FAIRHOPE, Ala. — Mayor Tim Kant’s veto Monday night of salary hikes for the mayor and City Council, which were approved by the council two weeks ago, may have raised more questions than it answered.

“After thinking about it overnight, and given that the ordinance was published in the paper indicating the mayor had signed it, I’m more convinced than ever that we’re on strong ground on this,” said City Council President Bob Gentle Tuesday, regarding the council’s subsequent override of the veto Monday night. “You don’t toy with the public. What you’re seeing here is a classic power struggle.”

The veto was read by the assistant city clerk at the start of the Feb. 25 council meeting, after she removed it from an envelope that apparently had not been presented to all council members until that moment.

At the end of the meeting, Gentle read the veto document dated Feb. 21 again, and a vote was taken by the council to override the veto.

That vote passed 4-1, with Councilman Mike Ford voting against it.

A subsequent vote passed unanimously to ask the Alabama Attorney General for an opinion regarding the effect of the override.

Statements made by City Attorney Tut Wynne and Kant at the meeting indicated that the override would not be effective because it had to be published in a local newspaper by Feb. 26, according to state law requiring pay raises for elected officials to become final six months prior to the August election for mayor and council members this year.

Before the vote on the override, Kant was asked by a council member if he believed that any override would not be effective because there was not time to have it published as required by law.

“That is my understanding,” Kant said.

Kant left immediately after the meeting adjourned. He went to Washington, D.C. Tuesday morning for a conference and would not return until Friday, his assistant said. The event is the American Public Power Association legislative rally sponsored by the Alabama Municipal Electric Authority, his assistant said.

Kant did not immediately respond to calls and e-mails seeking comment by press time.

When Kant and several council members left after the meeting adjourned, one man in the audience approached the dais and spoke with Gentle, Councilwoman Debbie Quinn and Wynne who remained behind. He showed them a copy of the ordinance that was published in the Feb. 16 edition of the Fairhope Courier.

All three city officials leaned over and looked at the ordinance in the newspaper.

The publication was in the “Courier Legals” section of the newspaper and included a copy of the entire ordinance passed by the council Feb. 11.

At the end of the publication, it read as follows: “ADOPTED AND APPROVED THIS THE 11TH DAY OF February, 2008 Timothy M. Kant, Mayor.” It also read: “Attest: Geniece W. Johnson, City Clerk.”

Quinn and Gentle told Wynne as they discussed the effect of the ordinance having been published, that he should include that information in his letter to the attorney general for a legal opinion about the veto.

Wynne explained that applicable law required the city clerk to deliver the ordinance passed by the council on Feb. 11 to the mayor within 48 hours. He had 10 days from Feb. 11 to veto it.

The document read at Monday’s meeting is dated Feb. 21 and shows an imprint that the document was received at 4:02 p.m. that day. That imprint is customarily stamped by the clerk’s office.

The ordinance document bears neither the mayor’s nor the city clerk’s signature, according to the copy in a file folder at the city clerk’s office.

However, e-mails sent from Johnson’s e-mail address under her e-mail signature to the Gulf Coast Newspapers legal department, show that publication of the ordinance was requested at 1:44 p.m on Feb. 13.

The request from Johnson’s e-mail address asked that the ordinance be published on Feb. 16.

Johnson did not immediately respond to call and e-mails seeking comment by press time.

Wynne also did not respond to a call seeking comment by press time.

The Monday night veto is the first veto by a mayor in recent Fairhope history, maybe ever, according to several council members and other sources.

“They weren’t allowed at that time I was there,” said former Mayor James P. Nix. “I had a vote on the council. I didn’t have the veto power.”