District Attorney-elect Patrick Flaherty wants several deputy DAs out of the office by Dec. 31, but the county says they should report to work at least through Jan. 3.

The turmoil over the transition in the Deschutes County district attorney’s office is continuing to play out this week, with the county and the incoming district attorney at odds over whether several prosecutors should report to work on Jan. 3.

That is the day District Attorney-elect Patrick Flaherty takes office.

On Monday, Flaherty sent letters to four of the 18 current deputy district attorneys informing them he would not appoint them when he takes office. The short letters do not tell the prosecutors why Flaherty chose not to keep them on.

One of those prosecutors, Phil Duong, said he had been told by Flaherty in November that Duong would remain in his job once Flaherty took office. Duong said that until Monday, he had not heard anything more from Flaherty about his job.

The other deputy district attorneys who were notified Monday that they would lose their jobs were Mary Anderson, Jody Vaughan and Brentley Foster, according to the letters obtained by The Bulletin.

Over the summer, Flaherty also sent a letter to Chief Deputy District Attorney Darryl Nakahira informing him that said he did not plan to employ him in the new year.

Then Tuesday, Deschutes County sent e-mails to the four deputy district attorneys and Nakahira informing them that until formal termination action is taken by the District Attorney, they remain on the payroll and are expected to observe county policy regarding hours of work and reporting time.

And on Wednesday, Flaherty sent another letter to the prosecutors, telling them their jobs will end on Dec. 31. The deputy district attorneys should clean out their offices and return any government property issued to them by Dec. 30, because they will no longer have access to the District Attorney’s Office, Flaherty wrote.

However, Flaherty does not yet have the authority to terminate the employment of people working in the District Attorney’s Office, according to the county.

“I expect that all of them will show up for work on (Jan. 3),” Deschutes County Legal Counsel Mark Pilliod said of the deputy district attorneys.

Flaherty did not return calls for comment.

The deputy district attorneys have formed a union, which approved a contract that includes a just cause provision that would dictate how and why they could be disciplined or fired. The union’s interest in the provision arose because of Flaherty’s election and his plans to dismiss some prosecutors. The union pushed for the Deschutes County Commission to vote on whether to ratify the agreement by the end of the year. Last week, the commission voted unanimously to delay that decision until Jan. 12.

Now, that decision may also be up in the air, because two county commissioners said Wednesday they might discuss on Monday whether to vote on the contract before January.

“We should talk about it,” Commissioner Alan Unger said Wednesday. Unger said he would reflect on what to do over Christmas weekend, because the commission is running out of time to change course before January.

Commissioner Dennis Luke said he would be happy to reopen the discussion, if the other two commissioners want to do so.

“From the discussion that I had with the county administrator today, he’s going to give the (County Commission) the opportunity to talk about that in executive session on Monday,” Luke said.

Commissioner Tammy Baney could not be reached for comment. She said last week it wouldn’t be right to make a final decision without hearing from Flaherty in his official capacity as district attorney.

After the commissioners decided last week to delay the vote, an attorney for two of the deputy district attorneys Flaherty plans to let go sent a letter to the county, asking officials to reconsider.

Attorney Andrew Altschul asked the county to “take any and all additional actions necessary to prevent Mr. Flaherty from illegally terminating any County employees.”

Altschul also informed the county that it must maintain his clients’ employment records and other documents and communications related to the dispute, in case there is a lawsuit.

“While my clients and I remain cautiously optimistic that they will remain properly employed even after Mr. Flaherty officially assumes his District Attorney role, given the recent actions described above, it seems prudent to make sure no evidence is inadvertently lost while we wait to see how everything plays out,” Altschul wrote.

Flaherty and Deschutes County commissioners have acknowledged that the county is likely to face legal action in any situation.

Altschul argued in the letter that if the county delayed a vote on the ratification of the contract in order to “help facilitate Mr. Flaherty’s forthcoming illegal terminations,” the county would be liable for those firings. Baney’s recent comments suggest that was a motive, according to Altschul.

“I genuinely am sort of baffled by the county’s failure to ratify the collective bargaining agreement, although I still hold out extremely slim hope they’ll do so by the end of the year, because ratifying that makes this all disappear,” Altschul said.