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<p>Former Luzerne County controller Walter Griffith sent emails highly critical of county Manager Robert Lawton to officials in an Arizona county that is considering hiring Lawton.</p><p>Griffith sent Luzerne County Council members a copy of these communications Friday, prompting two complaints that he has crossed a line.</p><p>Council Chairwoman Linda McClosky Houck said Griffith&#8217;s communication to Arizona is &#8220;really an unwarranted personal attack that completely ignores the fact that a lot has gotten done in this county under Mr. Lawton&#8217;s management.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;Regardless of anyone&#8217;s opinion of his work here, he should not be attacked as a person and prevented from seeking employment somewhere else,&#8221; McClosky Houck said.</p><p>Councilman Rick Morelli said Griffith&#8217;s communication was &#8220;totally unprofessional and was clearly done because of a personal vendetta against Mr. Lawton.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s one thing to say you don&#8217;t want Bob as the manager for Luzerne County, but it&#8217;s another thing to try and hurt someone&#8217;s livelihood because you don&#8217;t like someone,&#8221; Morelli said. &#8220;His actions clearly illustrate the type of behavior that we on council see so often from people like Walter who&#8217;s judgment on county issues are clouded by personal agendas.&#8221;</p><p>He suggested Griffith &#8220;do the right thing&#8221; and send an email to the officials in Yuma County, Arizona, apologizing for what he said about Lawton. Morelli also suggested McClosky Houck contact these officials to provide &#8220;background on Mr. Griffith and where his comments are coming from,&#8221; he said, hinting at Griffith&#8217;s past guilty plea on misdemeanor charges of obstructing the administration of justice related to wiretapping accusations.</p><p>Griffith said he stands by his decision because he believes citizens and officials should communicate concerns about the job performance of a public official being considered for employment elsewhere.</p><p>&#8220;I think somebody should have done the same for us before we hired our manager. In the interest of full disclosure, Yuma County needs to know what he&#8217;s doing to Luzerne County,&#8221; Griffith said.</p><p>Griffith said he does not view his communication as an attack and noted several council members here have called for Lawton&#8217;s resignation.</p><p>Griffith said another Lawton critic had advised him against sending such a communication because it could prevent Lawton from obtaining another job and leaving Luzerne County.</p><p>&#8220;I just can&#8217;t do that to another area. That&#8217;s not fair,&#8221; Griffith said, noting he sent his communication to the council here because he is &#8220;not trying to do it behind Lawton&#8217;s back.&#8221;</p><p>Lawton declined comment on the matter. Around 30 people applied for a Yuma County administrator job, and Lawton is among four finalists scheduled to be interviewed next week, according to the Yuma Sun newspaper.</p><p>Griffith sent the first email to Yuma County officials Oct. 6 outlining complaints about Lawton missing deadlines and causing the deficit to increase. He advised them to complete more research on Lawton &#8220;before you invest your taxpayers&#8217; funds on the airfare&#8221; for an interview.</p><p>Yuma County Supervisor Russell McCloud thanked Griffith for his input and said he completed a &#8220;fairly extensive&#8221; search of news articles about Lawton before finalists were selected and &#8220;found a mixed bag but not enough to eliminate Mr. Lawton.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;That is what interviews are for. I&#8217;ll have an opportunity to question and judge for myself the answers given,&#8221; McCloud wrote.</p><p>McCloud also said he found a letter-to-the-editor from a Dorrance Township resident to be &#8220;fairly revealing as to the atmosphere Mr. Lawton is working in.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;That carried a fair amount of weight in his favor,&#8221; McCloud said.</p><p>In the letter, John Kishel urged Lawton to reconsider, saying, &#8220;Those of us who truly see what is happening here have your back. Forget about those who you can never satisfy.&#8221;</p><p>Griffith wrote back to McCloud, saying Lawton is working under an environment he created and describing Lawton as a &#8220;great talker and wordsmith.&#8221;</p><p>Griffith sent another email to McCloud and other Yuma County officials Friday with a link to a news article about Lawton proposing an 8 percent tax hike for 2016, saying Lawton &#8220;couldn&#8217;t balance a budget if his life depended on it.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;Shame on him, and I certainly hope your county is smarter than ours and does not hire this person for county manager of Yuma County. He needs to be unemployed so he cant hurt any one else,&#8221; Griffith wrote.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Walter Griffith </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/web1_TTL121614budget2.jpg</photo0><caption0>Walter Griffith </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Jennifer Learn-Andes</p><p>jandes@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Jennifer Learn-Andes at 570-991-6388 or on Twitter @TLJenLearnAndes.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Griffith blasted for criticizing Lawton to Arizona county