St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones can fire city Personnel Director Sonya Jenkins-Gray following an unprecedented Civil Service Commission hearing over two months.
The commission announced Tuesday afternoon that there was cause for Jones to remove Jenkins-Gray.
“The commission finds that the director is guilty of the violation of the city’s vehicle policy by using a city vehicle for a personal matter, and of violation of the City Employee Code of Conduct by involving a subordinate in taking a city vehicle on an out-of-town trip during and after the normal workday and in having the subordinate drive, and finds the latter conduct constitutes malfeasance in office as charged,” the decision read in part.
A spokesperson for the mayor said she could make a decision by early next week.
Jenkins-Gray’s husband, the Rev. Darryl Gray, a St. Louis activist, said their attorneys were reviewing the 42-page decision and would issue a statement later. The hearing stemmed from a summer 2024 incident in which Jenkins-Gray traveled to Jefferson City in a city vehicle with a subordinate, Anthony Byrd. Jenkins-Gray said she went to retrieve personal documents from her car that that her husband took to Jefferson City.
Lawyers for the city argued that she was trying to catch her husband having an affair. The Grays denied these allegations under oath, and the mayor’s chief of staff later said he inferred those claims following an investigation with other city workers. Darryl Gray said he was meeting with his ex-wife from Kansas City to sign legal papers pertaining to their child.
Jenkins-Gray apologized for using a city car for the trip and reimbursed the $170 cost.
The city has paid $114,000 through January to the Stinson law firm for its work on the case.
Lawyers for the city argued that Jenkins-Gray’s behavior amounted to malfeasance and that she endangered Byrd on the trip.
Jones selected Jenkins-Gray to replace Richard Franks as personnel director in 2022. According to the city charter, the mayor doesn’t have the power to fire the personnel director without input from the Civil Service Commission.
The hearing included testimony from Franks, deputy personnel director Sylvia Donaldson and other city officials who said they hadn’t seen anyone get fired for breaking the city vehicle policy.
Commissioners said while that action may amount to a lesser punishment, they criticized her for roping in a subordinate and said she failed to conduct herself appropriately.
"Her actions set a troublesome example for city employees and were detrimental to the public's confidence in the civil service system and city government," the commissioners said in the decision
Lawyers for Jenkins-Gray argued the hearing was part of a political attack by Jones, citing her objections to a Jones-backed proposal to bring the personnel department under the mayor. Jenkins-Gray’s lawyers also said they were protecting civil service workers from mayoral control. And they cited her husband's criticisms of the mayor as head of the jail oversight board and his primary election endorsement of Rep. Wesley Bell over former Rep. Cori Bush, a close ally of Jones.
Correction: Sonya Jenkins-Gray traveled to Jefferson City and says she retrieved documents from her car. A previous version of this article misstated whose car it was.
