VARNELL, Ga. — With a new council with a new mayor and with a new vision of “the city moving forward,” the first order of business Tuesday night was to establish “rules of order, ethical conduct and decorum” for Varnell council meetings.

Following a tumultuous 2017 that saw two council members resign and the mayor and another council member not run for re-election, the new mayor, Tom Dickson, a former state legislator, wants a more orderly and less controversial council running the affairs of Varnell.

“The paper obviously knows that we have had some controversy over the last year, so we are looking forward to actually keeping our names out of the paper for awhile,” Dickson said. “I think we have an excellent group of people on the City Council, and they are of a like mind. We are here to keep the city moving forward and to do that in an honorable and orderly manner.”

New council members Bill Caylor, Bob Roche and Clyde Williams — all of whom ran unopposed — were sworn in along with Dickson by the city’s Municipal Court judge, Allen Hammontree. Council members also began the process of the 2018 budget with a first reading with $954,000 in expenditures and $954,000 in revenues.

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Gone from the council that started 2017 are Sheldon Fowler, who resigned after an incident at his home that resulted in his arrest for simple assault, simple battery against a law enforcement officer and disorderly conduct, and Andrea Gordy, who resigned after questions of her residency were brought to the forefront during controversy surrounding the council’s vote last summer to disband the city’s police department. Also gone are former mayor Anthony Hulsey, who vetoed the police department vote, and former council member Jan Pourquoi. They did not qualify for re-election.

Council member and former mayor pro tem David Owens voted in July along with Gordy and Pourquoi to disband the police department following the handling of the Fowler incident in June. Fowler was not arrested until two weeks after the domestic call, and Police Chief Lyle Grant wrote in his report that “officers were tolerant of his behavior because of his position on the Varnell City Council.”

Tuesday’s meeting was the first council meeting since August, when Gordy resigned the day of the meeting and councilwoman Ashlee Godfrey walked out to deny a quorum and an attempt to put in place a referendum on the fate of the police department.

Hulsey’s veto was officially delivered to the new council by the city clerk Tuesday night and was accepted by the council members with no further action.

Owens, who remains on the council, was not present for Tuesday’s meeting as he is recovering from hip-replacement surgery. The council voted 3-0 — with Godfrey abstaining — to make Godfrey the new mayor pro tem. The mayor typically votes only in the case of a tie.

Roche said as a new member of the council he hopes to see a new image of the city presented.

“(I am) very much looking forward to working with this new team so we can re-establish credibility not just with the council but with the city of Varnell as a whole,” Roche said. “I think the last six to eight months have kind of tarnished the reputation a little bit, definitely unfairly, and so that is the hurdle we will have to overcome in the next few months, and I am confident we can do that.”

Williams, who has twice run for the council, said he wants the city to move forward from 2017 and leave it behind.

“I don’t want no more turmoil,” Williams said. “That is the biggest goal of mine, reuniting the community and expanding on all of the good things Varnell has to offer families. I think we can really do something this year for the city and move forward.”

The council took action on two items during the meeting, unanimously approving an ordinance on rules for council meetings as well as rules for communication with the city attorney and making a change to voting by phone.

The new rules prohibit councilmembers from contacting city attorney Terry Miller. The ordinance says councilmembers should direct questions through Dickson or City Manager Mike Brown. Also, members must be present in a meeting in order to participate and vote. The ordinance says members may remotely listen to a meeting, but may not speak or participate. During the July meeting that saw the vote on the police department, Owens was part of the meeting through teleconference.

The council also approved a resolution to join the Greater Dalton Chamber of Commerce again. Brown said the council voted to stop participating in the chamber in 2016.

The council will hold a public hearing on the budget at its meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 16, and is expected to vote on it at that meeting. The budget has no capital expenditures and the two largest expenses are $352,894 for administration and $305,444 for funding the police department. Besides sales tax revenues of $275,000 from the state, the second largest source of revenue for the city is $240,000 in fines generated through Municipal Court.