The Village Trustees of Southampton are livid with the town’s mayor — claiming he lied to the press in a bid to stop their selection for police chief from getting the post.
Former NYPD inspector Anthony Carter had been chosen to interchange the ritzy enclave’s “million dollar cop” with the backing of the trustees.
But he rejected the job — and the $225,000 salary that comes with it — after Mayor Jesse Warren said in an interview with The Post earlier this month that Carter wasn’t qualified because “we wanted a candidate who had taken and passed the [chief’s] exam.”
Now, the village board is revolting against the mayor, claiming in an announcement Monday that he “made several materially false statements” to the press about Carter, who’s the present Deputy Police Commissioner in Suffolk County.
“After recruiting Commissioner Carter for the position and advising him that he would support his candidacy, the Mayor not only voted against his appointment but made several materially false statements about his reasons for therefore,” the trustees said.
“Mayor Warren continued with this reprehensible conduct by authoring an Op Ed piece within the Southampton Press that doubled down on his false narrative. He repeated a few of the same falsehoods in an article that ran recently within the NY Post.”
An individual accustomed to the hiring process said the mayor’s claims that he opposed Carter due to test didn’t add up, and insisted that Carter was greater than willing to take the exam.
“Not wanting to take the chief test is ridiculous,” the source said. “He was the front runner, and had the support of all of the trustees. It’s a shame. He would’ve been great.”
The trustees, who claimed Warren “proceeded to undermine the complete recruiting process,” said the mayor had “expressed his intention to search out a candidate who would accede to his wishes, with blind loyalty to him” before rejecting Carter.
In an announcement announcing his decision, Carter said he was turning down his “dream job.”
“Though turning the position down may be very disappointing, I’m grateful for the support of the Village trustees, the village administrator, the community, and particularly the highly dedicated men and girls of the Southampton Village Police Department who need and deserve everyone’s support,” he said.
A tense moment caught on a hot mic during a town meeting Thursday showed trustee Roy Stevenson talking to the mayor and blasting him over his behavior.
“It’s your individual doing man, you went too far,” Stevenson told Warren. “We were all in your team.”
Warren’s words are difficult to discern, but he mentions that despite “good intentions” sometimes “people don’t understand one another.”
“I just can’t stand what you probably did to Carter. I don’t get it. What did he do? He was going to do a high-quality job,” Stevenson said, claiming that what happened with Carter was “horrible.”
Warren declined to comment to The Post Monday.
He had listed the explanations he didn’t support Carter in a neighborhood Hampton paper in December. Amongst other reasons, Warren said: Carter’s compensation package was too generous; the candidate hadn’t passed the chief’s test, which he called an “necessary requirement”; the interview process was not transparent enough, amounting to a “violation of public trust”; and noted that Carter lacked direct ties to the local people.
The trustees said since it is their responsibility to pick the following chief, they may only involve Warren going forward to the “minimum extent permitted by law.”
“The Mayor’s actions were a concerted attempt by him to undermine the need of the Village Trustees who unanimously supported this outstanding candidate,” the trustee said, emphasizing Warren “has not deterred us from fulfilling our responsibility to the Village’s residents to search out a candidate who possesses the abilities and integrity needed for this necessary position.”
The Village Trustees of Southampton are livid with the town’s mayor — claiming he lied to the press in a bid to stop their selection for police chief from getting the post.
Former NYPD inspector Anthony Carter had been chosen to interchange the ritzy enclave’s “million dollar cop” with the backing of the trustees.
But he rejected the job — and the $225,000 salary that comes with it — after Mayor Jesse Warren said in an interview with The Post earlier this month that Carter wasn’t qualified because “we wanted a candidate who had taken and passed the [chief’s] exam.”
Now, the village board is revolting against the mayor, claiming in an announcement Monday that he “made several materially false statements” to the press about Carter, who’s the present Deputy Police Commissioner in Suffolk County.
“After recruiting Commissioner Carter for the position and advising him that he would support his candidacy, the Mayor not only voted against his appointment but made several materially false statements about his reasons for therefore,” the trustees said.
“Mayor Warren continued with this reprehensible conduct by authoring an Op Ed piece within the Southampton Press that doubled down on his false narrative. He repeated a few of the same falsehoods in an article that ran recently within the NY Post.”
An individual accustomed to the hiring process said the mayor’s claims that he opposed Carter due to test didn’t add up, and insisted that Carter was greater than willing to take the exam.
“Not wanting to take the chief test is ridiculous,” the source said. “He was the front runner, and had the support of all of the trustees. It’s a shame. He would’ve been great.”
The trustees, who claimed Warren “proceeded to undermine the complete recruiting process,” said the mayor had “expressed his intention to search out a candidate who would accede to his wishes, with blind loyalty to him” before rejecting Carter.
In an announcement announcing his decision, Carter said he was turning down his “dream job.”
“Though turning the position down may be very disappointing, I’m grateful for the support of the Village trustees, the village administrator, the community, and particularly the highly dedicated men and girls of the Southampton Village Police Department who need and deserve everyone’s support,” he said.
A tense moment caught on a hot mic during a town meeting Thursday showed trustee Roy Stevenson talking to the mayor and blasting him over his behavior.
“It’s your individual doing man, you went too far,” Stevenson told Warren. “We were all in your team.”
Warren’s words are difficult to discern, but he mentions that despite “good intentions” sometimes “people don’t understand one another.”
“I just can’t stand what you probably did to Carter. I don’t get it. What did he do? He was going to do a high-quality job,” Stevenson said, claiming that what happened with Carter was “horrible.”
Warren declined to comment to The Post Monday.
He had listed the explanations he didn’t support Carter in a neighborhood Hampton paper in December. Amongst other reasons, Warren said: Carter’s compensation package was too generous; the candidate hadn’t passed the chief’s test, which he called an “necessary requirement”; the interview process was not transparent enough, amounting to a “violation of public trust”; and noted that Carter lacked direct ties to the local people.
The trustees said since it is their responsibility to pick the following chief, they may only involve Warren going forward to the “minimum extent permitted by law.”
“The Mayor’s actions were a concerted attempt by him to undermine the need of the Village Trustees who unanimously supported this outstanding candidate,” the trustee said, emphasizing Warren “has not deterred us from fulfilling our responsibility to the Village’s residents to search out a candidate who possesses the abilities and integrity needed for this necessary position.”
