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OPINION
Ocean Pines PROGRESS August 2018
The education (or re-education) of John Bailey
I
t’s been almost a year that John Bailey has been in Ocean Pines as the Ocean Pines Associations’ general manager. It’s been a rocky learning curve, with some indications that he’s had some difficulty in syncing his preferences and modus operandi with the OPA membership. There was that $60 increase in the lot assessment that he proposed early in January that suggested that he might have been out of touch with the community. There was one stinging rebuke by OPA President Doug Parks when Bailey delivered a costly recommendation in the 11th hour for a Beach Club sprinkler system that Parks, and others, felt should have been provided much earlier. The project was rebid and the OPA saved a bundle in the process. More recently, he’s been promoting a renovation of the Country Club second floor in which latest cost estimates are more than double what the project could have been done for last summer. It’s not necessarily entirely his fault, but it happened on his watch, and that means he can’t escape responsibility for it. He’s abandoned the concept plan more or less endorsed by a previous board for renovating the Administration Building to provide more space for the police department. That concept called for reducing the area used by administrative departments in the existing building footprint. Instead, he is proposing extending the building out by 40 feet. The cost needless to say is greater if the expansion is implemented as opposed to keeping the existing footprint, knocking down walls and moving departments around. He’s come up with a seemingly inflated cost estimate for future road replacement -- $400,000 per mile -that he uses to argue for more funding for the roads reserve. One OPA director, Slobodan Trendic, says he believes the cost per mile is roughly 25 percent of Bailey’s estimate, or $100 per mile. The difference isn’t chump change, as over the next 40 years Ocean Pines’ 80 miles of roads will probably need resurfacing to one degree or another. To what extent is anyone’s guess. At $400,000 per mile, the OPA would need more than $32 million
career coasting to retirement in 15 years. An excursion through the curious cul-de-sacs A noteworthy positive sign is An excursion through theby-ways curious and by-ways and cul-de-sacs of Worcester County’s County’s most densely community. Bailey’s encouraging inclination to of Worcester mostpopulated densely populated community. support a bulkhead “waterfront difBy TOM STAUSS/ By TOM Publisher STAUSS/Publisher ferential” holiday next year for ownto replace its roads. At $100,000 per On the issue of geese removal, ers of most bulkheaded property in mile, the cost would be $8 million, Bailey has announced a non-lethal Ocean Pines. In a recent meeting of the Buda sum less than what the OPA over program of using collies as a way get and Finance Advisory Committime should be realizing from local to deter geese from gaining a new tee, Bailey said the flush condition casino impact funds at the current foothold in Ocean Pines in numbers of the bulkhead reserve could argue annual rate of funding, roughly that become unsustainable. for that holiday, or perhaps a multi$350,000 per year. That’s a step in the right direcyear partial holiday. Then there was the decision, tion, though by no means sufficient. To consolidate the advantage that much reviled in certain precincts in It has to be sustained and it has to might accrue to him if he adopts a Ocean Pines, to remove about 250 work. If it doesn’t, it needs to be supdifferential holiday as a policy recgeese from the South and North plemented with other methods tried ommendation, Bailey needs to be Gate ponds, with no notice to the in other communities with similar less tentative in his embrace of it. board of directors or Ocean Pines problems with geese. Be for it, for all the right reasons. before it was done. On the bulkhead staging area isHe should let property owners Some of the complaints directed sue, he has recommended that Hiknow he appreciates the unfairness at Bailey for the lack of disclosure Tide vacate the Swim and Racquet of a reserve fund that has collected beforehand, as well as for the forced Club site immediately, perhaps to almost four times what is reasonremoval and killing of geese, were West Ocean City. ably needed and can be spent in pointed and personal. Residents spoke and Bailey Ocean Pines for bulkhead replaceAnd, finally, the bulkhead re- heard. ment in any given year. placement staging area removed The downside of that proposChannel some populist rhetoric to from the Swim and Racquet Club al is that apparently transporting justify the holiday. campus two years after an outcry equipment and materials from West In the age of Trump, a little bomfrom the neighborhood reappeared Ocean City on a daily basis would bast might go a long way. not long ago. cost the OPA $25,000 more for bulkBob Thompson was divested of Bailey and the board got an ear- head replacement under way in his office in the Admin building two ful on that one at the July 27 board Wood Duck Isle. years ago for a record in some ways meeting. Suffice it to say that the He ran the $25,000 up the proless fraught than Bailey’s so far. reappearance was not supposed to verbial flagpole at the July 27 board The situation is salvageable, but happen. meeting. No one saluted. Bailey needs to exhibit more eviIf Bailey had accumulated such a In a year where there’s $1 mildence that he’s in sync with the folks record after, say, six years on the job lion budgeted for bulkhead replacewho pay his salary and benefits. in Ocean Pines, the pressure for his ment, that $25,000 cost would soar ouster would be palpable. to $150,000, a 15 percent premium Because he’s still a relative new- over what the OPA might otherwise bie at less than a year on the job, be paying. the impulse among many so far has Directors are resisting, hoping to been to cut him some slack and al- find a replacement site somewhere The Ocean Pines Progress, a journal of low him more time to grow into the in Ocean Pines, perhaps on a barge news and commentary, is published position. or barges just off the county’s wastemonthly throughout the year. It is cirThat could change. With new di- water treatment plant north of culated in Ocean Pines, Berlin, Ocean rectors coming on board this month Route 90. City, and Captain’s Cove, Va. who were not involved with hiring Bailey should have thought of him, it’s anyone’s guess how Bailey’s that one himself. 127 Nottingham Lane record so far will be assessed by the Still, the fact that Bailey was Ocean Pines, MD 21811 new board. quick to realize the political perils He’s coming up to the anniversa- of retaining Swim and Racquet as PUBLISHER/EDITOR ry date of his arrival in Ocean Pines, a staging area suggests that he is Tom Stauss with an automatic $10,000 bonus learning valuable lessons. tstauss1@mchsi.com due him if he is re-upped. So was his quick response to a 443-359-7527 He would be well advised not to property owner’s suggestion that accept the money, or to donate it he check out the use of dog patrols Advertising Sales back to some worthy cause in Ocean as a way of controlling Ocean Pines’ Frank Bottone Pines as an alternative. geese population. 410-430-3660 On a somewhat positive note, What he really needs to undersome of Bailey’s recent maneuvers stand is that solutions that resort CONTRIBUTING WRITER suggest that he is learning from to sharply higher spending levels Rota Knott some of the process missteps of re- over what might otherwise occur is InkwellMedia@comcast.net cent vintage. not the way to ensure a comfortable 443-880-1348
LIFE IN THE LIFE INPINES THE PINES