The body recruiting it
can't agree with itself.

Spoken versus published

What was said out loud, and what is published now.

On April 28, 2026, the LCEDC’s president described its membership out loud, with no written list. Read what the organization’s own website publishes today and the two accounts do not match.

Where the two accounts diverge.

• Charlie King Jr. is not named anywhere in the verbal account — he is covered only inside "all five county commissioners." The published site names him specifically and gives him a title: Vice-Chairman.
• The verbal account describes a membership on the scale of the LCEDC’s 13-member federal-filing board: utilities, a water utility, a gas company, both banks, all five commissioners, the superintendent, and named individuals. The published site lists five titled officers, not a full board.
• No written roster has ever accompanied the verbal account, and the published site does not claim to list anyone beyond its five officers.

Put side by side, these are not two views of the same list — they are two different kinds of account: an informal, wide-ranging verbal description with no titles beyond “President,” and a tidy five-officer webpage that names a role, Vice-Chairman, for someone the verbal account never named at all. We still do not have a clear, current, complete picture of who sits on the LCEDC’s board. A single published roster would settle it.

The structural conflict

Two names, both sides of the table.

The charter

Read in its own words.

The LCEDC is obliged to make its governing documents available to the public on request. We asked, and read them. What follows is quoted from the organization’s own Articles of Incorporation, Bylaws, and IRS Form 1024. None of it is our characterization of the LCEDC. It is the LCEDC’s description of itself.

1. What $2,500 buys

   Article 4 of the Articles provides that the Board "shall consist of one representative of each funding business, organization, governmental or quasi-governmental agency that contributes at least $2,500 to the Commission during its fiscal year, and each such Director shall be a voting member." It continues: if they do not choose to contribute, the County Commission, any industrial development authority in the county, and each incorporated municipality "shall appoint a member who shall be non-voting ex-officio members." The LCEDC told the IRS the same thing in its Form 1024: to be voting members, "must contribute at least $2,500 annually."⁷​

2. What $5,000 buys

   Bylaws Article II Section 8 seats every "investor" contributing at least $5,000 a year on an Executive Committee that "shall have and exercise the authority of the Board of Directors between meetings of the Board." The charter’s word for the payer is investor. The committee does not advise between meetings; it acts.⁷​

3. Who counts toward a quorum

   A quorum is "a majority of the voting class of Directors," and officers are elected from the voting classification membership. A public body that has not contributed cannot help make a quorum, cannot deny one, and cannot hold office in the organization recruiting industry to its own county.⁸​

4. Who keeps the records

   Bylaws Article III Section 5 makes the Executive Director the custodian of the LCEDC’s records, books, reports, and documents. The LCEDC’s Form 990 reports no paid employees, and its own website lists the Economic Developer role as filled from outside the organization. The custodian of records for a body now subject to an Alabama Open Records Act request is therefore a contractor rather than a public employee.⁹​²​

5. Where it started

   The Articles give the LCEDC’s initial registered office as "c/o Lowndes County Commission, 205A E. Tuskeena Street," and name a then-sitting county commissioner as an incorporator and as the initial registered agent. All three initial directors held public-body appointments. This describes the founding record in 2013 and makes no claim about anyone holding office today.¹⁰​

One document answers the question about itself twice, and the two answers do not agree.

Both sentences are inside one federal return, signed under penalty of perjury, seven lines apart. We are not calling that a false statement, and no one has adjudicated it. We are pointing out that the return itself promises to produce a conflict-of-interest policy on request, which is a promise a reader can hold it to.¹¹​

What we are asking for

Three procedural asks. Not accusations.

1. A recusal commitment from the Chairman.

   Chairman King to publicly commit to recusing from any Project Red Clay vote before the Commission, on the basis of the LCEDC vice-chairmanship both official pages now publish.

2. One reconciled, current roster.

   The LCEDC to publish a single accurate officer and full-board roster on one official page, together with its bylaws and any meeting minutes that concern Project Red Clay.

3. Recusal of materially interested members.

   Any LCEDC board member with a material utility, banking, or supplier interest in the project to recuse from any LCEDC vote concerning it.

4. The list of who has contributed.

   The charter makes a $2,500 contribution the qualification for a voting seat and $5,000 the qualification for the committee that acts between meetings. The LCEDC has never published who has paid either amount. That list, by contributor and by year, would show whether any party with a stake in Project Red Clay holds a seat it paid for. It is the one document that would answer the question this page raises.

5. The conflict-of-interest policy the return promises.

   The LCEDC’s Form 990 says a conflict-of-interest policy is available to the public on request, in the same return that reports it has none. Produce the policy, or correct the return.

What we are still verifying.

• The full current board membership. Both official pages list officers only; the federal filing reports a 13-member board, and the most recent return counts 12 voting directors.
• Who has contributed $2,500 or $5,000, and in which years. The charter documents establish the tiers but name no contributor, and no Schedule B or donor list accompanies them.
• Whether the County Commission chairman holding the LCEDC vice-chairmanship is required by bylaw or is convention.
• Meeting minutes for any LCEDC discussion of Project Red Clay.
• Whether the LCEDC is a governmental body under Alabama’s open-meetings law. It has a public function, public funding, and charter-guaranteed public appointments, but we have not found Alabama authority resolving the question and we do not assert an answer.

Last updated2026-08-10