Hoping to end the controversy surrounding their employee contracts, Warrenton Director of Operations/Finance Officer Terri Thorn and Police Chief Greg Houdyshell have volunteered to give them up.The contracts for Houdyshell and Thorn were proposed by former Mayor Greg Costello and passed by the board on a 5-1 vote in a closed session April 3, 2012.Costello proposed the contracts because he said he believed Houdyshell and Thorn had been targeted for termination by incoming Mayor Jerry Dyer.City Attorney Chris Graville also was offered a contract by the former administration, but turned it down.Residents have raised questions and concerns over the contracts at previous board meetings saying it wasn’t fair that only two city employees had them.“If there’s a way to end this, then I’m all for it,” Dyer said. “I think it has caused some division within the previous board and caused some division within this board. I think it’s put undo stress on Chief Houdyshell and on Terri Thorn and they’ve had enough of it.”The board voted 6-0 Tuesday night to draw up an ordinance to terminate the contracts when they expire in April 2014.The ordinance is expected to be voted on at the next board meeting in August.Board member John Cornell said he didn’t think the contracts were the right thing or even necessary.“That being said, you have to recognize that those contracts were voted on and authorized by an elected board and whether or not they should have done it, they had the power to do it,” he said. “I’ve always been up front with my distaste for those contracts.”Cornell said although he has been opposed to the contracts, he is not dissatisfied with Thorn’s or Houdyshell’s job performance, and he said their willingness to give them up speaks “volumes to their character.”Cornell noted he doesn’t fault either employee for accepting something that was offered to them, and doesn’t think they should be persecuted for their decision to do so.“They accepted something that was offered to them, and I don’t fault them for that,” he said. “There are members of our community who have issues with the contracts, and members who have issues with Ms. Thorn. Hopefully we can put this behind us.”Alderperson Karen Casserly said the city should hold the board accountable for decisions made for the city.“If you do not like the decisions we make, then that’s why every two years the citizens have the right to fire us,” she said. “For a long time everybody has held (Thorn and Houdyshell) accountable for the decisions that they do not like, and if that is still the case, then you are wrong and your aggravation and anger should fall on this board.”