Depending on who you ask, the Indian River County Republican Executive Committee is either as strong and vibrant as ever, or it’s embroiled in so much turmoil that the organization is dangerously close to imploding.
Committee Chairman Jay Kramer, a former Vero Beach mayor and Central Beach resident, said the recent rash of high-profile resignations – and the removal of Sheriff Eric Flowers and Property Appraiser Wesley Davis for missing too many meetings – is not cause for alarm.
Nor, apparently, was the harsh rhetoric, verbal sniping and personal attacks that some of the more-established members say made them uncomfortable at the group’s past two meetings, starting with the Sept. 8 session at which Kramer presided over a vote to censure School Board Chairman Brian Barefoot for endorsing a mask mandate on school campuses.
“I go to a lot of REC meetings around the state and, compared to some of them, ours are rather mundane,” Kramer said. “I’ve been to some meetings that have gotten very heated. We’re surprisingly very humane to each other here.
“People have arguments and disagreements,” he added. “That’s nothing unusual. It’s politics. I’m used to it. It’s nothing that surprises me.”
Several traditional, old-guard committee members, however, say they were appalled by the lack of respect, nasty tone and absence of decorum they witnessed during their September and October meetings.
They were especially troubled by the shabby way many in the crowd at this month’s gathering treated longtime island resident Linda Teetz, a prominent and influential party leader who has a long history of raising big money for Republican causes.
Teetz, though, was critical of Kramer’s leadership, which incited many of the newer members – recruits from the local “Moms For Liberty” and “We The People” mob that endorsed the censure – who’ve infiltrated the committee in recent months and begun dictating policy.
On Oct. 1, Teetz, past president of the 400-member Republican Women of Indian River group, attended the committee’s closed-door board meeting and accused Kramer of conducting an “illegal vote” that resulted in the censure of Barefoot, a lifelong Republican held in the highest esteem in his John’s Island community.
She cited Kramer’s failure to give advance notice of the censure vote by placing it on the meeting’s agenda and require a show-of-hands vote instead of an aye-or-nay voice vote that provided no legitimate count.
She also questioned the purpose of trying to publicly chastise Barefoot.
She then asked Kramer to resign as chairman.
“If you don’t know the rules, you shouldn’t be our leader, so I asked him to step down,” Teetz said. “I was hoping he would back down gracefully, but when the other board members asked if he would resign, he dug in his heels and said, ‘Absolutely not.’”
His refusal prompted Teetz to address committee members at the group’s Oct. 6 meeting, where she recounted her appearance before the board and requested that they rescind the ill-advised censure.
The response was ugly.
“They brutalized her,” Indian River Shores Public Safety Director Rich Rosell said. “You don’t speak to anyone like that, particularly someone of her stature. It was unlike any REC meeting I’ve ever attended.”
Reached by phone last week, Teetz said she appreciated the support she received in the meeting’s aftermath, when word of the hostility shown to her quickly spread throughout the local Republican community.
But she said the venom and verbal attacks didn’t bother her.
“It was rude and crude, and a lot of people were shocked at how vicious everything became,” Teetz said. “I didn’t intend for all this turmoil to happen. Unfortunately, they stacked the room.
“Obviously, there a lot of people who don’t understand how the rules weren’t followed, or maybe they don’t care,” she added. “They wouldn’t even bring my motion to rescind the censure to a vote. So there’s nothing I can do.
“Right now, I’ve got a lot of enemies.”
Teetz also has a lot of Republican friends who donate a lot of money to the party, but not enough of them were at the meeting. There will be even fewer at the committee’s next meeting.
“A lot of people are resigning,” she said.
At least a dozen members have resigned since the Barefoot censure, committee sources said, and more departures were expected after the Teetz-organized Lincoln Day Dinner on Monday at Bent Pine Golf Club.
The list of those who’ve resigned includes Rosell, School Board Vice Chairman Teri Barenborg, Tax Collector candidate Brenda Bradley and the organization’s membership committee chairman, Stuart Kennedy.
Asked if she was considering submitting her resignation, Teetz replied, “Good question,” then didn’t answer it. Current Republican Women of Indian River president Pat Stelz, meanwhile, said she was “seriously thinking about” resigning this week.
“The way they spoke to Linda was an embarrassment,” Stelz said. “But we’re listening to the newest and loudest group in the room, and there are members of the old crowd who are excited by it and say, ‘These people are doing something.’
“But what are they doing?”
Kramer acknowledged that “some people have resigned,” calling it a “personal choice.”
As for Flowers and Davis being removed from the committee’s membership list, Kramer said they missed too many meetings – three unexcused absences – which is grounds for removal under Florida Statutes.
“We don’t kick anybody out, but missing meetings shows a lack of interest,” Kramer said. “We need to ensure we have a quorum or we’d never get anything done.”
Also removed from the committee this month for the same reason was Ted Pankiewicz, the local Republican Veterans Club president who has been a loyal and active member for 15 years.
Neither Flowers nor Pankiewicz responded to requests for comment, but Davis accepted his removal, saying job conflicts caused him to miss meetings and that he would apply to rejoin the committee.
“I’ve been to two meetings in 2021, and they haven’t thrown me out,” Rosell said. “But the Republican Executive Committee throws out a Republican sheriff? It’s very suspect.”
Why does any of this matter?
The Republican Party dominates our local politics, holding all but one countywide elected office. The lone exception is Democrat Mara Schiff, who won election to the School Board three years ago in a No Party Affiliation race.
The Republican Executive Committee, which is charged with getting Republican candidates elected and promoting the party’s agenda, is the umbrella organization under which all the county’s Republican clubs operate.
So, historically, the committee has had some clout.
But if more high-profile Republicans resign and are replaced by members of a more-combative, less-classy, take-no-prisoners faction – if Teetz decides her fundraising efforts would be more appreciated elsewhere – the committee’s influence could wane.
“It’s very difficult for me to say anything because of my position,” said Republican State Committeewoman Elly Manov, who sits on the local committee’s board, “but I am glad people are realizing we have some problems.”
How should the Republican Executive Committee address those problems?
Depends on who you ask.
