Augusta Commissioners censure colleagues for conflict of interes - WFXG FOX54 Augusta - Your News One Hour Earlier

Augusta Commissioners voted to censure their associates Grady Smith, Wayne Guilfoyle and Joe Jackson Tuesday night for accepting money for doing business with the city.

The three Commissioners apologized for violating Augusta's conflict of interest policy.

Smith, Jackson and Guilfoyle have made several thousand dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars through work they've done for the city.

Some of their contracts were in place before they took office and they say they didn't know it violated city code.

Commissioner Smith says he'd rethink some decisions if he could.

Fox54's Mark Barber asked Smith, "Do you have any regrets, would you do anything differently if you could go back?" Smith said, "Yes, I would."

Guilfoyle says the weeks leading up to Tuesdays' decision have been painful.

"There's been no sleep these last couple weeks," Guilfoyle, said. Colleagues

He and Jackson agreed to not do any contract work for the city from now until they've been out of office for two years.

Smith says he will keep working on a Fort Gordon project for the city until it's finished.

He also agreed to not do any other work for the city for two years after leaving office. But he's considering resigning from his company so they can continue to work for the government.

"I can't tell you what's going to happen when I resign," Smith told his colleagues.

Even though they violated a conflict of interest policy, Jackson and his associates say they aren't worried about legal trouble.

"They're making the assumption that we're criminals, we're not criminals we just broke the ethics violation," said Jackson.