Rhea Roars
In Brentwood, a dubious ethics complaint dies a deserved death
One of the lingering controversies from Brentwood’s record-breaking municipal elections was the last-minute ethics complaint filed against Commissioner Rhea Little.
I’ve written about this before, but the gist of it was this: A Brentwood citizen, Rebecca Martinez, accused Little of violating the state’s Open Meetings Act by including his fellow commissioners in an email response to a resident about an issue at the city and then recalling the email. Little had intended to respond to a constituent who had emailed the entire Board of Commissioners about the divisive plan to construct a multi-million dollar racquet facility at Crockett Park. Little mistakenly hit “Reply All” and copied all the other Commissioners. When he realized his mistake, he used the “Recall Message” feature in Microsoft Outlook to remove the email from the inboxes of the other Commissioners.
There were all sorts of issues with this complaint:
Little sent the email in October, 2024. Martinez waited until March, 2025 — weeks before the May election — to file her complaint.
Martinez was not copied on the email.
Martinez was the co-chair of the citizen’s ad-hoc committee that came up with and championed the plan to build the racquet facility with public money.
All this came to a head at a dramatic Board meeting last April. From the Williamson Herald’s coverage of the event:
Only a state ethics officer can determine if Little violated the state’s “Sunshine Law,” but it is up to the city commissioners to decide if Little violated a city ordinance that prevents commissioners from using their position for exemptions or favors.
“I did not seek an exemption or privilege unavailable to all commissioners. I did not violate any rules,” Little said in his statement. “If I was clumsy in initially replying to all recipients, that is a human error and not an ethical violation.”
At Brentwood’s Board of Commissioners meeting on April 14, the board voted 4-2 to hire a third party to investigate a potential violation of this ordinance, despite uncertainty about the cost and timeline of the process. This decision was met with outrage from the meeting’s audience.
At this week’s Board meeting the judgment of outside counsel was revealed to the public, and it were emphatic: Commissioner Little did not violate the city code or charter.
In the ensuing discussion, Commissioner Anne Dunn reiterated how serious the charges against Little were. She said, “There were Commissioners pushing to make it a criminal charge, not just an ethics charge.” I can confirm that this was being discussed. Garry Latimer, the co-chair of the citizen’s ad hoc committee, wrote this in the comments of my Tennessee Conservative News op-ed on this issue:
1) The Complaint against Rhea Little is Tn State Law when he ordered the Brentwood IT Director to take an email off other Commissioners servers….this is a CLASS E FELONY in Tennessee 2) The felony violation was not publically [sic] known when it happened.
A Class E felony in Tennessee is punishable by 1-6 years in prison.
This week, the Board voted 6-0 to dismiss the ethics complain against Commissioner Little. The audience burst into applause. And then Little, who had not been allowed to participate in the discussion about his case, was finally able to address the accusations against him. I have excerpted his speech below.
This is not a little thing. This was a horrible thing. This was a horrible thing on my family, my wife, my friends, my business. It’s something I’ll never get over… I’m hoping what I’m about to say will lead this to never happening again in Brentwood.
The Little family has been in and served Brentwood for over 225 years and has always been known for its nobility and integrity. And for this political show to be done for political gain and power is a travesty and should never, ever happen in a city like Brentwood.
There were four commissioners involved. Two received their justice, I think, on May 6 by the Brentwood voters. And I do realize I’m blessed because a lot of people who are unfairly and unjustly accused of things, falsely accused, never receive justice.
Another commissioner resigned. We have another commissioner who is sitting up here, who I think may understand that he is now being watched very closely by the citizens of Brentwood. Because the citizens of Brentwood said, in very loud terms, ‘We will not have this in our community.’
Little was referring to Commissioner Ken Travis, the last remaining member of the Gang of Four, who was seated directly to his right:
Little continued, calling out his accusers by name:
How did Miss [Rebecca] Martinez get an email that was accidentally sent to other commissioners but was not sent to anyone else? A commissioner had to share it with them, because I do not believe the constituent [whose email I was replying to] did.
Why did [she] wait five and a half months?
Why did my accuser not face me? Generally in the United States of America, you are allowed to face your accused if you are being tried or accused of something. My accuser did not even show up that night.
One thing that really bothers me about this is that the people who were involved were part of the citizen’s ad hoc committee that was looking into us having a racquet facility. Rebecca Martinez was the co-chair of that. Melissa Geno, who is an avid tennis player, had also filed an ethics complaint against [Commissioner] Nelson [Andrews], but because of how they filed it and did not use municipal codes, our city attorney did her job — because she is the ethics officer for the city — and dismissed it.
This was the same person, when Miss Martinez didn’t show up, got up and read the entire ethics complaint. Which was not necessary, because it was already in our materials and citizens could see it.
The whole time, the other co-chair sat in the chair in the back row and coached Miss Geno before she came up — Garry Latimer. So this makes me think this was an orchestrated attack. And why, for something that the city was maybe going to do for an amenity for a small group? What was their motivations? We may never know. But it makes me suspect of anything about that project now.
Immediately when I made a mistake I did what I thought was correct to do. But you never know for sure, when something goes to a legal matter, if you will be absolved. I was.
Little paused here and seemed to be fighting back emotions before continuing.
To destroy someone’s reputation, or to try to, for power, political gain, is a horrible thing. It happens so much in our society. I think most people don’t realize how horrible that is. But it is, and it should never ever happen again. So one thing I want to come from this, and we’ve talked about it, is for our ethics code to be revisited. No one should ever be able to do this, especially that close to an election. It’s not right. And there are a lot of times where there are good servants in this community who do not serve, because they fear this more than anything.
I’m pretty tough-skinned. But this was bad… I will forgive, because I’m a forgiving person. And I will do my best to work with all citizens in this community, even those who participated in this, because I represent them. And I take that oath very, very strongly.
My hope is that Brentwood makes sure that this type of destructive behavior is never, ever again seen in our city. And that way, good community servants will want to serve on the Brentwood City Commission.
Speaking of which, Brentwood needs a new Commissioner. The Board will appoint someone to fill the seat vacated by Susannah Macmillan. You can apply here. Brentwood Commissioners will collect online applications through June 27 and will appoint the new Commissioner at their July 14 meeting.