Commentary: A response to ‘private citizen’ Tederick’s ‘cabal’ allegations, with an eye to the future – and recent past 

As Royal Examiner readers are aware, now self-identified “private citizen” Matt Tederick, fresh off a high-paying approximately 2-1/2-year stint as Front Royal’s appointed “Interim and Transition Man” has accused this reporter, this paper and publisher Mike McCool, the latter a former mayoral election opponent of Mayor Chris Holloway, of being part of a behind-the-scenes political “cabal” with others named and perhaps unnamed out to discredit Mayor Holloway in front of the 2022 Front Royal mayoral election.

At the center of “Mad Matt’s” cabal theory was this reporter and the Examiner’s non-reporting of a story shopped by former Front Royal Unites official Stevi Hubbard. That story concerned an alleged early leak of the Front Royal Planning Commission-initiated and Town Attorney-accomplished investigative report into the initial approval process of Mayor Holloway’s construction company’s non-conforming Steele Street subdivision permitting through the planning department.

Readers may recall it was a department still in flux and transition at the time after its director was one of five Town department heads axed during the downsizing (or so-called “rightsizing”) of the town government initiated during Interim Town Manager Tederick’s tenure. I guess it could be termed “rightsizing” if one shares a belief in eliminating in-house governmental staff and operations in favor of outsourced private-sector contractors it seems were often brought to the Town’s attention by its “interim man” Mr. Tederick.

Then Interim Town Manager Matt Tederick, standing left, fields questions from citizens concerned about his overhaul of the town government, including the removal of five department heads, during a hastily scheduled appearance at The Front Royal Brewery on Jan. 30, 2020.

It may be worth noting here that at the adjournment of the December 13 town council meeting at which his first “cabal” theory attack was voiced, this reporter told Tederick to his face why:

First, the invisible “leak” story wasn’t reported by Royal Examiner – a lack of requested first-hand verification of the leak, such as a copy of it, which Ms. Hubbard never produced.

And second, why this reporter cautioned Hubbard about identifying Town Planning Commissioner Darryl Merchant or anyone as a source of a leak she had no first-hand knowledge or proof of. In fact, Hubbard told this reporter she only had portions of the supposedly leaked 20-page report read to her over the phone by an unnamed source that appeared to clear Mayor Holloway of any wrongdoing in the permitting process.

As noted in Royal Examiner’s story accompanying the official November 17 release and subsequent final draft release of the report and accompanying press releases, the ethics of the described “fast-tracking” of the permit approval by Town Manager Steven Hicks, sometimes in the presence of applicant/Mayor Holloway through planning staff, are certainly debatable.

‘Private citizen’ Tederick launches his ‘Examiner cabal tour’ at December 13th Front Royal Town Council meeting. Despite being informed of verification issues with unreported leak story source, Tederick continued to make the same ‘cover-up’ allegations at public meetings over next two days. Below, Aug. 24, 2020, file photo of council work session with Interim Town Manager Tederick and Councilman Holloway putting their heads together.

Regardless of this information given to him the evening of December 13, the following two days in front of the county supervisors and town planning commission, as well as cameras filming those meetings, Tederick repeated the exact same allegations of a Royal Examiner “cover-up” of the supposed leak. To our knowledge into the new year, no first-hand evidence of an early leak of the report has ever been publicly produced.

And remind us, Mr. Tederick, what were the consequences of that non-reporting by all but one local paper (Warren/Frederick Report) of that allegedly leaked report that was never made public prior to its first official release on November 17? Oh, that’s right – there were none. 

Unless you consider “a consequence” a few weeks delay in the chance to put what appears, in retrospect, to be managed quotes read over the phone to Ms. Hubbard out into the public sphere. For Mr. Tederick seems particularly perturbed that selected quotes Ms. Hubbard heard over the phone supposedly clearing Holloway of any wrongdoing in his non-conforming subdivision permitting approval process were not reported, along with the allegation of a Merchant-to-Mabe passing of that phantom copy of the 20-page document that was never made public.

Sure, as was noted prominently in the Town’s new Richmond-based public relations/information firm’s one-page press release accompanying the report’s official releases, on one of the investigative report’s 20 pages it was stated that Holloway didn’t do anything “illegal” that could have landed him in court or jail; or anything there is a specific town code forbidding, such as elected officials seeking the town manager’s assistance in “fast-tracking” the permitting process. But again, was the town manager-facilitated “fast-tracking” through planning staff, sometimes in the mayor/applicant’s presence that is described in Town Attorney Doug Napier’s report, ethical?

Town Manager Steven Hicks listens as Town Attorney Doug Napier, left, reacts after Mayor Holloway announced the town attorney’s unexpected retirement on Dec. 13.

Opinions could well vary on that, particularly for a non-conforming subdivision it has been reported the roads would be so narrow to facilitate the desired six units that the subdivision will not be able to have Town garbage pickup service. Or perhaps I am the only town citizen who thinks there should be a town code forbidding elected officials, with town management staff cooperation, from bringing what the report describes as perceived your-signature-now outside the normal permitting processes pressure to bear on planning department staff.

Despite Mr. Tederick’s attempt to put Royal Examiner in a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” box where if the newspaper reports anything negative about the mayor, he can say, “See, I told you so” – we will not be cornered into not continuing to perform due diligence in bringing the public “The News Behind the News” as we promised at the time of our inception in the fall of 2016, perhaps now adding for the non-journalists out there, The “Verifiable” News Behind the News.

Ultimately, tracing motives behind public statements of unelected public figures like Mr. Tederick, as well as municipal policy and personnel decisions forwarded by elected officials appearing to be political allies of those unelected public figures, are important aspects of the job of a free and functioning press.

Tederick draws battle lines as town council, and its mayor around whom those lines were drawn, listen on Dec. 13.

If anything, the Front Royal-Warren County Economic Development Authority (EDA) financial scandal of 2014-2018 – aspects of which Royal Examiner first raised questions about among our earliest stories published September-October of 2016 – should have taught us that lesson.

So, Mr. Holloway’s behavior as mayor in seeking favorable in-town developmental permitting as a private citizen is a matter of public concern, as is the behavior of all public officials in similar regards, election season on the horizon or not.

What comes next?

Sure, there is likely to be additional criticism aimed our way. In fact, Mayor Holloway ended the year with a Royal Examiner Facebook page reaction to Norma Jean Shaw’s story on his receiving a court summons due to repeated complaints about his dogs running at large. In light of the mayor, perhaps coincidentally identifying himself as “a private citizen” in essentially promising to try and destroy the Royal Examiner in the coming year in another “pot calling the kettle black” tirade, there will be more on his post later.

Structure inside Town Hall may never be the same in wake of interim town managership of Matt Tederick, but is the realignment of departments and personnel under stewardship of town council and mayor completed yet?

But beyond Town of Front Royal political figures, elected or unelected, picking fights with a media source they can’t “manage” to their desired ends, we suggest keeping a close eye on Town Hall in coming days, weeks, even months – perhaps even a backward look toward the unexpected December 13^th announcement of the retirement of Town Attorney Doug Napier. For if those willing to pose the hard questions to those with the power to fire or dismiss them; or those commissioned and willing to find and report the truth about those questions; not to mention those willing to stand up to those hurling unsubstantiated accusations at their members and others, go missing in action then we may have a clue as to what “cabal” might really exist in Front Royal and Warren County politics and what its end-game might be.

Front Royal Planning Commission listens to update from new Planning Director Lauren Kopishke, upper left on Dec. 1, 2021. Also pictured, left to right from foreground around table, are Chairman Doug Jones, Commissioners Josh Ingram, Darryl Merchant, Kopishke, Vice-Chair Connie Marshner, and William Gordon. Below, council and mayor surround Town Attorney Doug Napier, plaque in hand, after his retirement was announced Dec. 13. Coincidentally, Napier was author of the planning commission investigative report describing perceived pressure by town manager on planning staff to hurriedly approve the mayor’s non-conforming subdivision request.

A best-guess from this perspective on the receiving end of Tederick’s accusations and Holloway’s threats, as to such ends would be a slavish acceptance of the manipulation and re-tooling of the town governmental apparatus to facilitate personal financial and/or partisan political gain – without media questions being asked or in-house investigative reports being commissioned that tell the truth despite any managed quotes or spin-doctoring of that truth. Achievement of such a goal by a political force from either side of the political aisle, nationally, statewide, or locally, is a step away from a democratically based rule of law applied equally to all citizens.

So, why did one “private citizen” with a long history as a local partisan political party operative take the opportunity to point what some might consider “a pot calling the kettle black” accusatory finger at Royal Examiner, its staff, and publisher as 2021 drew to a close? A logical guess would be to head off anticipated negative reporting as election season approaches of things like the above-referenced and supposedly leaked Town Planning Commission investigative report on Mayor Holloway and Town Manager Hicks “fast-tracking” of a permitting approval process – approval that has since been reversed as the Planning Commission has recommended denial of the Holloway Construction non-conforming subdivision permit.

But despite his three-day “name-calling tour” of locally broadcast meetings to berate just one of four local papers that did not report the phantom leak story, is that the only story about Mayor Holloway that the man-who-would-be king, or rather mayor-maker is concerned about surfacing? Judging from Mr. Tederick’s threat of January revelations about another supposed potential opponent of Holloway, perhaps not.

But what story could that planned offensive threatened by Mr. Tederick, who declined to identify his rank to us when he worked in military counterintelligence, a job in which the dissemination of “disinformation” to confuse an “enemy” is business as usual, be designed to head off?

Stay tuned for Part 2 of Royal Examiner’s exploration of the public attacks aimed its way by “private citizens” Tederick and Holloway.