Records confirm outside interest in effort to fire County Administrator Cheri Coryea
A bout of political trickery came to a stunning end Thursday after a key commissioner “flip-flopped” on his decision to discuss firing County Administrator Cheri Coryea.
After meeting with community leaders, stakeholders and Coryea herself, Commissioner George Kruse rescinded his support of the 4-3 vote that would have seen the Manatee County Commission debate firing the administrator on Jan. 6.
“We’re talking about real people here — a county administrator who put in 30 years with the county and to have the cloud of potential termination over her head for a month. You’ve got 1,900 county employees who are sitting here waiting to see what happens to someone they look up to,” Kruse said in an interview with the Bradenton Herald on Monday afternoon.
Kruse had previously voted in support of the motion, along with commissioners James Satcher, Kevin Van Ostenbridge and Vanessa Baugh, arguing that it would allow for an open discussion on the matter. Van Ostenbridge and Satcher had been vocal critics of Coryea, who came under fire for the county’s $32.5 million Lena Road land purchase earlier this year.
Voting against the motion were commissioners Reggie Bellamy, Misty Servia and Carol Whitmore. They raised concerns about rumors they’d heard involving prominent developers pushing to remove Coryea from her post.
Van Ostenbridge has recently denied trying to push Coryea out on the behalf of local builder Carlos Beruff, but newly released public records suggest that the developer had been clued into the attempt to fire her at the Nov. 19 meeting, which came just two days after the new commissioners’ swearing-in ceremony.
That morning, Beruff texted Van Ostenbridge to ask if he was “all set.”
Two days earlier, Van Ostenbridge reached out to Beruff, who contributed more than $10,000 to his campaign, to inform him that Whitmore “took the bait,” approving Van Ostenbridge’s request to hold a special meeting under false pretenses.
Van Ostenbridge also appeared to reach out to Bob Spencer, president of West Coast Tomato, to share the news. In a text message, he wrote that he had “acted like I was stumbling through it” so that Whitmore, who serves as chairman of the board, would allow a special meeting.
Whitmore took objection to the revelation that Van Ostenbridge had purposefully misled her, noting that she had supported his bid for election — a decision she now regrets.
“It shows immaturity and low class for one of the highest positions in this county,” Whitmore said. “I’m very disappointed in someone whose family I’ve known for my whole life.”
The text messages were released in response to open records requests, including one from Sarasota paralegal Michael Barfield, who is suing Satcher for violating the Florida Sunshine Law.
Reached for comment Monday afternoon, Van Ostenbridge confirmed that he had been in contact with Spencer and Beruff, noting that he sees them as mentors and friends. While Van Ostenbridge noted that Beruff and Spencer gave their thoughts on Coryea’s job performance, he declined to describe any of their specific concerns.
“I sought the counsel of many people, including the two of them. It was not a hasty decision. I put a lot of thought into it,” Van Ostenbridge said. “In order to make that motion, we had to be in a meeting, and achieving that took some political maneuvering.”
Coryea’s own notes from a one-on-one with Van Ostenbridge that morning point to more evidence of a planned announcement, even though the item was not detailed as part of the Nov. 19 meeting agenda. According to 11 pages of handwritten notes, Van Ostenbridge requested a private meeting with the administrator to discuss the county’s potential defense to a federal economic shutdown.
But when the meeting began, Van Ostenbridge blindsided Coryea, interrogating her on the Lena Road land purchase and the decision to close the sale before the new commissioners were sworn in. He also asked Coryea to turn in her resignation but she declined.
Coryea defended her actions, reiterating that her job is to follow the orders of the board. Then, according to her notes, Van Ostenbridge threatened to sell off pieces of the Lena Road land.
“I intend to parcel out the property into small parcels and sell them off at a loss, and that will embarrass the previous board and you,” he said, according to Coryea’s notes. “I might keep a sliver for something. I have the votes.”
Van Ostenbridge told the Bradenton Herald that he hopes to hold on to about 20 acres of land adjacent to the Lena Road Landfill, but confirmed his interest in selling off most of the land.
“I’m not interested in spending 50 plus million building out the rest of the property,” he said. “I would like to see us shop the remaining acreage and see if we can get a decent offer.”
On Thursday, Van Ostenbridge admitted that he didn’t have the votes to move forward with firing Coryea. In a Facebook post early Friday morning, he appeared to take a shot at Kruse’s reversal.
“I am very disappointed that Commissioner Kruse decided not to hold anyone accountable for the Lena Rd land deal that wasted 10’s of millions of taxpayer dollars. I am also very disappointed to learn that our Manatee County BOCC is not led by a conservative Republican majority,” he wrote. “I will continue to govern as the true conservative I campaigned as. In yesterday’s meeting, I realized my motion was defeated when Kruse announced his flip flop.”
Moving forward, Kruse said he’s committed to pushing for the changes he wants to see and is confident they can happen under Coryea’s leadership. He suggested hosting a workshop meeting for the board to describe their vision for the administrator’s policies and suggestions for change.
“You can’t blame the administrator or the staff for implementing policy if you don’t tell them to,” Kruse noted. “In this case, it’s up to us. I, at the end of the day, don’t get to tell Cheri what to do. She needs a vote from four of the commissioners.”
In meetings with Coryea and county staff, Kruse said they were receptive to his new ideas, which include making administrative regulations more transparent and rethinking the annual budget process. In recent weeks, Kruse has proposed a new system that would allow staff and commissioners to make policy changes and recommendations more transparent.
“There’s better ways of handling that with a short form that says what we have on the books, what I’m proposing, an analysis of what it costs taxpayers and how the change would be beneficial to the people of Manatee County,” Kruse said, pointing out that the board could then vote on each policy change, giving new guidance to Coryea and staff.
Van Ostenbridge is also hoping to move past this episode, and looks forward to working with Coryea to bring more “conservative principles” to county government.
“I would say she is our administrator for the foreseeable future, so it is the responsibility of the board and the administrator to work together,” he said. “The commission has to set expectations of the administration, and I hope that those expectations are in line with my conservative principles.”
This story was originally published December 14, 2020 at 4:31 PM.
