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Toledo city auditor personnel file details complaints about him questioning city projects

Toledo city officials released the personnel file Saturday for suspended auditor Jake Jaksetic.

TOLEDO, Ohio — The city of Toledo has released the personnel file for suspended City Auditor Jake Jaksetic, revealing that there were complaints about his demeanor and about the auditor asking questions about city-funded construction projects and the installation of new city water meters. 

Toledo City Council President Matt Cherry suspended Jaksetic sometime in final days of October and city council voted on that suspension, making it public, on Nov. 1. City officials did not cite a specific reason for Jaksetic's suspension, but Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz accused the auditor of not performing his duties. A letter from the city administration also made vague allegations about Jaksetic's behavior, saying "the employees of the city of Toledo have a right to feel safe in the workplace, free from threats and intimidation."

WTOL 11 requested the auditor's personnel file on Nov. 1 and received it Saturday morning. The file includes one letter from Cherry to Jaksetic from September, 2020, reprimanding him for not following COVID-19 protocols. According to the letter, Jaksetic refused to wear a mask in One Government Center and also refused to let security guards there take his temperature, both of which were mandatory at the time.

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"I am told that when security guards in the lobby ask you to put on a mask, you not only refuse to do so, but also berate these employees for merely doing their job," Cherry wrote.

Cherry also called out what he described as Jaksetic's bad reputation among city employees.

"While you may not care that you have developed a reputation in Government Center as a boorish and obnoxious blowhard, I assure you that I do care," Cherry wrote. "You represent Toledo City Council, at least currently, and you need to act in a way that comports with the values of our organization."

The file also includes an April, 2022, letter from Jaksetic to the Kapszukiewicz administration asking for information about vacation for the mayor's staff. Jaksetic says in the email that he believes people on the mayor's staff have been granted more vacation than they are allowed.

Jaksetic, 52, was hired by city council in 2014. The personnel file shows that his initial pay was $33.65 an hour. He received an increase in March, 2017 to $38.46 an hour and again in 2019 to $39.61 an hour.

The remaining items in Jaksetic's personnel file are emails from city workers and city contractors to city officials in 2021 and 2022, complaining about Jaksetic appearing at city job sites to ask questions about projects, including the installation of new city water meters.

In one such email from Oct. 21, Audrey Noel, who works for Johnson Controls, a company involved in the city's installation of new automated water meters, complained about Jaksetic's questions about the project and what she described as rambling diatribes about his issues with the mayor and other city workers.

In response, the city's deputy director of the Department of Public Utilities, Doug Stephens, said that no one should speak with Jaksetic about the project.

"Under no circumstances is anyone to speak to the city auditor in the future unless I approve it. He needs to come through the administration and not go to contractors or consultants directly," Stephens wrote. "I will be taking this up with the mayor's office and city council."

In the hours before council voted to suspend him, the auditor released a letter accusing city leaders of retaliating against him for bringing issues to light with city-funded projects. He has since declined to comment publicly on the matter.

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