Former City Manager Michael Patterson pleads guilty to two misdemeanor charges

by Charlotte Burrous
Fremont Crusader

After more than a year of delay, former Florence City Manager Michael Patterson pled guilty to harassment of an employee and providing alcohol to a minor.

In August, Patterson pled not guilty to all six charges. Since then, he struck a deal with prosecutors in the 4th Judicial District Attorney’s office. On October 20, 2022, as part of the plea bargain, the court dismissed two felony stalking charges, a misdemeanor sexual contact without consent and misdemeanor harassment charges.
The alleged behavior became known after an incident that allegedly happened on August 30, 2021. After a two-hour executive session, the Florence City Council unanimously voted on August 31, 2021, to terminate Mike Patterson as city manager, effective immediately.
After conducting an investigation, the Florence Police Department issued a warrant for his arrest November 3, 2021. On November. 15, 2021, Patterson was arrested at the Denver Int’l Airport by the Denver Police
Department with the assistance of the Department of Homeland Security, according to a press release from the Florence Police Department. Shortly thereafter, Patterson was transported to Fremont County Jail, charged with two felonies and four misdemeanors.
Since 2019, the City of Florence has settled three lawsuits for $444,000 that accused Patterson of sexual harassment. The city’s insurance providers paid the victims after elected leaders agreed to pay the deductibles.
Patterson will be back in court on January 12, 2023, where he will be sentenced.

by Charlotte Burrous

March 8, 2022

As a guest speaker, resident Tim Jordan continued his campaign to bring corruption to an end in Florence during the Florence City Council on Monday.
“In hearing your report of a forensic audit, this is going to be kind of a touchy subject,” Jordan said. “I see you’ve reached out to Commissioner Debbie Bell, asking for assistance. A forensic audit has been asked for quite some time. … I find it kind of disturbing it took an outside reporter to come in and calculate stuff and come up that you are missing money. Other than that, whether it’s $10 or $10,000, and all the other stuff she’s found. What bothers me [is] it took her to come in here and find all this stuff in a short amount of time. My suggestion is to contact CBI, lock the door and do an investigation. I want to know where every penny has (gone). I want every record that’s gone out of here — all of it. If [the reporter] would not have done this, we would not have found out about the wage advances. We would not have found out about the money that [is] still owed.”
At that point, Interim City Manager Tom Piltingsrud said he spoke to the current County Administrator and former Florence Finance Officer Sunny Barnes about a forensic audit. ” Continue reading Florence Resident Requests CBI Investigation of City Government →

by Charlotte Burrous
Fremont County Crusader
February 7, 2022

During the visitors’ section of the meeting on Monday, several residents spoke out about the issues in Florence.
Florence resident Tim Jordan asked about the statement the city issued that was printed in the Fremont County Crusader,
where there were several references to the total cost of the previous lawsuit that was brought against the city after an incident in which former city manager Michael Patterson was
involved. Continue reading Florence Town Council Meeting – Feb 2022 Citizen Outrage & Responses →