Marshfield Common Council Approves Removal of Mayor

Tuesday, March 23rd, 2021 -- 11:50 AM

(WDLB) By the narrowest margin allowable, Marshfield's top elected city official has been removed from office.

After a two-hour closed-door deliberation that followed four hours of public testimony and closing arguments on both sides, the Common Council voted 8-2 just after 11 o-clock last night to remove Bob McManus from the Mayor's office.

The eight Council members who voted to remove McManus from office (Nick Poeschel, Ken Bargender, Ed Wagner, Tom Witzel, Adam Fischer, Rebecca Spiros, Tom Buttke and Peter Hendler) all agreed the Mayor deleted text messages he should not have, tried to blame it on a member of the city's I-T department, and misled city officials and the public about it.

The Council said the Mayor's violations rose to the levels of inefficiency in government and official misconduct.  During his testimony, McManus said he did nothing intentional, and that he deleted text messages almost as they came in or went out, because he was under the impression everything was being archived by the city.

Andy Keogh, who filed the complaint to remove McManus from office, didn't buy the Mayor's argument.  Keogh added in his closing arguments, "I take no pleasure from any of this." 

Many of the text messages deleted by the Mayor were supposed to be part of an open-records request filed in April of last year by Fire-and-Police Commission President Randy Gershman, who wrapped up his testimony last night by saying he "didn't have the stomach" to also file the complaint against McManus.

In his closing arguments, McManus characterized Gershman's open-records request, and the complaint filed by Keogh, also a Fire-and-Police Commissioner, as politically-motivated.

McManus also pointed out that Gershman's open-records request was filed on April 24, 2020, three days after he attempted but failed to nominate an appointee to replace Keogh on the Fire-and-Police Commission.

Gershman had testified last Friday that he filed the open-records request a year after he first started working on it.  Aldermen Mike Feirer and Quentin Rosandich voted against removal.

The Council had no discussions regarding what happens next, in terms of the remainder of the Mayor's term, which expires in April of 2022.

Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.