Town Manager update: Tewalt expresses concerns on process; Tederick ready to press forward

The post Closed Session vote Monday night, October 29, to agree to a contract with current Interim Front Royal Mayor Matt Tederick to transfer to the role of Interim Town Manager on November 9th, the day after current Town Manager Joe Waltz’s resignation becomes effective, drew only one dissenting vote.

That vote, like the lone October 15 vote against offering Tederick the town manager’s job without any competitive search or interview process, came from Councilman and Mayoral candidate Eugene Tewalt.

Contacted the following day about his dissenting vote Tewalt echoed past comments about his perception this council majority too often moves without enough information, forethought or opportunity for public input.

“My main concern is we had no time to discuss if there are any problems or concerns. We never saw a contract – at least I didn’t see it,” Tewalt said of the contractual basis for the interim mayor’s agreement approved by a 5-1 council vote Monday night.

Councilman Tewalt’s concerns have revolved around final decisions without normal background information and procedural transparency. Royal Examiner File Photos by Mark Williams, Royal Examiner.

Royal Examiner saw a draft version of Tederick’s contract in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request regarding Town Charter and Code implications surrounding Tederick’s shift from the appointed Interim Mayor’s position to an interim appointment as Town Manager. That contractual agreement approved Monday evening by council includes a $12,500 monthly salary commencing November 9, 2019 and potentially extending through July 1, 2020. The term will expire earlier upon appointment of a permanent Town Manager, a position Tederick assured us he was not interested in with a three exclamation point “No! No! No!” answer on October 16.

Asked about the agreed upon compensation that would come to $150,000 annually, Tewalt said, “I think it’s way out of line,” for someone he has not been shown has experience running a multiple department, large employee base business or municipal operation.

Contacted by Royal Examiner Tederick admitted to a lack of experience in operational oversight of such a large enterprise but said he was ready for the challenge – “It’s a matter of management and leadership,” he reasoned.

Tederick said he has already met with department heads on various topics and possible initiatives he is interested in pursuing. “It’s a challenge, do I want to try and push these things through or tee them up so I can say to the permanent selection, ‘Here, this is ready to go,’ ” he observed of balancing his interim tenure against the longer term management goals of his successor.

Matt Tederick is ready to transition from one interim Town job to another, the new one at a slightly better pay scale.

Of his salary Tederick said he had been offered a monthly compensation based on the total compensation package departing Town Manager Joe Waltz had in place. Tederick put that annually at “just over $200,000”. But he said he was willing to take less, dropping about a quarter off that to the agreed upon $12,500 monthly number in the contract, as noted above which equates to $150,000 annually.

One portion of Tederick’s draft contract received by FOIA caught our eye.

“It is expressly agreed that Manager may transfer and assign this Agreement to Manager’s wholly-owned limited liability company (LLC) … such transfer and assignment being strictly for business and tax reasons of Manager …”

Contacted about that clause of the contract Town Attorney Doug Napier explained that Tederick “asked for it” observing, “I don’t give tax advice, you’ll have to ask him.”

Tewalt said he’d never seen such a clause in a Town Manager’s contract before and reiterated his point about more time and due diligence being undertaken by council in the appointment process.

Tederick noted that as a short-term contractor he will be paying his own taxes and stood to save $5,000 to $7,000 on the LLC transfer arrangement – “But I’m probably not going to do that,” he said pausing, then adding, “If it passes the check boxes on ethical, legal and taxes we’ll see.”

And while some public concern was expressed about Tederick’s second successive interim appointment to key Town positions during the open portion of Monday’s meeting as reported by Kim Riley in her lead Royal Examiner story on that meeting (see below referenced story), Tewalt noted that after an approximate 45-minute closed session following a nearly two-hour public meeting, the public was no longer present to see the Tederick Interim Town Manager agreement approved.

“In my opinion we are not showing the community we’re transparent at all. We go into closed meeting; a decision is reached and we come out and vote. There was no one there except the media by the time we came out of the closed meeting and voted,” Tewalt observed of Monday’s council action as the clock approached 10 p.m.

“We are not following protocols of the past where we’d get multiple applications. There were no applications, no resumes, no interviews. This is the first time I’ve seen it like this,” Tewalt observed, adding, “There has been nothing discussed on the process of hiring a permanent town manager.”

Tederick told us from discussion with staff who had been through the process eight times in the past the hiring of a permanent Town Manager could take from three to six months on average. And he reiterated Wednesday on Halloween Eve that he would like to get the search process up and moving within a month.

“I’ve talked to VML and Human Resources about the kind of people we are seeking for a permanent appointment. There is a November 12 regular council meeting, I think by the one after that we’ll have greater clarity and get the process launched in November,” Tederick told us.

Legal issues
In the email accompanying his Royal Examiner FOIA response Town Attorney Napier addressed, as he had Monday evening, certain Charter or Code concerns surrounding Tederick’s interim movement from the mayor’s seat to the Town’s top administrative job.

“I researched State Code and the Town Charter, and given that Mr. Tederick is appointed interim Mayor, not elected, given that the law is that a mayor is not a member of Town Council, and given Mr. Tederick’s appointment as interim Town Manager does not commence until after his term as interim Mayor ends, Council is fully authorized to appoint Mr. Tederick as interim Manager,” Napier wrote, citing several Virginia Attorney General opinions on the council-mayor issue.

Town Attorney Doug Napier assures us Tederick’s move from Interim Mayor to Interim Town Manager is not prohibited by Town Charter or Code.

Of the pace toward that appointment the town attorney explained, “Considering the timeline in the departure of Mr. Waltz as Town Manager it appears that Council had quite limited options. Mr. Waltz informed Council that no Town department head was available to step into the interim role.

“Mr. Tederick has garnered considerable knowledge of the Town’s operations; as well as intimate knowledge of the whole EDA situation and lawsuit.

“Council wants good continuity of government, a thorough transition between Mr. Waltz and the Interim Town Manager, someone who can hit the ground running. Given all that is going on in the Town, Council did not feel it would be in the best interests of the Town and its citizens to not have a Town Manager in place who is unaware of what is going on. Mr. Tederick seemed to Council to be the right fit for this interim role.”

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