Fourth County Employee Fired For E-Mail Use

SEBRING - The land acquisition manager for the Highlands County Engineer's office was fired for what county officials described as inappropriate use of her county e-mail account.

Kathy Avirett, 32, a county employee since November 2003, was fired June 30 by her boss, county Engineer Ramon Gavarrete.

"It was the volume and the content" of Avirett's e-mail sent on her county computer that led to her termination after four years and seven months of employment, said John Minor, director of the county's human resources department.

The "inappropriate" e-mails came to light due to fired, former county worker Treasa Handley's public-records request to review the past six months of e-mails sent and received by Avirett and several other county workers, Minor said.

Once Handley's public-records request uncovered the amount of Avirett's e-mails and copies of individual e-mails the records were turned over to Gavarrete and other county officials, Minor said.

Avirett filed an appeal of her dismissal a few hours after she was fired. No hearing date before county Administrator Michael Wright has been set yet.

Following standard county policy for appeals of a dismissal, Avirett's position will be left vacant until a decision in her appeal either brings her back to work or finalizes her termination, according to Gloria Rybinski, county public information officer.

Asked about the specific "volume" and the "content" of Avirett's e-mails that led to her firing, Minor said both factors added up to termination.

By volume, he said, Avirett sent and received too many personal e-mails on her county computer while she was on the county time clock.

Regarding the inappropriate "content" of her e-mails, Minor answered, "It was a little bit of content.
"People were sending her jokes and she was forwarding them to other parties, both inside and outside of county government employment. Some of the jokes were not offensive at all, but others were deemed to be offensive."

As the engineering department's "right of way manager," Avirett was in charge of acquiring land, either through purchase or right-of-way agreements, to build or expand county roads and other public infrastructure.

According to Minor, no single joke that Avirett received and forwarded was so offensive that it could cause her dismissal. And, he said, the volume of the personal e-mails she sent and received while working did not, by itself, rise to the level of termination.

"It was the combination of many things," Minor said about Gavarrete's decision to fire Avirett, which was released first to Wright.

Asked about how Avirett's e-mails came to the attention of Gavarrete and other county officials, Minor answered: "It came about because of an open records request from Treasa Handley."

Handley and two other county employees were fired earlier this year for sending inappropriate instant messages on their county computers. According to the Highlands County Clerk of Courts office, which investigated county employee instant message use, many of Handley's instant messages were not only personal but also sexually explicit, offensive and insulting to other county employees and elected officials and offensive.

Minor said he did not know how many other county employees had their e-mails reviewed by Handley, but he did say Handley requested Avirett's complete e-mail records for the past six months.