BRATTLEBORO — The Selectboard won’t say whether it asked Town Manager Octavian “Yoshi” Manale to resign after only five months. But the departing leader’s contract and nearly $70,000 severance package offer several clues that is the case.
Manale, who took the job in January, abruptly submitted his resignation May 20 after weeks of public criticism over his recommendation that the municipality pull out of a contract with its nearly 60-year EMS provider, the private nonprofit Rescue Inc., with little notice or public debate.
“In a small town like Brattleboro, I have quickly discovered that the prominence of this position creates drawbacks for me to fulfill the duties of the job most efficiently,” Manale wrote in a letter. “I am not the right fit for this position.”
The Selectboard apparently agreed, according to paperwork obtained by VTDigger.
“Recognizing that the employment relationship was not working to each party’s expectations, Manale has tendered his letter of resignation and Brattleboro has accepted the letter of resignation,” the board wrote in his seven-page severance agreement.
Manale’s $120,000-a-year contract doesn’t allow him to receive such a package if he leaves of his own volition. He gets the severance deal only if he is “terminated without just cause” or “if the employee resigns following a written or oral offer to accept resignation from a majority of the governing body.”
The Selectboard has never said the word “terminate” when speaking of Manale’s departure. Instead, it voted Tuesday night to formally accept his resignation and approve his severance, which includes $60,000, representing six months of wages, 12 weeks of continuation of health coverage benefits, $3,565 in accrued time off, up to $6,000 in moving expenses and a letter of recommendation.
One last section of the severance agreement — that neither Manale nor remaining municipal officials can publicly disparage one another — could be the reason the Selectboard won’t confirm or deny whether it asked the town manager to resign.
“The board has been advised by counsel to rely on our prior public statements,” Selectboard Chair Ian Goodnow said Tuesday, “and to refrain from making further comments.”
The only past comment made by the board came last month, when Goodnow said, “I understand that Yoshi would prefer to return to work in larger municipalities and we wish him the best with his future endeavors.”
Manale called for the town to drop Rescue because he considered its annual cost of $285,600 for this coming fiscal year to be too high. But the municipality will spend almost that much when it adds up the departing town manager’s $70,000 severance package, a $75,000 transition contract with Golden Cross Ambulance of Claremont, New Hampshire, a $38,721 feasibility study of a proposed fire department takeover of EMS, and whatever fee Rescue is expected to charge for covering mutual aid calls.
The Selectboard has appointed Assistant Town Manager Patrick Moreland to be the interim municipal leader and is expected to conduct a search to fill its top administrative position in the coming months.