ATMORE, Ala. — The Atmore City Council closed its regular meeting Monday with an item that rarely appears on a municipal agenda: Mayor Shawn Lassiter formally pardoned a local business owner for a minor offense committed 23 years ago.
Lassiter thanked Don Taylor for his investment in the community and, in particular, in local children, before reading aloud the municipal and state code provisions that grant a mayor the authority to issue such a pardon. The offense was harassment.
“What you do gives a positive impact on the kids,” Lassiter said.
Taylor is a well-known figure in Atmore. He has owned and operated MrTechXpert Electrical and Electronics Inc. since October 2016.
Earlier in the same meeting, the council awarded a $121,882.75 bid for resurfacing work at the municipal airport, adopted a nuisance resolution covering 26 overgrown properties, heard that a previously approved street resurfacing project has begun, tabled a citizen request and recognized September as Suicide Prevention Awareness Month.
Where a Mayor’s Pardon Power Comes From
An Alabama mayor cannot pardon a felony. Clemency for state criminal convictions rests with the Alabama Board of Pardons and Paroles, and executive clemency in capital cases rests with the governor. What a mayor holds is a narrower but genuine authority over the municipal court system.
Section 12-14-15 of the Code of Alabama gives the mayor power to remit fines and the costs payable to the municipality for violations of municipal ordinances, to commute sentences imposed by a municipal court or by the court to which an appeal was taken, and to grant pardons after conviction for violations of such ordinances. The statute attaches a reporting requirement: the mayor must report the action to the council or other governing body at the first regular meeting of the following month, with the reasons in writing.
That is a meaningful limitation. The power reaches ordinance violations prosecuted in municipal court — the traffic, nuisance and misdemeanor-level matters a city handles itself — not the state felony docket. It is also transparent by design. A mayor cannot quietly erase a municipal conviction; the action goes on the record in front of the council.
Pardons of this kind are not common, which is part of why Monday’s item stood out. A two-decade-old municipal conviction ordinarily stays on a record without anyone revisiting it. The practical effect for someone in Taylor’s position is largely about how a record reads to a background check, a licensing body or a volunteer screening.
It is also worth distinguishing a pardon from an expungement, which is the remedy people more often have in mind. A pardon forgives an offense after conviction; the conviction generally still exists in the record, with the pardon noted alongside it. An expungement is a separate court process that removes or seals records, is governed by its own statutes and eligibility rules, and is not something a mayor can grant from the dais. Monday’s action was the former.
A Single Bid for the East Apron
The airport work came to the council as Resolution No. 2026-23. The bid was awarded to Ameriseal of Ohio Inc. for $121,882.75. Officials said it was the only bid received.
Lassiter said the money is for the specific purpose of resurfacing the east apron at Atmore Municipal Airport.
An airport apron — sometimes called the ramp or tarmac in casual usage — is the paved area where aircraft park, are fueled, loaded and unloaded, boarded and serviced. It is distinct from the runway, where aircraft take off and land, and from the taxiways that connect the two. Aprons take a different kind of punishment than runways do: aircraft sit on them under static load for long periods, they absorb fuel and hydraulic fluid spills, and they see ground vehicle traffic that runways never do. Surface cracking on an apron is both a pavement problem and a safety problem, because loose material can be ingested by a propeller or jet engine.
Atmore Municipal Airport, identified by the FAA as 0R1, sits about three nautical miles east of downtown Atmore and is owned by the city. Its single runway, 18/36, measures 5,209 by 80 feet after a 2017 extension from its previous 4,950-foot length. The FAA’s National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems classifies it as a general aviation facility serving the public. South Alabama News reported in August that the airport had landed a grant for a $594,000 jet fuel storage facility.
For a city the size of Atmore, an airfield is a piece of economic development infrastructure as much as a transportation asset. Atmore sits in Escambia County near the Florida line, roughly 50 miles from both Mobile and Pensacola, and had a population of 8,391 at the 2020 census. The city was incorporated in 1907, and the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, a federally recognized tribe whose operations are a significant presence in the local economy, is headquartered there. A usable general aviation field gives corporate and charter traffic a way in without a drive from a larger airport.
How a Sole Bid Gets Awarded
The fact that only one bid arrived is worth explaining, because it sounds like a procedural problem and generally is not one.
Alabama law requires local governments to seek competitive bids above statutory thresholds. Under the state’s competitive bid law, purchases of labor, services, materials or equipment at $30,000 or more must be bid. Public works construction contracts are governed separately under Title 39, which requires an awarding authority to advertise for sealed bids before entering a public works contract exceeding $100,000. For a municipality, the advertising requirement is at minimum one publication in a local newspaper of general circulation, with bulletin board posting and mailed notice as the fallback where no local paper exists.
What the law does not do is guarantee that more than one contractor will respond. Specialized pavement work on an airfield draws from a limited pool of firms willing to travel, and scheduling, bonding capacity and current workload all thin the field further.
When only one responsible bid comes in, a municipality has options rather than an obstacle. It may re-advertise in hope of a larger field, or it may negotiate informally with the single bidder — with the constraint that negotiation cannot end in a contract with a different entity at a higher price than the first bid received. Awards must go to the lowest responsible bidder, a standard that weighs conformity with specifications, delivery terms and the bidder’s capacity to perform, not price alone.
Twenty-Six Properties on the Nuisance List
The council also adopted Resolution No. 2026-24 addressing grass and weed nuisances. City Code Enforcement Officer Greg Vaughn said 26 properties are on the list.
The resolution authorizes the city to send formal letters to the addresses in question and to have the list of properties published in local newspapers.
That sequence is not bureaucratic decoration. Abatement of an overgrown lot is a legal proceeding that can end with the city cutting the grass and assessing the cost against the property, which is why notice matters. Written notice to the owner and published notice to anyone with an interest in the property establish that the owner had an opportunity to correct the condition before the city acted. Skipping those steps is how abatement cases get overturned.
Streets, a Health Fair and a Tabled Request
Vaughn also told the council that the road resurfacing project approved roughly a month ago has begun. The work is slated for the 100 block of 1st Avenue, the 200 block of 4th Avenue, Whippoorwill Lane, Bob White Drive, Martin Street and White Streets.
In other business, the council:
- approved looking into a request to move the Atmore Health Education and Resource Fair at Tom Byrne Park from the second Saturday in October to the spring;
- tabled Sandra Gray’s request to address the council regarding Houston Avery Park concerns on behalf of the Concerned Citizens of Atmore, along with her request to begin a partnership to prepare Atmore for disasters through the American Red Cross.
Tabling a request is a deferral rather than a denial. An item laid on the table can be taken back up at a later meeting, and councils commonly use the device when they want additional information, a legal review or a fuller agenda slot than the current meeting allows.
Suicide Prevention Awareness Month Proclamation
Lassiter read a proclamation designating September 2026 as Suicide Prevention Awareness Month. The proclamation was presented to Marlo Young.
Support is available at any hour through the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, which can be reached by calling or texting 988.
What Happens Next
With Resolution No. 2026-23 adopted, the resurfacing contract with Ameriseal of Ohio Inc. proceeds toward execution and scheduling for the east apron. The nuisance resolution starts the notice clock for the 26 listed properties. The street resurfacing work is already underway on the six listed segments, which means residents on those blocks should expect equipment, lane restrictions and temporary access changes.
The health fair scheduling question and Gray’s tabled requests remain open and can return to a future agenda. Atmore City Council meetings are open to the public, and agendas and minutes are maintained by the city clerk’s office.