Guest Opinion | From a concerned Eastsound Water user

||| FROM FRED KLEIN |||

I’ve heard a rumor floating around Orcas Island that the current “recall” effort at Eastsound Water is being orchestrated by a disgruntled former Board member, Steve Smith…a rumor which claims he intends to turn EWUA into a private company which he would own and manage. This is just not true. Nor does he have any intention of leading a group of investors to buy EWUA now or in the future…another false and malicious rumor.  Steve may be difficult to work with but he is certainly not “evil incarnate” as one of his detractors has described him to me. 

Steve and Tenar Hall, a former Secretary/Treasurer of EWUA, were the whistleblowers on a Board which was protecting a General Manager who had written checks to himself totalling in excess of $10,000…money above and beyond the generous salary to which he was entitled…a GM who has not given to two Board Treasurers sufficient access to financial records essential for them to meet their responsibilities, regardless of what he may claim in public meetings. 

Our current effort to recall the dominant board faction is the result of research and investigation by a group of Concerned Eastsound Water Users in collaboration with the remaining Board members.  Our names are listed on the recallwater.com website (see: Who We Are); the list includes Smith and Hall. Because the tasks of setting up a recall effort are expensive and time consuming, we have used the website set up for the previous recall effort (which was suspended immediately after the Board election) in 2023.

I strongly urge members to read our group’s meticulously footnoted “Things Fall Apart” White Paper which details the evidence of financial mis-management of our member-owned Association before deciding whether or not to support the recall of the Dominant Board Faction.

EWUA MEMBERS: If you believe as I do that the evidence demands that the Dominant Board Faction be recalled please sign the petition and proxy,  the necessary first step for a recall to be accomplished.

Like many of you, I first heard about the assertions of impropriety at the Eastsound Water Users Association when the “recall water” website was announced in The Orcasonian and The Islands Sounder back in August, 2023. Again, perhaps like many of you, I was skeptical of the assertions being made regarding the actions of the Board as I knew most of the players and regarded them both as friends and men of integrity who had served the community well in various capacities over the years. I’ve also been an EWUA  member and served on its Board back in the teens.

It was my reading of “AN OPEN LETTER TO EWUA MEMBERS” by Tenar Hall, the then recently resigned Secretary/Treasurer of EWUA, that really caught my attention. Published in late August, 2023, I sent it on to a number of Eastsound Water members with a suggestion that “reading this is worth your time”…and I invite readers to do the same.

After sitting down and discussing with Michael Riordan and Robert Austin, we decided to interview Tenar and found her to be quite credible; we also set up a meeting with EWUA’s General Manager, Dan Burke, and I had long conversations with (then) Board members Clyde Duke, Scott Lancaster, as well as an impromptu meet-up with Joe Cohen. The net effect of these interactions resulted in Michael, Robert and I posting a Guest Opinion on The Orcasonian dated October 9th, 2023 and entitled, “An open letter on EWUA management”.

In that Orcasonian article, we reference a report by Acuity Forensics commissioned by the Board to look into Treasurer Hall’s allegations. The report…certainly worth a read… largely validated Hall’s concerns and was sharply critical of the Board’s lack of oversight of the GM’s handling of EWUA’s finances. While it was adopted unanimously by the Board, the implementation of the report’s recommendations, contrary to the Board’s claims, has not been complete.

My initial conclusion was that the Board suffered from “good-old-boy” syndrome. After touting the need for gender balance while looking for a couple of “no nonsense, financially-savvy women”, I recruited Teri Nigretto to run for a seat on the board. Some time later after she became Board President, Teri let me know that she considered the allegations of financial impropriety to be “settled business” and she was looking forward, not backward.

The flawed 2023 election which split the Board into two factions, also triggered a member’s lawsuit. Rather than re-run the election to correct the flaws, the dominant Board faction followed some questionable legal advice and has spent (thus far) $60,000 of membership funds to fight the lawsuit simply to maintain power and control over the seven-member EWUA Board. This act in itself demonstrates that the Board has failed to meet its fiduciary responsibilities to the membership. If you believe as I do that the evidence demands that the Dominant Board Faction be recalled please sign the petition and proxy,  the necessary first step for a recall to be accomplished.