Marshfield mayor who was removed from office for deleting records is running again

The former mayor of Marshfield who was removed from office less than a year ago by the City Council is seeking the office again.

The Council voted 8-2 to remove Bob McManus in March 2021 after an investigation found that McManus deleted public records and lied about it. Marshfield, which has a city administrator who manages staff, has been without a mayor since then.

Now McManus, a local real estate agent, is one of three candidates seeking the part-time position in the central Wisconsin city of about 19,000 people. He’ll face former City Council member Ken Bargender and hair stylist Lois TeStrake in the Feb. 15 primary.

“I was not removed for any legal wrongdoing,” McManus said. “I was removed by a group of eight people. I was not removed by the voters.”

An investigation by the Portage County Sheriff’s Department into McManus’ handling of public records did refer charges to the district attorney; the DA declined to bring criminal charges against him but wrote that McManus could be subject to fines.

The investigation exposed a battle between McManus and the city’s Fire and Police Commission over a fitness policy for police officers that was unpopular with the city’s police union. Records obtained by WPR show that just months after his election in 2018, McManus in an email to city administrator Steve Barg referred to the Commission as “hungry” for power and asked, “What is the process to get rid of the Police and Fire Commission?”

In an interview, McManus said of the email that he was “a brand-new mayor, and there were a lot of questions being asked, because I was learning.” He did not push to disband the Commission, but his relationship with it remained sour throughout his tenure, especially when he sought to replace members of the board.

In 2020, then-Commission chair Randy Gershman filed a sweeping open records request for McManus’ emails, text messages, calendar and other records. McManus took months to produce the records, and when he did, they were incomplete. Evidence showed that he’d deleted his side of some text conversations.

McManus initially blamed city IT staff for the deletions, and told an investigator that an IT staffer had had to “wipe the phone clean and do a total reboot.” The staffer told the investigator and later testified to City Council that he hadn’t reset McManus’ phone and hadn’t deleted any text messages or other records.

Barg also testified that McManus had “lied” to him about deleting records.

McManus declined to answer a direct question about whether he had deleted public records.

“There was nothing intentional,” he said. “Are mistakes made? I’ll be the first one to say I make mistakes. I do. Is anything intentional or hiding? Of course not.”

McManus’ removal in March 2021 came less than a month after Marshfield paid its former police chief $72,000 to resign amid sexual assault charges. Last month, Rick Gramza pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a sexual relationship he had with an officer who reported to him, who said he repeatedly groped her at work.

At the time, McManus was critical of the Fire and Police Commission’s handling of Gramza’s case. At his 2021 removal hearing, McManus said “it’s very clear” why Commission members wanted him removed, “and it has nothing to do with this (complaint). That’s a charade.”

“He tried to tie the two events together, and there’s absolutely no correlation between the two,” said Gershman, in his first public comments since Gramza was removed.

Gershman said members of the Commission were, like McManus, frustrated by the lengthy process required to remove the chief — but said they were following Wisconsin law by putting him on paid leave while the case played out.

McManus’ removal, Gershman said, “has got nothing to do with the Fire and Police Commission. It has to do with honesty and transparency. No one forced him to delete those records.”

McManus said if elected he would be able to mend relationships with city staff, calling Barg a “great guy” and promising to work collaboratively with city departments.

McManus’ primary opponents say he has little credibility to make those claims. TeStrake said McManus’ actions “cost us the trust of city staff and residents alike,” and said she is running to put Marshfield on a positive track. Bargender, who voted to remove McManus, said the Council found “based on evidence and testimony that McManus was no longer trustworthy and had become a liability to the city.” Bargender, who said rebuilding trust in the mayor’s office is a key reason he is running, called the relationship between McManus and city staff “irretrievably broken.”

“How can McManus effectively lead and represent the city of Marshfield after it was found that he destroyed public records, lied about it and blamed others for his mistakes?” Bargender said.