George R.R. Martin, the prolific novelist (Games of Thrones), grew up in a small house in Bayonne, NJ, a peninsula just south of Jersey City. When asked what inspired his imagination to create fantasy worlds as a child, Martin said he used to stare out his living room window at the lights across the water and imagine a Shangri-La. He later found out he was starring at Staten Island.
I regularly bike down Bellevue Road to the ferry and gaze out at Oxford across the Tread Avon River. Oxford is the quaintest town on the eastern shore. It is a Chesapeake Shangri-la accessible by ferry, one of the oldest in the land, a short eleven-minute ride. Our favorite activity is taking friends, family, and out-of-town guests on the ferry to Oxford or boating to Capsize in our clunky pontoon boat for water-view dining and a tasty Creamery ice cream cone afterward. I have many good friends who live in Oxford.
Sadly, town mismanagement has tarnished Oxford’s tranquility, turning this picturesque town into a political mess. Earlier this year, an Oxford resident, Scott Rensberger, a TV journalist by trade, frustrated by a lack of transparency and accountability on several issues, began producing cleverly crafted and controversial video reports.
Having been stonewalled by the town regarding his home’s flooding issues, he began using his significant media and investigative skills to focus on a lack of transparency regarding the town’s governance. Why was Town Manager Cheryl Lewis’ compensation with bonuses (est $179,000), not a line item in the town budget, a fairly standard practice? Why was it so much higher than the same job in towns of a comparable size? What was the context of Lewis’ daughter being hired by the Town, among other issues? The lack of a coherent, satisfying response from the Town prompted Rensberger and others to file Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) submissions as a last resort to get information being withheld by the town. Where there is smoke, there is sometimes fire.
The reaction to Rensberger’s video reports was mixed. Many people applauded his efforts. Others were offended out of loyalty to those town officials singled out they had known for years. Another group could not handle the in-your-face social media content, which combined factual reporting with some needed entertaining snark and popular culture references to keep viewers’ attention since Rensberger could not get the key players to go on camera. This genre of independent grassroots journalism is not new, especially in places with limited local news outlets.
More importantly, the criticism of Rensberger’s videos was mostly about style rather than the substance of the central facts, which have not been disputed.
Oxford used to remind me of the 1950s black-and-white TV show Mayberry R.F.D. Today, it is closer to the more contemporary TV comedy series Schitts Creek, another small-town soap with its local drama and complex relationships.
Undoubtedly, Lewis has done some good things for the town during her long time in office. However, transparency was not her priority. When we learned that her salary, the highest of any town employee, was not listed as a line item in the budget or included on the town website, it should have been a red flag about transparency.
By the way, the current Town Manager job description shows a salary range of $90,000–$110,000 compared to Lewis’ base salary, which was about $164,000 (without bonuses). This indicates the Town is getting its Town Manager’s salary in line with the market rate and maybe using the freed-up funds to hire more staff.
Staying with this theme of openness, when the Lewis controversy erupted earlier this year, why didn’t the Town Commissioners immediately update the website and add a line item showing the Town Manager’s salary? And defend her higher-than-market compensation and daughter’s employment, explaining that it didn’t violate any ethics laws. And let voters decide if the Commissioners handled the issues appropriately when the Commissioner’s three-year terms expire and elections are held.
Instead, they stonewalled, I assume, waiting for things to blow over, for Lewis to retire in June, and hoping to hit the reset button with a new Town Manager. Things did calm down. Summer on the eastern shore has that effect. That ended last week when Oxford shockingly parted ways with its newly hired Town Manager, Micheal Calvert, only a week and a half before his scheduled swearing-in ceremony.
Rensberger, after doing some simple internet sleuthing on Calvert, forwarded to Town Attorney Lindsey Ryan a 1994 Washington Post story reporting that Calvert was charged with “Indecent Exposure,” a criminal offense, and “Prostitution,” a misdemeanor offense. Connecting the dots, I’m guessing this new information resulted in frantic conference calls, more diligence, and the decision to end the Calvert relationship before he was sworn in.
The Town quickly issued a “Dear Residents” statement about Calvert’s sudden departure, explaining, “We mutually agreed to the part-ways” with Calvert, adding that it was “not a good fit.” The statement also added to the PR word salad that because the Town’s background checks are confidential, personal records are not subject to disclosure – code for: “We will not discuss this in the future, and when we do, it will be in closed session.” This is unfortunate since it would be interesting to know the extent of the vetting failure as residents wait for an “interim” Town Manager to be named.
This should have been a squeaky-clean search process, but Oxford Commissioners chose not to hire a search firm that vets candidates as part of their statement of work. It has been reported that Commissioner Katrina Greer wanted to hire a search firm. However, Tom Costigan and departing Commissioner Susan Delean-Botkin did not, due to the cost directly leading to this egg-on-face moment. They preferred having their controversial outgoing Town Manager, Lewis, handle the search. How did that work out? Sadly, all Lewis or someone else had to do was ask the town’s police unit to do a criminal background check.
The Town of Oxford should thank Scott Rensberger.
Calvert’s sudden departure has generated a loud collective: “Are you kidding me? The Town Commissioners must clean up this mess, hire a search firm, and generally be more transparent and accountable.
Hopefully, Norm Bell, the incoming Commissioner, will bring a fresh voice and temperament to the Town’s governance and make Oxford more like Shangri-La than Staten Island. No offense intended to Staten Island.
Hugh Panero, a tech and media entrepreneur, was the founder & former CEO of XM Satellite Radio. He has worked with leading tech venture capital firms and was an adjunct media professor at George Washington University. He writes about Tech and Media and other stuff for the Spy.
Mickey Terrone says
Mr. Panero, you ought to consider all the facts before you jump to conclusions as you have now done.
First, you need to take the Rensberger story with several grains of salt. He has owned a home in Oxford for about 7 years, which I understand he bought at an extremely low price because it was located in a very low area of our already low-lying town. To the best of my knowledge, he had not attended a town meeting prior to his 2023 staged performance signaling his involvement in the ongoing campaign to oust town Manager Lewis. I think Mr. Rensberger glommed on to the group that selected Ms. Greer to run for commissioner because it was perfect audience for his theatrics. I often wonder if this group didn’t pay Rensberger for his videos in support of Josh Coder’s campaign and the assaults on Ms. Lewis.
Rensberger’s town meeting soliloquy presaged his “investigation” into Lewis’ high salary as manager of this small town. He compared her salary with many other town managers. Her salary was high. Yet, Rensberger’s “investigative journalism” was, in my view, simply a hit job. It made no effort to distinguish Lewis’ job description from those who are paid less. It made no effort to acknowledge the relative number of paid staff those other jurisdictions maintained and their overall salary loads. It made no effort to recognize Lewis’ many achievements bringing in $30 millions in grants to the little town of Oxford.
Now that Lewis retired, Oxford will wind up paying three staff persons to do the work Lewis did herself while paying more combined salary and having light years less cumulative experience in fund raising. One thing of which you should have been aware before writing your article is that much of the opposition to Lewis has come from residents who maintained grievances against her for sticking to the rules and holding everyone consistently accountable to live within the rules of the town. In Oxford, we have many retired, successful folks who usually got their way in life. Thus, some wanted favors in terms of property rights, others, when they screwed up and didn’t shut the water off they received large bills from the town. They expected Lewis to look the other way and not force them to take responsibility for their mistakes. Lewis held everyones’ feet to the fire and did her job with professionalism and integrity. This explains alot about her unpopularity among the gripers.
Several of these people have sued Oxford and Lewis over this water bill issue. All lost. Yet one of them is now a town commissioner whose election campaign was aimed at removing Lewis. If you are any kind of legitimate investigative journalist, you’d have sought out that kind of information before writing your sorry, misinformed and misleading article. In my view, as soon as Rensberger figured out he had an audience for his gripes, he joined the character assassins and did his worst.
I believe his claim that he received no response from the town is false. I believe my wife, Commissioner Delean-Botkin did indeed respond to him via e-mail to begin to address his issues. His script demanded he play the innocent victim of the town manager and the town, however. So, he has played to his crowd and created videos depicting Oxford as a terribly mismanaged hellhole. Oxford is a great town, albeit imperfect, but after 35 or so Freedom of Information Act requests (made mostly by Lewis’ harrassment group), virtually zero eamples of evidence of malfeasance could be found. None! Every aspect of Lewis’ record was examined and reexamined. The town auditor was questioned in detail twice (reporting on the annual audit and after Lewis’ exit audit). No evidence of skimming money from those grants, or irregularities in the annual reports or monthly accounting statements was found. None.
Lewis answered many questions by patiently explaining her actions and her knowledge of our local environmental issues was unmistakable. Two new professional staff have been hired and are already assuming portions of Lewis’ overall responsibility as town manager. The incident with the most recent hire was the unfortunate result of an incomplete background search, although I understand numerous positive references were received. Mr Rensberger’s “investigation” appears to have centered on an involved individual whose opinion of the candidate may be comparable to someone calling upon him for a fair assessment of Cheryl Lewis’ performance as Oxford Town Manager. And since your biased article chides Mr. Costigan and Ms. Delean-Botkin for not supporting the hiring of a firm to do a national search for Oxford’s new town manager, you might have acknowledged by name, the third Oxford commissioner who also voted to hire the recently dismissed prospective staff person. You might also check to see which commissioner officially moved to hire that person.
As a 10-year resident of Oxford, I’m deeply concerned at this point that potential candidates will not want to work in this toxic atmosphere created largely by the allegedly aggrieved residents who have succeeded in pressuring Lewis from her job. You might want to check out how many qualified candidates dropped out of the running arbitrarily, perhaps because they saw Rensberger’s melodramatic and malicious video treatment of Lewis, especially now that the job pays far less. I also believe you lied (or perhaps repeated someone else’s lie) about Lewis controlling the search for her replacement. The town attorney managed the search, Mr. Panero. Everyone who reads your article(s) needs to be made aware of your shortcomings in churning out garbage rumors in print.
If there is one massive failing in Oxford’s town management, its been in the failure of most of our own residents to attend or participate in the town meetings for years. That is likely because the town had been so very well managed by Cheryl Lewis and her staff. Neither did most residents use the town web site to review proceedings or participate in town committees. Perhaps the worst failure of our residents was not supporting Lewis (and our 3 then commissioners) adequately after the removal of our former police chief. The impassioned but misinformed outrage was not effectively challenged. The misguided belief seemed to support the idea that the chief was unfairly removed because of some personal vendetta(s) by Lewis, the 3 commissioners and the town attorney, who likely played some role in advising the commissioners on their decision.
In my view, the grievance group then seized upon the misplaced emotion in town and campaigned hard to harass the commissioners and staff. The people who knew better didn’t speak up sufficiently or courageously enough and the matters festered with the election of Greer, who, I understand, refused to work with the town manager or even enter the town office for an orientation or briefings until after Lewis has indicated she would leave her job of 12 years.
I think Mr. Rensberger has done serious harm to Oxford along with the hardcore group of aggrieved gripers. I believe many qualified, competent candidates will walk away from this Oxford staff job because the town has been painted as badly managed and remains deeply divided. Your sadly shallow advice to hire a national search firm under these circumstances only adds to the chaos.
Oxford must demonstrate to the current and future staff that it will support its staff, proactively participate in town committees, attend town meetings and provide measured criticism when due, without putting on melodramatic, public displays of egotism. And people like you need to learn the facts before spreading malicious falsehoods and half-truths.
Scott Rensberger says
Mr. Terrone is Commissioner Susan Delain-Botkin’s husband. Need I say more? I could debunk this man all the way to the moon and back but I don’t have the time.
I’ve repeatedly asked Delain-Botkin to meet with me to go through each and every fact. She never responded. I submitted a PIA asking why she hasn’t responded. My PIA was completely ignored.
Rebecca Ellison says
Mr. Panero,
Thank you for your accurate and caring article about ‘The Mess in Oxford…’. And thank you also for simply bringing the discussion to the Talbot Spy.
But now, well, you’ve ‘stepped in it’.
[Quote from Mr. Terrone’s reply to Hugh Panero’s article – ‘I also believe you lied (or perhaps repeated someone else’s lie) about Lewis controlling the search for her replacement. The town attorney managed the search, Mr. Panero. Everyone who reads your article(s) needs to be made aware of your shortcomings in churning out garbage rumors in print.’] … Yikes.
So, welcome to the twisted hostile world the residents of Oxford find themselves struggling to understand and get free of. Why is it that the facts and the truth are not enough to make this stop?
Why is it the truth that is perhaps the most targeted … and the facts the most twisted?
(Note – Interesting though, to hear Mr. Terrone say that the Town Attorney is the one who did the failed vetting.)
Hugh (Jock) Beebe says
The sordid mismanagement of the recruiting process for a new Oxford Town Manager seems to have been accomplished only by the departing manager and reviewed or approved by Commission president Costigan. Minutes of the the Oxford town Commission’s meetings beyond May28 are not yet presented so we are left to wonder about steps taken and whether the unfortunate result was due to only superficial or even careless process, which lacked transparency. It might seem to indicate the position of Town Manager may not have been considered important enough for more responsible attention.
Does the Oxford commission expect the citizens of Oxford to simply accept the failure and move on? Would thoughtful consideration of what this debacle exposes about the Town of Oxford government’s function lead to voters taking more serious interest in voting for some commissioners?
Jan Greer says
“Several of these people have sued Oxford and Lewis over this water bill issue. All lost. Yet one of them is now a town commissioner whose election campaign was aimed at removing Lewis. If you are any kind of legitimate investigative journalist, you’d have sought out that kind of information before writing your sorry, misinformed and misleading article. In my view, as soon as Rensberger figured out he had an audience for his gripes, he joined the character assassins and did his worst.”
As is so often the case, Dominic “Mickey” Terrone got his “facts” wrong. After the second quarter of 2020, we received a water bill claiming we had used the preposterous figure of 168,000 gallons of water during the quarter. I did not sue the Town of Oxford. I (not my wife, Katrina) contested the invoice with then Town Administrator, Cheryl Lewis, essentially saying “prove it”, and offered to go to court to have the dispute adjudicated. In short, the Town could not prove the “usage” or “leak” (the only two options on offer, take your pick) and reduced the gallonage charged to 31,000, and the amount due from $2,119.50 to $451.50. I have difficulty determining if simply “making ‘stuff’ up” is equivalent to lying, but I suggest Mr. Terrone ought to think really hard about getting his so-called “facts” straight before putting them in a written record.
Jan Greer says
In Mr. Terrone’s tiresome screed, as is so often the case, he gets his so-called “facts” dead wrong. In it, he claims “gripers” who screwed up and didn’t shut the water off received large bills from the town, and that Ms. Lewis held everyones’ (sic) feet to the fire and did her job. He goes on to say several of these people have sued Oxford and Lewis over this water bill issue. All lost. Yet one of them is now a town commissioner whose election campaign was aimed at removing Lewis.
In case he would like to know the actual facts, about which I have indisputable documentation, these follow. After the second quarter of 2020, my wife and I received a water bill claiming we had used (or had experienced a leak of, take your pick) a preposterous 168,000 gallons of water. I alone (not my wife) disputed this bill, and over a long exchange of correspondence with Ms. Lewis, then the Town Administrator, I did not sue the town, but basically said “prove it”, and offered to go to court to have the matter adjudicated. Subsequently, in what sounded to me like incomprehensible gibberish, she confessed the town could not prove the figure, and submitted a re-stated bill for 31,000 gallons of water for the subject quarter, and instead of the originally billed amount of $2,119.50, a bill for $451.50. I am not certain whether so-called factual claims that prove to be hot air are equivalent to lies, but suggest to Mr. Terrone, who blames others for failing to get their facts straight, that he look to his own assertions before committing them to a written record. That said, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck… it’s a duck.
Dr. Barbara Paca, OBE says
Thank you Mr. Panero for being thorough and truthful. Scott Rensberger and you represent the kind of excellence in journalism that we all need right now.
Theresa Dejter says
Thank you for an excellent article Mr. Panero explaining some of the endless problems our town of Oxford has had for quite some time now. Many egregious failures and mistakes have been made governing this town. I cannot begin to tell you how ugly, antagonistic, divisive and arrogant many of the residents have been and I have lived here 16 years now. Everyone I come across has exclaimed “ This is NOT the town I once knew. It’s never been this bad.” And once again, Terrone thinks he knows what he’s talking about, fans the flames and continues to spread lies and nonsense. Let him run for Commissioner next time around.
Mickey Terrone says
For the past decade since I moved to Oxford and until early, 2023, the town has been an idyllic place to live. Part of the evidence for that statement is the fact that the town ran so very smoothly. The town manager and staff knew their jobs and managed the town very effectively. The annual audits verified that the finances met the standards. Not perfect, but effective.
Volunteers participated in the life of the town in the Fire Department and its Auxiliary, the Community Center, the Historical Society, in town events like Oxford Day and on the town committees and boards. In fact, things ran so smoothly, few people felt the need to attend town meetings. These are not opinions. These are facts and reality.
Then came the dismissal of the police chief and the abased retribution campaign that morphed into the ugly, ongoing effort to remove the town manager and punish the 3 commissioners who participated in the removing the police chief. At this point, Norm Bell’s close victory for the open commissioner seat has demonstrated that a slim majority of our residents are confident the traditional Oxford way of town life is the best direction for this wonderful, but imperfect place.
Yet the negative drumbeat persists despite the departure of the town manager. Screaming mimis continue to howl out loud about the results of the election, about the town finances and about their ongoing grievances with the town. They have jumped on the problem with the newly hired town staff person who had an issue revealed that required his employment not to be completed. The public consternation in some quarters is unceasing, despiute the fact that all three commissioners voted to hire the person.
There is a bigger problem at this point, and that is that the image of Oxford has been dragged into an ugly abyss by some people who’ve led the charge to remove the former town manager. The melodramatic videos and articles and avalanches of Freedom of Information Act demands have turned the image of Oxford into a sh**hole where strong staff candidates would be very hesitant to go. In fact, my understanding is that several good candidates turned down their offers for interviews. Apparently they’ve seen the videos and read the frantic exaggerations by people from that ilk of Oxford society.
One such writer is infamous for charging that the former town manager was skimming money from the $30 millions in grants she brought in to Oxford to replace the water treatment system and find a new aquifer that has been providing the town with a far better quality of drinking water for nearly a decade now. This is how innuendo, rumors, lies and the mob mentality have gripped Oxford in the last 18 months.
But the height of distortion and delusion has now come from my neighbor across the street who describes living here as “I cannot begin to tell you how ugly, antagonistic, divisive and arrogant many of the residents have been and I have lived here 16 years now. Everyone I come across has exclaimed “ This is NOT the town I once knew. It’s never been this bad”.
If this woman, I’ll just call her Karen on Steroids, has been so distressed, she certainly hasn’t ever made the time to serve on any town committees, or attend many town meetings (even after the police chief’s dismissal, and for whom she was never complimentary anyway). In all my conversations with her on our street over 8 years, I can’t ever recall Karen complaining about the town manager. Her complaints have focused petty issues like the young couple who moved in behind her house and make noise sitting out in their yard at night. But I always believed Karen was likely complaining to them about us for something. Spiro Agnew referred to people like this as nattering nabobs of negativism.
This woman quickly joined the howling group that demanded the removal of the town manager in 2023, never considering that the town manager and commissioners could have been acting in the best interests of Oxford to protect the town. When I challenged her on that issue, I received a blank look and we haven’t spoken since, for which I am grateful.
I believe most Oxfordians are tired of the negativity, but when the nattering nabobs complain about the negativity in town, they ought to look in the mirror for the problem. Having dragged the image and repuation of Oxford into the ground with grossly overstated innuendo, the town will likely continue to lose the best candidates because of the toxic environment the nabobs themselves created and perpetuate on video and online.
Ron Walker says
Mr. Panero,
You mentioned, “They preferred having their controversial outgoing Town Manager, Lewis, handle the search”. This seemed to be confirmed by Lyndsey Ryan at the Town Meeting the other night, July 9th.
She said, “The background investigation was done by an online firm by the prior town manager”.
In the reply to your letter, Mr. Terrone said, “The town attorney managed the search, Mr. Panero”.
One has to wonder who did the background searh; the town manager or the town attorney?
Mickey Terrone says
One need not be an English major to comprehend that the overall job of managing a search includes doing a background investigation oneself or by hiring a firm, online or otherwise. I would also suggest that the online service firm doing this background investigation had a credible record and the selection of that firm was known beforehand by the three commissioners and by Ms. Ryan.
To claim that the former town manager independently handled the search is an out and out lie. I wonder who misinformed Mr. Panero of that falsehood? Maybe you should investigate that, Mr. Walker, rather than pick nits over who did the background check.
I wish people like Mr. Ron Walker would have been as alert to the baseless innuendo and falsehoods perpetrated against the town manager while he supported Katrina Greer’s 2023 campaign and others’ yearlong, abased accusations which, after 35 or so Freedom of Information Act demands found virtually no financial or accounting issues worthy of rebuke. The charade of establishing a Budget and Finance Committee was just as big a stinking sham because once the opportunity for committee members to walk into the office and open any files they wished was eliminated, only one person bothered to seek membership on that committee.
Maybe if people like Mr. Walker offered an honest acknowledgment that the financial management of the town has met all the accounting and financial audit requirements for Cheryl Lewis’ entire tenure as attested to by the town’s CPA firm, their false and obnoxious campaign would end and the doubt cast upon the town and its staff would justly be stifled. But that level of candor is apparently asking too much. Instead, we continue to see more finger pointing.
If people like Mr. Ron Walker simply acknowledged that the three commissioners acted thoughtfully and responsibly in early 2023 and made a courageous decision to protect the best interests of Oxford despite the unpopularity of replacing the police chief, most of these ugly divisions that separate the town’s people would never have developed.
And of course, those same residents who worked to publicize the negative accusations and innuendo will never likely acknowledge that their own dirty work (aimed at removing the town manager) has created such a negative image of Oxford that several qualified town manager applicants who wee invited, refused to interview for the job. It seems very likely to me these paople must have seen the hideous videos and ugly blog postings by our loudest nabobs before they dropped out of the running. I have to believe candidates in any national search could reasonably react similarly. This toxic atmosphere is hurting the town. I believe these people have already set back the image and reputation of Oxford.
Jan Greer says
Dylan Thomas’s poem entreats his dying father to “Rage, rage against the dying of the light”. The same entreaty might have another application as well. Take, for example the seemingly endless word salad outpourings of someone who wants desperately to be regarded as a definitive intellect and individual of genuine consequence, even though “Because their words had forked no lightening”, and their sell-by date is in the distant past, they pathetically “Rage, rage, against the dying of the light”.