2020
Volume 33, Issue 16
Council hires new Chief Operating Officer
By MIKE EDDLEMAN Managing Editor The long-awaited question on how the Liberty Hill City Council would fill the role formerly designated as City Administrator was answered Monday when the Council unanimously named Lacie Hale as the new Chief Operating Officer (COO). The vote came after discussion in executive session and was not discussed before or after the vote in open session. Council member Kathy Canady made the motion that was seconded by Mayor Pro Tem Liz Rundzieher. In an interview Tuesday morning, Mayor Rick Hall cited Hale’s experience as reason for her selection. “She comes to us with several years of experience in municipalities,” he said. “This fall she will be graduating with her master’s degree in public administration. She is a certified international municipal clerk along with a list of other trainings she has. She’s worked for several cities here in Texas and she is here to work for us now.” The new job description – previously requested by The Independent – was provided by the City Tuesday and specified that the COO reports directly to the Mayor and Council. Essential duties for the position include management of capital projects, community relations, department operations and providing assistance in negotiation and enforcement of contracts. The required education and experience specifies a bachelor’s degree in public administration, political science or business administration and three to five years of
See COUNCIL, Page A5
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March 12, 2020 | 50 Cents
Council terminates Chief Campbell
By MIKE EDDLEMAN Managing Editor Following an internal investigation spanning roughly two weeks, the Liberty Hill City Council voted unanimously Monday to terminate Police Chief Maverick Campbell. “I’d like to make the motion to terminate Maverick Campbell for cause pursuant to Section 13 of his contract,” said Council member Kathy Canady in her motion, which was seconded by Mayor Pro Tem Liz Rundzieher. There was no discussion in open session and no other specific reasons given Monday for the termination. The only comment following the vote was from Rundzieher, clarifying who was making the decision to terminate Campbell. “This is a decision made by the Council and has nothing at all to do with the Mayor,” she said. The Council did not identify specifically which portion of Section 13 in the contract was violated. Section 13 of Campbell’s contract spells out the causes for termination, including “willful misconduct, gross negligence, dishonest or fraudulent conduct, or such other acts in bad faith which result in injury to em-
Local venues work to bring more live music
By a unanimous vote Monday, the Liberty Hill City Council terminated the employment of Police Chief Maverick Campbell. Campbell, who has been employed since June 2016, said he has never been counseled or disciplined for any reason prior to his termination this week.
By ANTHONY FLORES Staff Writer In an effort to bring Central Texas’ live music scene closer to home, several venues in the area are working to bring more live entertainment to Liberty Hill. With the hope of ushering in a live music scene in the downtown area, Hell or High Water Brewing is hosting live music every Friday and Saturday starting this month. With house musician Zach Willard at the helm as the talent booker at their downtown location, investor and co-owner Jim Jenkins believes Hell or High Water can be one of the best spots for live entertainment. “Zach is going to work local talent in as well as regional talent,” said Jenkins. “We want to make sure that we give people a different experience a couple times a week.” The goal for the downtown hot spot, musically, is to keep things fresh and explore a broad spectrum of music. Last Friday night, former “Voice” and “America’s Got Talent” contestant Dave
See CAMPBELL, Page A6
See VENUES, Page A3
liamson County. But as cases of the virus are diagnosed closer to home, area officials are working to be prepared. “Every week at 4 p.m. on Thursday we have a statewide teleconference where a lot of people weigh in and discuss what their individual municipalities and all levels of government are doing to stay ahead of this, prep and plan,” said Liberty Hill Emergency Management Planner Casey Cobb. “One of the main things coming from the county is really controlling
our messaging.” Beyond that regular communication and some basic preparations there is not much for the City to do at this point. “Outside of staying wired in and tuned in with higher guidance and authority, here locally all we’re doing is monitoring,” Cobb said. “We’re ordering some sanitary equipment, we’re doing emergency management posts on the website. There’s a ton of literature and guidance and
ployer.” The other four causes included in the contract include theft or embezzlement, conviction of a felony, refusal to obey lawful direction by the City Council, and failure to abide by the rules and policies issued by the Council. Not only did the Council not elaborate on the incident at the meeting for the public, but Campbell’s attorney, Tiger Hanner, told The Independent he and Campbell were never told the reason either. “They never expressly said what the cause for termina-
tion was,” Hanner said. “The investigation focused on the matter in Atlantic City. As for anything else, we were never given any information there was some other reason.” Since the March 1 meeting where the Council spent more than three hours discussing the issue in closed session, Hanner said no other information has been shared about the investigation or questions asked of Campbell as part of the investigation. During the Monday executive session, City Attorney Tad Cleaves came out to talk
to Hanner, Campbell and his wife in what Hanner said was “some brief discussion about whether we’d like to resolve the matter informally”, but he said there were no real negotiations. But even after the back and forth, Hanner was not surprised by the Council’s decision. “Based upon the behavior of the Mayor and several other people with the City, I wasn’t surprised,” Hanner said. “Obviously this was a breach of
Area officials closely watching COVID-19 situation
By MIKE EDDLEMAN Managing Editor News of confirmed COVID-19 cases creeps closer to home every day, but local authorities are focused on keeping the community updated and prepared to avoid the spread of misinformation and panic. Deb Strahler with the Williamson County and Cities Health District (WCCHD) said so far the wealth of information available has kept their phones relatively quiet. “Overall we’ve not been
getting a lot of inquiries from the public,” she said. “We’ve been pushing out a lot of messaging, working with the school districts and cities within Williamson County to push out information. There’s literally so much information in the media and on social media that we’re trying to point people to credible places like CDC (Centers for Disease Control) and Texas Department of State Health Services.” Since first being detected in Wuhan City, China, on
Dec. 31, 2019, COVID-19 – also called coronavirus – has claimed 3,996 lives worldwide with 113,584 confirmed cases of the virus. The hardest hit countries include China, South Korea, Iran, Italy and Germany in terms of confirmed cases. The United States has 423 confirmed cases in 35 states, including Texas, with 19 deaths as of March 9. In Texas, there are 12 travel-related cases of the virus and no deaths to date. No cases have been identified in Wil-
See COVID-19, Page A5
BUSINESS
Grand Donuts keeps customers happy with old-fashioned recipes
By RACHEL MADISON Staff Writer The smell alone is enough to draw you into Grand Donuts, along with the promise of freshly-made donuts, kolaches, breakfast tacos and more. And with 20 years of experience under his belt, Ty Heng, owner of Grand Donuts, knows a thing or two about making quality food. Heng and his family are originally from Cambodia. He ©2020 The Liberty Hill Independent
immigrated straight to Texas from there in 2000. “The economics over there were not good for us, so we decided to move to the U.S.,” he said. “When I came to the United States, my uncle trained me to be a baker and donut seller.” For a couple of years, Heng trained with his uncle, who had his own chain of donut shops. “It took a lot of training,” he said. “It took one to two years to completely learn everything. We were working every day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.” In 2007, Heng opened his own donut shop, under the name Super Donut, in Cedar
Park. Next came a shop in Leander, and then in 2009, a third shop opened in Cedar Park and a fourth opened in Leander. “We have family come over from Cambodia and we train them, and then once they are ready, we let them run and manage it themselves,” he said. “We train people for one to two years on making and selling donuts before they’re experienced enough to run the business.” In 2010, Heng expanded his business to Austin, and then in 2011, to San Antonio. The name was still Super Donut RACHEL MADISON PHOTO then. While several Super Sochenda Pheau and Ty Heng are the couple behind Liberty Hill’s Grand Donuts. Heng and his family own several Grand Donuts in the area, and are excited to serve their fresh-made donuts See DONUTS, Page A4 and kolaches to the Liberty Hill community.