Teitelbaum Demoted by School District

BRADENTON – Manatee County School District Superintendent Cynthia Saunders demoted Mitchell Teitelbaum after determining that he had rescinded his previously issued resignation in a dishonest manner. The attorney will remain employed by the district but will no longer have assistant superintendent status. He was also issued a letter of reprimand that will be entered into his employee record.

Teitelbaum had tendered his resignation to the district after accepting Manatee County Administrator Scott Hopes' offer to be one of his deputy county administrators in November. However, on Nov. 29–the day Teitelbaum was confirmed by the BOCC and brought into the administration building to meet his subordinates–an incident occurred for which a young woman filed a sexual harassment complaint, alleging that Teitelbaum had made uninvited and unwanted physical contact with her.

The employee attempted to make a complaint with the county's HR department on two occasions but to no avail, having been told that the proper form could not be located. On Dec. 13, the employee's supervisor, public records manager Debbie Scaccianoce, was said to have assisted the employee in accessing the form, and a formal complaint was filed. The same day, Teitelbaum contacted Saunders and asked that his pending resignation be "tabled," without mentioning the complaint.

Also on Dec. 13, Scaccianoce was escorted from the building and placed on administrative leave, while the employee who made the complaint was transferred out of the administration building to another county facility in what appeared to be retaliatory actions. On Dec. 14, TBT emailed Hopes to request comment on the status of the complaint against Teitelbaum. TBT did not receive a response, however, both Scaccianoce and the employee who had filed the complaint returned to their roles at the administrative building the very next morning, while the school board, unaware of the complaint at that time, voted to allow Teitelbaum's resignation to be tabled.

When the district learned of the events, Teitelbaum–who had previously been put on leave by the district in 2020 over similar complaints for which he was given a "memorandum of conference" and made to take sensitivity/sexual harassment in the workplace training–was put on administrative leave once again.

"At the time of your request to rescind your resignation from the district, you did not disclose all pertinent details regarding this allegation to me or the School Board as a factor for declining the position with Manatee County government," wrote Saunders in her letter of reprimand.

Saunders said this led her to doubt Teitelbaum's ability to return to his old post where he would have oversight over district departments and their employees and that, going forward, he would solely function as general counsel.