June 2017
www.issuu.com/oceanpinesprogress
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THE OCEAN PINES JOURNAL OF NEWS & COMMENTARY COVER STORY
Bosack resignation roils board; majority supports Hill continuing to serve as acting general manager Jacobs, Trendic fall short in ouster bid for second consecutive month By TOM STAUSS Publisher he sudden resignation last month of Director of Finance Mary Bosack after only a few months on the job as the successor to long-time Ocean Pines Association Controller Art Carmine has led to a serious breach among members of the Board of Directors and no definitive consensus on why she left. The vacancy created by her abrupt departure was quickly filled by John Viola, an Ocean Pines resident and chair of the Budget and Finance Advisory Committee, who had been a finalist among the applicants for Carmine’s position. He was appointed by Acting General Manager Brett Hill within a few days of Bosack’s decision to leave. By some accounts, Bosack decided to resign without the customary notice after delivering a defacto ultimatum: Either the board remove Hill as acting general manager and her immediate supervisor or she would leave her $130,000 year job as the OPA’s chief financial officer. A meeting between her, OPA President Tom Herrick and OPA Treasurer Pat Supik in which she reportedly made her case for why they should choose her over Hill resulted in his favor. Her resignation occurred a week after her meeting with Herrick and Supik. Director and OPA Vice-President Dave Stevens joined Herrick and Supik in supporting Hill remaining in his unpaid role as the acting general manager until such time as the board hires a new general manager, expected sometime this July or August. Director Doug Parks, who is running for a three-year term on the board of directors in this summer’s annual board election, also in the end backed Hill. In a special meeting called for May 23 to discuss the circumstances of Bosack’s resignation, directors Slobodan Trendic and Cheryl Jacobs defended Bosack and were in favor of removing Hill as acting general manager. Both directors had wanted to go into a closed session in April for a discussion
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of other management actions by Hill that both felt could have justified his removal as acting general manager. That effort fizzled, however, with other directors unwilling to even discuss possible grounds for removing Hill as acting general manager in a closed meeting. At the time, Hill said he wanted any such discussion to be held in an open meeting so he could defend himself against any untrue allegations. In what was an obvious protest of the board majority’s decision to Acting General retain Hill, both Jacobs and Trendic Manager Brett Hill were absent from the board’s regular meeting the following day, May 24. Neither had communicated their intentions not to attend the meeting to Herrick or any other OPA official. Trendic, the board secretary, later confirmed that his absence was his way of making it clear he was very unhappy with the majority’s decision to keep Hill in his acting role. He did not dispute a reporter’s inference that Jacobs intended to send a similar message to her colleagues and the Ocean Pines community that she was acting in solidarity with Bosack and in opposition to Hill and the board majority in support of him. Trendic said under instruction of legal counsel and agreement of the board, he could not discuss the contents of the closed meeting in which Bosack’s situation was discussed. It To Page 37
Stevens, Herrick downplay possibility that security cameras violated state law Page 30
Hill still pursuing Swim & Racquet beer and wine license
The Aquatics Advisory Committee recently voted to oppose a beer and wine license for the Swim and Racquet Club this summer, taking the position that there is no need for one given a recent board decision not to proceed with adults-only swimming on Sundays at that facility, But Acting General Manager Brett Hill may not be quite ready to abandon the idea.
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Bulk purchasing leads to chink in supply chain
One of Acting General Manager Brett Hill’s management innovations in the 2017-18 budget year, bulk purchasing, had avoided incoming chaff from critics, until his June 1 town meeting. A resident said she had recently experienced something that she never expected to encounter at a golf course, specifically the Terns Grille, the lower level restaurant venue at the Country Club designed primarily to serve golfers. “They ran out of draft beer,” she told Hill, adding that there have been other shortages as well, with the grill occasionally running out of staples like French fries or chicken patties.
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Capital improvement plan process making progress, Stevens says
Ocean Pines Association Director Dave Stevens reports incremental progress on the path of drafting a draft of a new capital improvement plan for the OPA. Stevens said that OPA Treasurer Pat Supik has been making progress in bringing up-to-date last year’s reserve study by DMA Consulting, while he has been working on coming up with a list of future projects. Once last year’s reserve study is scrubbed of outdated or already completed projects, Stevens said his to-do list can be turned over to DMA, which then can produce an updated report that will constitute a new and improved capital improvement plan.
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