Tederick’s sometime stormy tenure at Town Hall will end December 8

According to Town Manager Steven Hicks, current part-time Town Business Development Manager Matt Tederick’s tenure with the Front Royal Town government will end by mutual agreement on December 8. That will be a year and one day after Hicks replaced Tederick as town manager, the current town manager pointed out. At the time Hicks took office on December 7, 2020, it was announced that Tederick would remain in a part-time position to help Hicks transition into his new job, essentially getting the lay of the land after his move from North Carolina where he had served as town manager in Selma.

Hicks estimated Tederick working 30-hour weeks during his latest job with the town, and called him a valuable asset over the past year. Tederick was considered a “provisional employee” in his most recent stint with the town government. Contacted about his compensation in his part-time role at the time he transitioned to it, Tederick said it was slated at “up to $3,500 per month” with no benefits.

Photo of former Selma, N.C. Town Manager Steven Hicks accompanying press release announcing his coming to that same position in Front Royal. (Courtesy Photo) Below, Matt Tederick in his interim mayor’s role at outset of a 2-1/2 year run in Front Royal’s Town Hall. Royal Examiner Photos by Roger Bianchini

Tederick’s earlier tenure at Front Royal’s Town Hall, particularly as interim town manager for 13 months from November 9, 2019, to December 7, 2020, after an approximate seven-month stint as interim Mayor, saw a number of controversies erupt. Those included the removal of five department heads and long-time Council Clerk Jennifer Berry, the latter who has since filed a federal sexual harassment suit against the Town; and the elimination of the in-house Community Development Director, who was Felicia Hart’s, position; as well as dismantling of the Town’s Tourism Department and Visitors Center staff in favor of outsourced consultants with a focus on online and social media marketing.

Interim Town Manager Tederick faces a somewhat angry group of citizens in meeting agreed to at The Front Royal Brewery in wake of staffing and departmental cuts he was perceived as the driving force behind.

Tederick termed his moves governmental “rightsizing”, a term most recently invoked by fellow Republican Committee member and county Supervisor Delores Oates at Monday’s joint Town-County Tourism work session. But others, as was commented at that November 29th work session – “You mean downsizing?” – saw it as a philosophically based shrinking of the town governmental function in favor of outsourced, private-sector consultant contracts. Tederick was appointed interim town manager by council shortly after Town Manager Joe Waltz announced his pending resignation.

Also while Tederick was at the head of the town administrative department, over the objection of then-Mayor Eugene Tewalt, the town council agreed to withdraw from involvement with the half-century-old joint Town-County EDA while initiating hostile litigation against the EDA. That eventually led to the filing of an EDA countersuit over contested financial claims stemming from the EDA financial scandal, circa 2014-2018. At the center of that financial dispute was a Town refusal to make payments on its EDA-financed new police station. On the Town side that ongoing dueling litigation is being handled by outsourced legal representation brought to council by Tederick. The Town is in the process of creating its own unilateral EDA, while the County continues to utilize the post-financial scandal, re-tooled EDA Board and staff.

From left in December 2019, the man who was interim mayor, the councilman who would become mayor, and the then-mayor put their heads together to hang Dr. Joseph Warren’s plaque in the Town Hall foyer in memory of the pivotal Revolutionary War figure Warren County is named for.

Tederick transitioned to interim town manager from interim mayor as the special election called to fill Hollis Tharpe’s term saw the former mayor and then councilman Gene Tewalt beat Tharpe in that special election. Tharpe had resigned effective May 2, 2019, after being charged for sexual solicitation in a local massage parlor. Tharpe denied any wrongdoing but resigned to fight the charges out of public office. A Republican Committee member council majority appointed Tederick as interim mayor shortly after Tharpe’s resignation.

The charges against Tharpe were later dropped due to a lack of evidence after the owner of the massage parlor refused to testify by invoking her 5th Amendment right against self-incrimination after facing charges based on the allegations of operating a bawdy house. Coincidentally, Tederick was the foreman of the grand jury that handed down the indictment against then-Mayor Tharpe. Tederick pointed out to this reporter at the time that he was appointed to the grand jury prior to any charges being filed against the then-mayor.

So, while Tederick found himself at the center of quite the rollercoaster ride over his first year-and-a-half with the Town, his final year in an advisory role has been relatively calm and behind the scenes as the consequences of the first portion of his tenure continue to play out at Town Hall, the Warren County Government Center, and in the courts.

Attempts to reach Tederick Friday for comment on his tenures in the town government were unsuccessful prior to Friday’s publication deadline.