Pine Ridge Police Chief Nicholas Scott and Lieutenant Joshua Starkey have voluntarily resigned.

This is the 2nd command shakeup this year.

“It is the town’s policy to not publicly discuss personnel matters,” a Town Hall announcement reads.

“Town police will continue to operate with backup from Lexington County Sheriff’s Department.

“Mayor Robert Wells, the Town of Pine Ridge Council, and the Pine Ridge Police Department will continue to focus on the safety and welfare of the citizens.”

At an impromptu Town Council meeting in March, it was announced interim Police Chief Eddie Powell and Police Officer Jonathan Car-swell were leaving.

Demotion, discipline or release of an employee were items included on the executive session agenda published before the meeting when the 2 were fired.

Scott joined Pine Ridge after serving the City of Columbia Police Department for 10 years. A native of the Columbia area, Chief Scott joined the Columbia Police Department in 2008 and served most recently as Sergeant in the Criminal Investigations Division.

Chief Scott told Lexington Ledger Editor Paul Kirby that he could no longer operate in good conscious in a hostile work environment.

“The Pine Ridge Police Department is not actually able to be a police department as long as the mayor is there and operating in the way he is,” Scott said.

“He has his hand in so much of the day-to-day operations that some of it challenges what’s considered ethical operations of the department.”

Scott said his police officers are supposed to have the highest standards

“Mayor Robert Well’s actions often jeopardized those key qualifiers.

“I can’t sit idly by while anyone jeopardizes those key points by their actions and shows no signs of stopping. As hard as it may be for the mayor, the trained and qualified police chief will need to be allowed to run the police department as it should be run if it is ever going to be operated in a way that doesn’t challenge those standards.”

Scott said the mayor’s actions, and the actions he allows, could easily jeopardize investigations and cases,

“This wouldn’t be allowed at any department where basic standard operating procedures for a police department are followed.”

Earlier this year the department was left rudderless, Kirby wrote on the Lexington Ledger site.

“Patrolman Dale Brown is Pine Ridge’s only full-time qualified police officer. The last time this happened, the department’s operations were suspended.”

The town released a statement that many said led them to believe their town would get preferential treatment from the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department, Kirby wrote, but the sheriff’s department denied this several times.