Lawrence Mayor Jeremy Farmer looks to the crowd at a City Commission meeting, April 14, 2015, at City Hall.

Lawrence Mayor Jeremy Farmer has unexpectedly stepped down from his position as executive director of a local food bank, in part because the nonprofit is about $50,000 past due on federal payroll taxes.

Leaders with Just Food announced on Monday that Farmer had resigned as executive director, effective immediately. Elizabeth Keever, Just Food’s chief resource officer, has been named as interim executive director.

When asked by the Journal-World, Farmer confirmed that Just Food recently discovered that several payroll tax payments had not been made. Kristi Henderson, president of Just Food’s board of directors, confirmed that the nonprofit had about a $50,000 tax liability due to the IRS, and Just Food leaders were investigating whether there was an additional tax liability due to the state of Kansas. Henderson estimated that the missed tax payments stretched from the start of 2014 to the early part of 2015.

The unpaid taxes were discovered in approximately the last month. Henderson said the board and Farmer came to a “mutual decision” that he would no longer serve as executive director of the food bank, which is the largest in the county.

Farmer said the payroll tax mishap was part of the reason for the decision.

“Part of my oversight was to make sure those got paid, and they didn’t,” Farmer said.

Farmer said that since his one-year term as Lawrence mayor began in April, it has become more difficult for him to provide enough attention to Just Food operations.

“It has become increasingly clear that I can’t give an organization like Just Food the attention that it needs,” Farmer said.

Farmer said he plans to continue his duties as mayor. He said he’ll now have more time to focus on several pressing city issues. Henderson said a review by the Just Food board has not turned up any signs that money had been misappropriated by Farmer. Rather, Henderson said it appears the payments just weren’t made.

“It looks like just a lack of attention to detail,” Henderson said.

Farmer also characterized the issue as a mishap.

“Nothing was done intentionally,” Farmer said. “It was just me not doing it right.”

Henderson said the board and its accountant are working on payment options with the IRS. She said Just Food leaders are optimistic they’ll be able to pay off the tax liabilities without impacting the services they provide to hungry families and individuals in Douglas County.

“We have a great board in place and a great interim executive director,” Henderson said. “We have an incredible support base in the community. I’m confident that we’ll be able to resolve this and still provide great services to our clients.”

Farmer’s past does include at least one other allegation of financial mismanagement. In 2011, Amber Farmer sued for divorce from Jeremy Farmer while the couple lived in Arkansas. In a sworn deposition, Amber Farmer was asked why she and Jeremy Farmer separated. She said that Jeremy Farmer had been fired from a job for misappropriation of funds, and that had created trust issues in their relationship.

“Trust has been an issue in our relationship,” Amber Farmer said in the 2011 deposition. “I am entering seminary this fall hoping to become a priest in the Episcopal Church. I learned that Jeremy had misappropriated funds and was fired from a job I helped him get through my friendship with a member of our church. Jeremy did not disclose this to me and did not admit to it until forced to. He had been accused previously of a similar thing in another job, but I believed him when he denied it. With the path I have chosen I cannot remain married to someone whom I cannot trust. This has caused me great emotional pain.”

Attempts to reach Farmer’s ex-wife for further comment on Monday were unsuccessful.

Jeremy Farmer said Monday his marriage to Amber Farmer ended for different reasons, but he declined to elaborate. He said the allegations of financial misappropriation have never been proven.

“I go back to the fact that no matter what she said in an affidavit, no charges were filed from anywhere against me for anything,” Jeremy Farmer said. “There were other things going on in the course of our relationship. I’m having a hard time just tossing her under the bus and causing her frustration.”

Farmer said he only learned in the last several months that Amber Farmer had made allegations about misappropriated funds in the 2011 deposition. He said he waived his right to participate in the divorce proceedings because he had been given advice by a friend that the waiver would expedite the process. He said he got a copy of the divorce decree, but never saw the actual deposition until conversations about its contents started to emerge in some political circles and on Journal-World message boards earlier this year.

Farmer said he could provide several character witnesses from his time in Arkansas to refute claims that he would misappropriate funds from an employer. The Journal-World, at Farmer’s suggestion, did talk to a former pastor that employed Farmer at a Malvern, Ark., church. The pastor, Ronnie Brumley, who served as Farmer’s boss at Lifepoint Church, said such alleged activity was not consistent with what he had seen from Farmer.

“I never had any issues like that with Jeremy,” Brumley said.

Officials at Just Food have not alleged any misappropriation of funds related to the unpaid taxes. Henderson said the organization had conducted a financial review.

“All dollars are present and accounted for,” Henderson said.

She said the board did find out about the deposition and its allegations recently, and discussed the matter with Farmer.

“I think when people are in a situation like a divorce, it is difficult,” Henderson said. “There are two sides to every story. He told us that (the allegations) wasn’t the truth, and we believed him.”

Henderson said the 2011 deposition did not have a bearing on the decision to move forward with a new director.

Keever steps into the role of interim executive director after having been at Just Food since 2013. She previously has overseen the organization’s two annual fundraising programs and played a key role in expanding a Just Food program where it recovers unused food from local grocery stores, according to a press release from Just Food.

Farmer was with Just Food for four years and was credited with creating programs to recover unused food from restaurants and grocery stores, the addition of cooking and gardening classes, and instituting several efficiencies in food distribution, the release stated.