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Ex-Police Chief meets with supporters
Main
May 10, 2023
Ex-Police Chief meets with supporters
By JERRY FINK MANAGING EDITOR,

A crowd of 100 attended a special city council meeting on Thursday originally called to determine whether the council would appoint a councilman to fill the Ward IV seat left vacant by the resignation of Dan Kirby or hold a special election to let the voters decide.

However, the meeting took on a different tone with the sudden unexpected resignation of Police Chief Mark Goodwin on Wednesday, May 3.

While many of those pres- ent were there because of the Ward IV issue, many others that filled the meeting room were there to show support for Goodwin, who has been head of the police department for four years.

Goodwin met with City Manager Jeb Jones on Tuesday and after the meeting he typed his letter of recommendation.

“Jeb and I had a difference of opinion on how a police department should be ran,” Goodwin said. “He just doesn’t like my leadership style.”

Jones said it was a personnel matter and declined to comment on the resignation.

However, Goodwin was open about what happened.

“There was no issue between us. I thought we worked well together. But out of the blue I got a call to come see him in his office on Tuesday (May 2). He told me he wasn’t satisfied with my performance. He said I wasn’t the leader he wanted for the police department.”

Goodwin said he wasn’t fired, but he couldn’t agree with the changes Jones demanded and so he turned in his resignation.

He posted his issues on Facebook, which spread quickly throughout the community and resulted in a large turnout at the meeting that was called to discuss only the Ward IV vacancy.

Goodwin spoke to the crowd before the meeting started and urged calm, asking everyone to not do anything to get them ejected.

In an earlier interview he said he initially was not going to attend the meeting but decided he needed to be there.

“I didn’t want anyone to think I was leading this protest,” he said. “My only position will be to explain to them that the council can’t answer questions (about the resignation). They can’t discuss this issue because it’s not on the agenda. They can listen. But they can’t discuss it.”

True to his word he told his supporters, many of them carrying signs, that they should not disrupt the meeting.

Goodwin said he has always had the support of the council members and he doesn’t believe they had anything to do with his leaving.

“I believe it was 100 percent Jeb,” he said.

Goodwin left the door open to returning, “if some changes are made.”

But he left little hope that anything would change.

Meanwhile, on Friday, the day after special meeting, he was on a plane headed for Hawaii for a week’s vacation.

“It had been planned for a long time,” he said.

His wife, Diana, has been working in Hawaii for a year as a curriculum coordinator for a charter school.

“She loves it there,” he said.

They have been married 37 years, together for 41. The distance in the living arrangement has been difficult for both of them, but they have adjusted to the arrangement.

He visits her several times a year.

But he says he could never live there.

“This is my Hawaii,” he said of Eufaula.

Since he has resigned, he says he doesn’t have to stay for only a week.

“I can trade my ticket in on an open-ended one,” he said At the time of the meeting Goodwin said Jones told him to go on the vacation and decide when he returns what he wants to do.

“I told him I would prefer to get it done before I left on vacation. But I thought about it overnight. I talked with my wife for hours. I said I have to stand by my word. When a police chief and the city council or city manager don’t get along, it hurts the whole community. There’s no need to make everyone suffer for me to try to keep my job.”

He decided it was best to resign.

He will miss his men. “We have an excellent department. He doesn’t realize the excellent officers we have hired. The officers here are sought after by other departments. They are recruited all the time.”

Seminole survives Checotah 34-27
B:, sports
Seminole survives Checotah 34-27
By Rodney Haltom sports EDITOR 
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The Seminole Chieftains were lucky to go home with a 34-27 win over the Checotah Wildcats Friday night. Checotah’s penalties that accumulated to over 100 yards. The Wildcats moved the football up and ...
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A: Main, news
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The Eufaula City Council removed former Mayor Todd Warren from the Council Monday night citing excessive absences. City minutes of past meetings presented to the Council showed that Warren missed the ...
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A: Main, news
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Decades before Oklahoma became a state in 1907; years before the first railroad track was laid in Indian Territory in 1870 and the year the Civil War ended, folks in a remote area of what is now McInt...
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A: Main, news
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Mayor James Hickman perhaps summarized best when he sent a letter of appreciation to Karen Weldin and the Vision Eufaula Board of Directors for one of the best Wine & Art Festivals held in the city. “...
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A: Main, news
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At about 7 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, I strolled into the Las Vegas Sun newsroom where I worked as an entertainment reporter. The room was quiet, a palpable feeling of dread filled the air as the f...
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A: Main, news
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Margaret Marie Vickery Floyd has been named the 2025 Eufaula High School Homecoming Parade Marshall. Born in 1927 in Ramona, she is the fourth greatgranddaughter of Chief McIntosh, and the mother of f...
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Editor Picks
A: Main, news
Ironhead Homecoming Friday
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The Homecoming Weekend kicks off Friday, Sept.12, with a Pep Assembly at the Eufaula High School Auditorium at 9:30 a.m. followed by a parade at 1 p.m. The coronation of Homecoming Royalty takes place...
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A: Main, news
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September is Library Card Sign-up Month, and so the new coordinator of Eufaula Memorial Library is taking that opportunity to challenge the Jim Lucas Checotah Public Library to a competition to see wh...
Braddock Dobbs joins School Board
A: Main, news
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Braddock Dobbs, 31, son of the late Margaret Dobbs, who was on the Eufaula School Board for 15 years, is following in his mother’s footsteps. Monday night, Aug. 8, at its monthly meeting, the Board ap...
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Former Army Sp4 Timothy Pickering of Eufaula was honored recently at the Driller Stadium in Tulsa as a “Hometown Hero,” a program that honors people who have had a lasting impact on the community. Pic...
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Flea Pop-Up Market
September 10, 2025
Friday – Sunday, Sept.12-14 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., 210 N. Main St. Booth rental available. Call Mr. Printer at 918-689-5998, Jani at 918-839-8494 or Ricky at 918-424-9961. Prices for all three days: ...
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