Karen Bevans, she's been the Director of Tourism since 2014, but reports tonight say she's been sent home after a letter of termination was prepared.
Bevans was thought to be untouchable when the new government was elected because of the upper 6 figure value of her 5 year contract, which was re-negotiated in 2019. If the BTB decided to fire Bevans "without cause", they would owe her 3 year's worth of salary. That's over half a million dollars - not including all of her other "remuneration" and "benefits" that "would have been due" throughout the life of her employment contract.
But, the BTB may have found a loophole when it started to investigate her for alleged misuse of $400,000 in BTB pension funds to pay employee salaries in 2020.
When we spoke to the Chairman of the Board at the end of February, here's how he put it:
Evan Tillet - Chairman, BTB
"The investigation is not only on the director, the investigation is of the pension plan and the monies that were used on the pension plan. Currently we are on a position where we are getting advice on the matter and as soon as we get that legal advice then obviously we'll make a decision on the way forward. Basically because it is under investigation and we are awaiting legal advice then I cannot give you that information at this time. So once we get that information we will share it with the media."
"The director is still working, the contract is still valid. And so we have a lot of things to achieve at the BTB in terms of rebuilding the industry. So the main focus for us right now is to bring the industry to pre-Covid numbers and how we can continue to build the industry beyond 2019 numbers."
Again that interview is from February 27th.
Now, it is not known if that is what led to Bevans' reported dismissal, and neither Tillett nor Bevans could be reached for comment today. We'll keep following the story on Monday when an official statement is expected.
