Lansing Township supervisor resigns for Oklahoma job

(This story was updated to include additional details at 9:52 a.m.)

WEDNESDAY, April 6 — Lansing Township is in search of a new supervisor following the resignation of Diontrae Hayes, who quit the job last month without public explanation to take a job at a nonprofit group in Oklahoma. 

Deputy Supervisor DeeAnn Overton told City Pulse today that the Board of Trustees voted to accept Hayes’ resignation at its last meeting on March 15 but “there was really no reason” given to explain her departure. Reached by phone today, Hayes said she left to pursue “another opportunity” and declined to elaborate further before abruptly hanging up the phone.

On March 8, the Met Cares Foundation — a six-year-old nonprofit group based in Tulsa, Oklahoma that focuses largely on public education — announced that Hayes had been appointed as its executive director. 

“I didn’t leave under bad circumstances,” Hayes told City Pulse, ignoring subsequent questions about what motivated her to depart halfway into her second full term on the township’s Board of Trustees. 

Meeting minutes from March — which would include details include Hayes’ resignation notice — haven’t been made available online. Overton referred additional questions to Clerk Maggie Sanders, who was out of the office and didn’t return calls on her cell phone this afternoon.

Nobody else in the office today could produce minutes or resignation notices, Overton said.

Trustee Henrietta Brewer said the board was not given an explanation for Hayes’ resignation.

“There was nothing given to us,” she said. “I don’t know anything about what she was doing.”

Brewer declined to answer additional questions and, like Overton, referred calls to Sanders. Trustee Nathan Ruiz declined to comment on Hayes’ resignation and “anything else you might want to ask me about.” Trustees Tracie Harris and John Broughton didn’t immediately  return phone calls.

Hayes was unanimously appointed to the helm of the board in February 2016 to take over for retiring Supervisor Kathy Rodgers. She was elected to her first four-year term later that year and sailed into a second term unopposed in 2020. Her term would’ve expired at the end of 2024.

A notice posted on the township website notes that applications are being collected to appoint a replacement to serve until the Nov. 2 General Election. Those who apply will be “required” to run in the August primary election, according to the notice. Applications, resumes, letters of interest and references for the appointment are due to clerk@lansingtownship.org by 5 p.m. April 15.

The township board’s last regularly scheduled meeting on March 29 was canceled due to a “lack of business,” Brewer said. The next meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. Tuesday (April 12).

Check back for additional details as they become available.