Former Evans City Councilwoman Shelley Natali has made it her mission to expose what she claims are problems plaguing the Evans City/Seven Fields Police Department and leaving the borough open to legal liability.

EVANS CITY — Lee Dyer, president of Evans City Borough Council, denied allegations made in a public Facebook post by Shelley Natali, the Evans City councilwoman who resigned July 1.

In the July 2 post, Natali, who cited a potential conflict of interest in her resignation, claimed to be the “black sheep” of the council who “always got voted down.” Allegations made in the social media post include claims that other council members held meetings in private and would have a quorum of members present in the secretary's office to discuss official business.

Dyer denied Natali's allegations council members held secret meetings, saying other members of council were in the secretary's office training a new employee.

“It's not forbidden,” Dyer said. “We lost two secretaries within three months of each other, creating a situation of, 'Oh my God, we need to pay the bills.' ... We cleared it with the state.”

Pennsylvania's Sunshine Act, which governs the place and manner that public agencies hold meetings, forbids agencies from holding private meetings with a quorum of members to deliberate agency business or take official action. Training new employees is not an official action nor a deliberation of agency business under the law.

Natali also claimed wrongdoing in the Evans City/Seven Fields Regional Police Department, alleging there was “mishandling” of the department and that members conducted police business without her.

“Because I'm not even in the police commission, they don't even want to listen to what I want to say, they don't want to provide information in regard to the police department,” she said in an interview with the Eagle. “So, anything you get you have to dig for, you have to go to the meetings. But even if you go to the meetings, if there's someone who's not on the commission ... they don't want to go into detail.”

Tom Smith, Seven Fields borough manager and the joint police administrator, argued Natali would have no way of knowing anything about the police commission.

“She has not been to a police commission meeting since last year. She has never put in a request for information,” Smith said. “She's factually incorrect.”

In December 2018, Natali attended a police commission meeting to criticize what she viewed as staffing issues within the department. Smith, however, says Natali's past criticism of the commission was not accurate then and remains inaccurate now.

At the time Natali made the remark, the commission had allocated funds for a fifth full-time police officer and was accepting applications for several part-time positions.

“At no time was either municipality in any sort of danger,” he said.

Natali told the Eagle that she had been forbidden to take the action of posting borough budgets and audits on Evans City's website. She claims she only had time to post one year's financial information online before passwords were changed.

As of July 10, borough audits through 2017 and budgets through 2018 were on the website. Natali's criticisms of being shut out of the website mirror her complaint of being shut out of meetings, another issue Dyer denies. He argues Natali has been welcomed to “anything she wanted to be included in.”

“Everyone has a fair and equal vote. There have been, absolutely, positively, unequivocally no hidden meetings,” Dyer said, adding that “Everything is open and public. It's been that way for as long as I remember.”

Natali further claims that a public official in Evans City had stalked her since her 2017 election. She told the Eagle she had not reported the stalking to police, but said she spoke with “friends ... who are officers in other departments.” She additionally claimed there had been “a lot of slander” by members of the borough council.

Again, Dyer says her claim lacks evidence.

“I know of no instance where any body slandered Ms. Natali,” he said.

Despite their disagreements, Natali, Dyer and Smith do share the same hope that a competent, caring community member takes Natali's former spot on council.

“Someone from the town who has good intentions has to show their intentions in council, get in and make a difference,” Natali said.

The Evans City Borough Council is accepting applications for the open council seat through 3 p.m. July 22. The term would expire on Dec. 31.