Kruse renews push to fire Coryea. He accuses Whitmore of blackmail attempt over affair
County Administrator Cheri Coryea’s job is back on the chopping block after a commissioner accused her of taking part in a scheme to embarrass him over his extramarital affair.
As a result, the Manatee County Commission could vote in about two weeks on whether to fire Coryea.
Commissioners Carol Whitmore and George Kruse, both of the county’s at-large commissioners, held an informal meeting on Friday to discuss their own goals and visions for Manatee County. While the meeting was properly noticed, Kruse said he felt betrayed, calling the meeting a setup.
According to Assistant County Attorney Bill Clague, Friday’s meeting did not violate Florida’s Sunshine Law that requires public notice of meetings between elected officials. A notice for the meeting appeared online on Jan. 14, but Clague said he was unaware of the meeting and would have preferred to have notified the entire board of the meeting.
The unorthodox meeting between Kruse and Whitmore took place on the fifth floor of the county’s downtown Administration Building at 8 a.m., an hour earlier than the board typically hosts meetings. Other commissioners said they weren’t aware of the meeting.
Commissioner Kevin Van Ostenbridge, who learned of the meeting that morning, attended the meeting, as well. County staff, including Coryea and Jan Brewer, the county’s director of financial management, also attended.
Kruse and Whitmore discussed several topics, including affordable housing, unemployment, infrastructure and other countywide issues.
“I don’t know in terms of the details of how (the meeting) was conducted because I wasn’t there,” said Clague, who noted that Whitmore approached him weeks ago to ask if such a meeting would be legal. “I did feel that other commissioners should be notified of it.”
Pinning the blame on Coryea, who scheduled the meeting, Kruse made a motion at Tuesday’s meeting to again move forward with terminating her 30-year employment with the county. According to Coryea’s employment contract, she must receive notice at least 15 days in advance of any final decision to fire her.
The board voted 4-3 in support of the motion. Commissioners Kruse, Van Ostenbridge, James Satcher and Vanessa Baugh voted in favor, while Commissioners Whitmore, Reggie Bellamy and Misty Servia cast dissenting votes.
The meeting Friday raised concerns among the public and fellow commissioners, who claimed they were unaware of the meeting, as well. The board debated the issue for hours as part of Tuesday morning’s meeting.
An affair and accusations of blackmail
According to Kruse, Whitmore knew that backlash was coming and meant to tarnish Kruse’s reputation and commitment to transparency. Reading a prepared statement to the board, Kruse said he was owning up to an extramarital affair before it could be used against him.
“Late last year, I did the absolute worst thing you could do to someone you love, and she’s right here in the audience,” said Kruse, gesturing to his wife Jess. “I had a short but nonetheless real affair.”
“While it was going on, one commissioner, Carol Whitmore, knew about it. Rather than ignore something that didn’t pertain to her, I learned that she acquired pictures from when we were out in public.”
Kruse and his wife have an 11-year-old daughter and a 14-year-old son. All of them were present for Kruse’s swearing-in on Nov. 17.
Kruse accused Whitmore of working through “corruption and deceit.” He said he believed Whitmore acquired the photos as blackmail and hoped to use those photos to manipulate his votes on the board.
In an interview with the Bradenton Herald, Whitmore denied any attempt at extortion — calling it, instead, an excuse to resume the effort to fire Coryea.
“The only truth is that I knew it was happening,” said Whitmore, who said that she was sent the photos by someone else who saw Kruse with a woman in public. “I’ve seen this happen before, but I told him he’s a powerful person at the county and he needs to be more careful.”
“To pull Cheri into this when, first of all, it’s not related,” Whitmore added. “I asked her as one of her seven bosses to put a meeting together.”
Renewed move to fire Coryea
Tuesday’s vote is a continuation of three new commissioners’ effort to fire Coryea shortly after they were sworn in. Citing conservative philosophies, Kruse, Van Ostenbridge and Satcher, as well as the re-elected Baugh, voted in November to send notice of Coryea’s possible termination. Whitmore, Bellamy and Servia voted against the proposal.
In December, Kruse played a key role in saving Coryea’s job with the county. After previously voting in support of sending notice to fire the administrator, he reversed course, noting that he wanted to give her a chance to adjust certain county policies.
But now, Kruse said he has lost trust in Coryea’s leadership, echoing Van Ostenbridge’s concerns from the last attempt to fire Coryea.
“This meeting last Friday reaffirmed my suspicions that this administration focuses internally to friends and connections and not externally to those that matter most — you, the citizens of Manatee County,” Kruse said.
While the majority of commissioners said they felt Coryea’s mistake was a fireable offense, the dissenting commissioners said they didn’t believe the administrator had done anything to warrant termination.
Deep divisions on the commission led to a heated debate on the issue before finally voting to move forward with Coryea’s possible termination.
“In all due honesty, I don’t think that has anything to do with the county administrator,” Bellamy said.
Van Ostenbridge, who led the first charge to fire Coryea in November, said he was glad Kruse had come around to his point of view.
“I saw examples of bad government a long time ago when I was on the campaign trail,” he said. “I look at the Lena Road land deal. I look at the poorly organized meeting on Friday. These are parlor tricks. That’s the bare minimum of legality in government.”
Servia expressed concern about how firing Coryea might impact the county’s workforce of 1,900 employees.
“This would be a disruption of business at the highest level,” Servia predicted. “We’re not just talking about Cheri. This is a disruption of business on a very deep level.”
If the board moves forward with firing Coryea, an interim administrator would be appointed.
“This board needs to have a thorough discussion about how to move forward from here,” Baugh said.
Coryea’s termination has not been finalized. The board is expected to make a final decision about her employment in the coming weeks.
Herald reporter Jessica De Leon contributed to this report.
This story was originally published January 26, 2021 at 1:30 PM.
