On Friday, workers recently laid-off by the City of Selma trickled into city hall to collect their final payments and turn in their work uniforms and badges.

According to Curtis Wimberly, former Football Director and Recreation Specialist for the Selma Parks and Recreation Department, none of the former workers received formal notice that they would be receiving their checks and only found out through “word of mouth.”

Wimberly had ventured down to city hall to continue the demonstration which began earlier in the week when he was informed by Carneetie Ellison, a 15-year veteran in the city’s Parks and Recreation Department who was also laid-off earlier in the week, that checks were being issued.

According to Chief of Staff Saprina Simmons, the city Personnel Department was notified about the dispersal of the workers’ final checks. When asked whether or not personnel had contacted all of the former employees, Simmons declined to comment.

“I felt as an employee of the city and a citizen that there’s answers that we need,” Wimberly said.

According to Wimberly, he approached Simmons about setting up a meeting with Mayor Darrio Melton regarding the duration of the lay-offs and was told that, until the city council finds new revenue streams, information regarding the length of the lay-offs could not be shared.

“She was real nasty about it,” Wimberly said. “There’s no estimated date, there’s no definite date.”

According to Terry Ward, another former Parks and Recreation Department employee, Simmons criticized the demonstrators and claimed that if jobs were reinstated none of the “idiots” protesting would be brought back to work.

“This is not a personal attack against the Mayor,” Wimberly said. “This is an attack against all of the powers that be.”

“It’s our right,” added Ellison.

All of those outside of city hall voiced frustration over the inability of the city council and the mayor to work together to resolve the ongoing issues.

“Nobody’s working together and we’re in the middle,” Wimberly said. “It’s like they’re playing tennis with us and nobody gets any answers.”

Councilman Sam Randolph said that he will motion for the city to continue to pay for the laid-off workers’ health insurance and provide them with at least two weeks of vacation pay.

“We only need five votes to make it happen for our employees,” Randolph said. “I hope that the council will make that happen.”

Randolph noted that currently the city council has no real knowledge of the city’s financial situation because the mayor refuses to release financial statements.

“Don’t say the city doesn’t have money when you won’t let us see that the city doesn’t have money,” Randolph said. “It’s not right to lay people off over a sales tax you want to put on the people, the people are already taxed enough.”

A one-percent sales tax proposed by Melton to provide new equipment to the Selma Police Department was rejected by the city council in late September.