Rossville mayor resigns amid misconduct claims
Rossville Mayor Hal Gray Jr. has stepped down under contentious circumstances, with his final day being Friday, Sept. 13. This follows closely on the heels of his resignation as Walker County police chief. Two weeks earlier Gray had sent a letter to the county Board of Commissioners resigning as Walker County police chief, another position that involved some controversy.
Gray did not seem to see the conflict with the city of Rossville coming when he resigned as county police chief. In his resignation letter to the county commission, he said he was looking forward to continuing to work with the county as mayor of Rossville.
But at a Sept. 9 Rossville council meeting, City Council member (and mayor pro tem) Jonathan Lasseter presented a PowerPoint presentation outlining problems he saw with Gray’s financial conduct within the city and outside it.
One example he gave was the cost of trash service. The city contracts with Republic Services. The cost of service in fiscal 2024 was $250,000. The cost in the 2025 budget was listed as $414,000. Lasseter said he was alarmed and asked Gray about it. Gray, he said, suggested the city should just pay it. Lasseter worked on negotiating with Republic and got the cost down to $358,000.
Lasseter said that Gray gave certain employees unauthorized raises, including $2,080 to public works director Robert Blakemore. He also said that Gray used a city credit card to pay for food and other items for himself and Blakemore at a Trump rally, as well as the gas to get there. Blakemore, a Walker County commissioner, has resigned his position with the city of Rossville.
A community member had made open records requests about city money Gray had allegedly spent on personal clothing, meals and other things and shared her research at the council meeting.
Other council members and citizens spoke out against Gray and many attending the meeting held up signs calling on him to resign.
Gray told the council and members of the community that things are not always as they appear and the city budget was passed with restrictions on the mayor’s use of city funds. A few days later he resigned.
People in Walker County had complained a number of times at commission meetings that they felt it was a conflict of interest for Gray to be serving as mayor
destination already has one top-rated golf course and plans a second. It also has plans to grow its convention center.
McLemore employs more than 180 full-time workers, has four restaurants, a spa and many other amenities. Memberships to the golf course and other aspects of the resort are available.
In addition to keeping 3% of the 8% hotel/motel tax it collects, 3.5% of the tax will go to the Walker County Chamber of Commerce to be used to reimburse McLemore for advertising. The funds are required by law to go through a nonprofit entity like the Chamber.
The remaining 1.5% of the hotel/motel tax collected will be used by McLemore to help pay for the construction of the convention center and for operations expenses after that.
The objections from many of the residents who attended the commission meeting centered on whether it was right to funnel tax dollars back to the resort. Whitfield said the return for the county in tourism spending, which generates a lot in taxes, will substantially exceed the tax breaks being afforded McLemore.
Quite a few people asked commissioners to table the vote on the contract and consider reducing it to ten years. Thirty years, they said, is too long. No one knows what will change over that period of time, they said.
One person suggested it wasn’t fair to give McLemore a break that was not offered to the many people who rent properties through Airbnb or Vrbo. Whitfield countered that McLemore had made a huge investment in Walker County that will only grow as a source of revenue.
District 2 Commissioner Mark Askew told the audience he had consulted at length with the city attorney and with outside counsel to make sure he understood all the ramifications of extending the contract. He said the advisers spent three months studying the issue. “I’m not an attorney,” he said, “so I consulted people who were and who understood these things.”
The board gave all the citizens who wished a second chance to air their concerns before a vote. Only one said she saw the situation in a new light, but the consensus was that, all other issues aside, 30 years was too long to commit to a contract — the future was too unknowable.
The contract was approved unanimously. During commissioner comments at the end of the meeting, Askew and Whitfield once again tried to reassure people the commissioners were making a careful and wellinformed decision.