A V.I. Taxicab Commission board member voiced concern over the firing of the commission’s former director, Vernice Gumbs, and the appointment of Gumbs’s replacement in an open letter to Virgin Islanders this week.
Vincent Georges, a retired V.I. Police Department captain, wrote that the VITCC board violated the law because the board included two taxi drivers from St. Thomas at the time of Gumbs’s removal.
“Only one taxi driver on the island of St. Thomas is allowed to vote and that would be the active member Mr. [Julian] Penn, who was approved by the 35th Legislature in September of 2024,” Georges wrote, adding that the board terminated Gumbs on Feb. 20 — alleging multiple instances of insubordination — and appointed Melissa Smith to the role of acting executive director, “which is totally illegal.”
“What I do know is two … members of the Board were not notified of the alleged Executive Sessions and/or Board meetings,” he wrote. “There could only be one taxi driver representing the island of St. Thomas, and as a result, there could only have been four … members present with the authority to cast a vote, which is not a quorum.”
Georges added that he was unaware of any disciplinary actions previously being taken against Gumbs and wrote that he was bothered by a letter VITCC acting chair and Assistant Tourism Commissioner Elizabeth Hansen-Watley penned to Senate Vice President Kenneth Gittens in which Hansen-Watley appeared to take issue with questioning of the board’s understanding of relevant rules and laws.
“I don’t know what rules and laws she’s referring to,” Georges wrote, “However, the only law the Taxicab Commission Board is guided by is Title 3 V.I.C. section 274, which they have proven they don’t have any clue about, because those persons on the Board who are practicing ‘selective prosecution’ have violated the law.”
That section of the V.I. Code requires that the VITCC board be composed of nine members. Of those, three members must be active taxi drivers and three must be members of the public-at-large who are not government employees. For both groups, there should be a representative from St. Croix, St. John and St. Thomas. The board must also include one member with a background in law enforcement or the legal profession, and one V.I. Tourism Department employee and one V.I. Licensing and Consumer Affairs Department employee, “provided further that one employee shall be a resident of the District of St. Croix and one employee shall be a resident of the District of St. Thomas-St. John.”
Georges concluded his letter by asking Hansen-Watley and Deputy DLCA Commissioner Myrna George whether they’d conferred with the V.I. Attorney General’s Office to determine the legality of their recent actions.
“It is no secret that both of you have been making decisions single handedly [sic] on behalf of the Board,” he wrote, “and if neither of you are in a position to govern and lead based on the law then you should both step down and focus on your respective government jobs instead of creating havoc within the automobile for hire industry. Our transportation ambassadors deserve better.”
One person questioning the legality of Gumbs’s termination is Gumbs herself. Last month, Gumbs filed a civil complaint in V.I. Superior Court asking for a declaratory judgment that her firing was unlawful, an injunction against her removal as well as restoration of back pay and withdrawn entitlements since Feb. 20.
On March 19, Superior Court Judge Denise Francois granted Gumbs’s petition for a writ of review, mandating that the VITCC provide the court with the record of proceedings leading up to its decision to fire Gumbs by April 14.
Many of the claims in Georges’s letter echoed those made by Gumbs in the civil complaint. Gumbs alleged that one of the five board members who voted to remove her was not qualified to serve on the commission. Further, Gumbs complained that neither she, Georges, nor board member Loretta Lloyd were present for the vote “because they were never notified of the meeting.”
