Cary mayor says ousted town manager broke trust: 'Could have been a disaster'

CARY, N.C. (WTVD) -- The ABC11 I-Team sat down with Cary Mayor Harold Weinbrecht for the first time since Town Manager Sean Stegall resigned after open records requests found financial mismanagement, including thousands spent on a councilmember's tuition, and a land deal for more than $1 million spent without council approval.

"It takes years to build trust, and it takes a second to destroy it," Weinbrecht told ABC11.

The mayor said he understands Cary needs to rebuild trust. It's trust that he said was broken by Stegall, who served as town manager for nine years, and who the mayor thought was doing a good job until financial records came to light as part of open records requests last month.

"I was made aware of things in early November, things he did and things he said, which was devastating, because one, I thought he was my friend. And two, not only was he withholding information, he was making decisions that he shouldn't have made. He was working with a subset of council members when he should have been working with the whole council," Weinbrecht said.

ALSO SEE | State auditor looking into questionable spending in Cary after town manager shakeup

Among other things, there was a pattern of what the mayor said was a toxic environment and unchecked spending. Councilmember Lori Bush gained approval under Stegall's watch for the town to pay nearly $40,000 toward a master's program, money she said she later paid back.

There was also a land deal worth more than $1 million near Cary Elementary School, where Stegall and the town approved the deal without council approval, even after the town recommended against it. The mayor said the town still owns that land but hasn't decided what to do with it.

"Why did the town go ahead and purchase that and not bring it up to the council? Because that's a council decision in my mind," Weinbrecht said. "You're kind of skirting your authority when you break it up into two parcels that total over the amount that your discretionary spending allows, and that should never have happened."

He said one of the biggest things that needs to change is the million-dollar discretionary spending limit for the town manager, which meant that Stegall, as town manager, could approve anything below that amount without the council signing off on it.

Weinbrecht said he believes Stegall got around that number by splitting the land deal into two purchases.

He said that much unchecked money is one of the first things Cary plans to change. That limit is already much higher than in most similar-sized cities.

"I don't know how it got that high. I don't know when it got that high. I don't know what it was before it got that high. But we're going to find out," the mayor said. "And I'm pretty confident that council will want to lower that amount because that is definitely too much money."

He also wants greater transparency. He said live-streaming every meeting will help, and so will the new interim town manager, Russ Overton, whom the mayor said he believes can help turn things around.

"I think it's important to know that even though this was very bad, it could have been a disaster, and that was avoided because we have one of the best staffs in the state, if not the nation. They carried us through this," Weinbrecht said. "We're going to make adjustments, and Cary is going to be stronger when we come out the other end."