CHESTER – Chester City Administrator Malik Whitaker, former county administrator for Fairfield County, was fired by the Chester City Council’s Monday night during the city council’s meeting. Council also fired the city’s law firm Boykin & Davis.
At the outset of the City of Chester’s Monday night meeting, a majority of the council voted to move executive session up from the end of the agenda, ahead of the agenda’s action items.
The executive session discussion items included: “discussion of employment matters related to the city administrator, including performance evaluation and compensation considerations, employment contract” and “discussion of legal services contract with Boykin and Davis.” After 90 minutes in executive session, council returned to open session, and Councilwoman Robbie King-Boyd made the motion to fire both Whitaker and Boykin and Davis.
The motion passed 5-3 with no discussion.
King-Boyd, Hayward Boyd, David Claytor, Ursula Boyd-Crosby, and Dennis Jackson voted ‘Yes’. Mayor Carlos Williams and Councilmen Terry Foster and Tony Nelson voted ‘No”.
Following the vote, King-Boyd made the motion for the City to hire the Norrell Powers and Norrell law firm.
In another 5-3 vote that followed the vote to fire, council voted to adjourn the meeting without discussing or voting on the remaining agenda items.
Whitaker and the Boykin & Davis law firm were both formerly contracted by the Fairfield County Government under the Moses Bell led council in December of 2021, but only served a year. Whitaker was selected as the new City Administrator for Chester Dec. 13, 2022. That same day, he gave his notice to Fairfield County Council that he will be leaving his position at the county on Jan. 15, 2023.
Whitaker had recently come under fire in Fairfield County for approving bids and signing contracts for multi-million dollar projects without council’s consent. He has also been the target of criticism from both Fairfield citizens and employees in response to two separate surveys.
