were made public after the former Florence City Council admitted it violated Colorado's Open Meeting Laws while responding to a legal notice sent by a former Florence city clerk.

"We're not doing our job if we approve money, and then we don't spend it on that thing. That's insane," former Councilwoman Melissa Hardy said.

In the January 3 executive session, Police Chief Shane Prickett described disarray in his police department to the now-former city council.

"Everybody is looking to hire people. There's nobody to hire. So, that's the first problem. The second problem I have with all this personally is I am the Chief of Police, and everybody is getting their information, not from me," Prickett explained.

In the meeting, council members and current Mayor Paul Villagrana were pressing for answers on why Florence city funds approved to hire two patrol officers were used to hire a police evidence tech instead. The new police evidence tech being discussed in the closed-door meeting is the police chief's son.

"I have sergeants who sit on their ass over here all day, who should be out on the street and if they're out on the street, I don't need more cops, if they do their job," Prickett said.

Prickett doesn't have the ability to hire employees. At the time, the Florence City Council had the power to hire and fire, according to the recordings.

"We hired two police officers and that is changed and we're not told about it. You have to understand where we're coming from, especially when one of those new hires is your son," Brian Allen said.

"Okay. So there again.  So there, I wasn't involved in that, and we only had three applicants," Prickett responded.

"And I'm not, I don't really have a problem with your son, I have a problem with (unintelligible). I have a problem with money we allocated for one thing being changed to something else and us not being told about it," Allen said.

13 Investigates has learned five Florence police officers have resigned since the beginning of the year.

The most recent police officer resignation letter dated April 1 says in part:

"The morals, ethics, values and integrity of this agency have been compromised, raising questions by the community, and now, unfortunately, by the officers themselves."

The Colorado Bureau of Investigation has launched a probe and is looking into some allegations in the city of Florence.

13 Investigates asked the Florence police chief and finance director for comment on these executive session recordings on Wednesday. They have not responded.

You can listen to the entire Janaury 3, 2022, Florence executive session recording here.