||| FROM MIKE PARNELL for FARM TO MARKET LLC |||
The EWUA board agreed that the 2023 ballot to elect new directors did not have the correct number of seats to be voted on. EWUA refused to correct the error and, instead, went to Court to defend that error.
The third highest vote recipient, Jim Cook, was appointed to the board but he was prevented from voting by the directors trying to protect those who did wrong and to continue their financial malfeasance. Only after that majority was established was Cook allowed to perform his duties as a director. All this occurred while they knew my lawsuit was pending where I was asking the court to order a new, correct election. We members own EWUA as a private co-op. This is a suit I brought to protect our rights as members.
Not all decisions made by the illegitimate board since the defective election have to be voided. But, EWUA refuses to come to the table and discuss alternatives. It would rather spend $60,000 in Member money and another $20,000 in the next week than to risk having a board that might look at the finances of the Association. This is the definition of malfeasance.
It cost $200 to conduct the 2022 election. It cost $2,000 to conduct the 2023 election. For the Association to say it will cost another $50,000 to conduct a corrective election is unconscionable.
Do you approve of what your representatives are doing?
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I do not approve. There appears to be a significant coverup happening. In their recent op-eds on this website, we are being told by Teri Nigretto and Dan Burke that it’s the cost of the lawsuits, not the actions that triggered the lawsuits, that people should worry about.
Meanwhile our water rates keep going up, and according to an article on Orcas Currents, so does Dan Burke’s salary.
Thank you Mike for pressing this issue. Maybe we can get you, Austin, Klein, and Riordan on the Board to set things straight. Seems to me that you four guys know more about EWUA’s history and finances than the four members who are facing a recall effort.
Seems to me that the decision by the Board to use $80k of EWUA member funds to fight this lawsuit rather than have conceded the flaws in the election process and re-run the election is just as questionable as was the previous Board’s decision to reimburse Dan Burke for his attorney’s fees, rumored to be somewhere between $15 and $25K, incurred when he threatened to sue the Board! In that instance, it simply blows me away that a GM would have the audacity to sue the Board to which he is beholden…and then for the Board to pick up the tab.
I am astonished at the poor relationships on this so-called board. I am not a member of EWUA, thank dog. But I think the entire current board should resign and new people be elected by the members; a new board that can and will support transparency. And get to the bottom of this current nonsensical he said she said. Members need to vote.
If you add the anticipated $80,000 in legal expenses on the Farm to Market lawsuit and the $71,390 spent last year for “general employment” matters, which according to a recent Burke email to Robert Austin was “due to considerable time that was spent during the last half of the year resolving an employment dispute, paying out severance/settlement to resolve the dispute, and considerable costs incurred with the forensics investigation,” the total comes to over $150,000 in legal fees and expenses during the last 18 months. That money has gone, or will go, for purposes that have no direct benefit to EWUA members. And the $80,000 is targeted mainly to keep the dominant board faction in office, for they are the ones being challenged by the lawsuit — not the three board members who have objected to such unwarranted expenditures.
This is money that could have been much better spent for-water system improvements, such as much-needed replacements of asbestos-concrete pipelines and upgrades of our water treatment plants. The current board majority is responsible for making such questionable decisions on members’ behalf.
To understand the details of the election errors, follow-up decisions and resulting legal expenditures, please read the article “Why Is the EWUA Board Defending a Botched Election?” by the Concerned Eastsound Water Users on the RecallWater.com website:
https://recallwater.com/index.php/botched-elections-riordan/
If you agree with the observations and sentiments expressed, please access and sign the recall petition and proxy forms at the link provided at the end.
Is there an update on the court case? Thank you for keeping this in front of the members. They deserve better.
Judge did not throw the suit out. The judge did not think it “frivolous”. There will be a ruling in the next two weeks.
That said .. a rough guess on what EWUA and Orcas Fire has spent on attorneys and buyouts in the past 18 months or so is easily pushing $500,000.
The common denominator in both of those boards is the treasurer for EWUA!!!