||| FROM CAROL ANN ANDERSON, RON CLAUS, and JIM COOK |||
The three of us, Board members of Eastsound Water Users Association, have recently called for the recall of our fellow Board members Teri Nigretto, Jim Nelson, Mike Cleveland and Leith Templin because they have repeatedly failed to fulfil their fiduciary responsibilities to EWUA Members and blocked our own efforts to do so.
It feels unsettling to ask for the recall of well-known and respected islanders who have volunteered their time and energy to serve on an important local Board of Directors involved in providing essential water services. But that is precisely where we find ourselves.
During the last six months, the three of us have tried again and again to engage with these fellow Board members through private conversations and email exchanges, and in special and regular monthly meetings — offering motions and communicating our deeply felt concerns about the Board’s egregious failures to exercise its mandated responsibilities to represent the Members’ interests. But our valid concerns have repeatedly been ignored or dismissed.
We have collectively done our due diligence and exhausted all available options to remedy the pervasive Board dysfunction. Due to the seriousness of the problems being encountered and the intractability of the dominant Board faction, we therefore feel we have no other option but to act on behalf of the EWUA Members and seek removal from office of Nigretto, Nelson, Cleveland and Templin.
These four Board members have refused to allow the Secretary/Treasurer full, unfettered access to the financial records of EWUA, preventing her and the Board from properly executing its responsibility for oversight of its financial operations. And in early 2024 they rejected the minutes she had taken of several Board meetings and had them replaced by those drafted by a staff member.
They also manipulated the 2023 election of Directors, in violation of Member rights as stipulated in the EWUA bylaws. And in January 2024, Nelson, Nigretto and Cleveland prevented new Director Jim Cook from voting until Templin could be appointed. (A legal action challenging these irregularities was recently initiated by Farm to Market LLC.)
Last year the dominant Board faction spent Member money on reimbursing the General Manager for his attorney fees and gave him a 25 percent pay raise this year. They have also failed to recover lost EWUA money as was recommended in the Acuity Forensics report of June 2023.
EWUA has consequently incurred over $100,000 in attorney fees in 2023 and is on track to spend another $50,000 or more in 2024. The dominant Board faction has repeatedly acted without full Board knowledge or authorization — and taken important actions in closed session, violating EWUA bylaws.
These four Board members have enabled all this irresponsible behavior, excused it, and covered it up.
The three of us have therefore joined forces with former EWUA Board members Fred Klein, Tenar Hall and Steve Smith, plus several other concerned Members, to protest this behavior and recall Nigretto, Nelson, Cleveland and Templin — for failure to perform their fiduciary duties, for blocking others from doing so, and for acting in bad faith.
But don’t just take our word for it. We invite you to review the extensive evidence presented at the website RecallWater.com. If you agree with our observations, please sign the recall petition found therein.
Working together, we can make a difference for the better. Let’s aim to bring about positive change in Eastsound Water Users Association. Please join us in demanding transparency and accountability from its Board of Directors.
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Could we hear the other side of this?
I will vote in favor of the recall. This fiasco has gone on far too long and wasted far too much money. What are they trying to hide?
I think the most obvious question is “How’s the water?” Is it okay, and if so, will it stay okay while this mess is cleaned up?
If CAROL ANN ANDERSON, RON CLAUS, and JIM COOK are unwilling or unable to work with the majority of the board, I suggest that they resign and let reasonable people fill their positions on the board.
Light is the best sanitary tool in dealing with folks who operate in the shadows.
i AGREE ANDERSON, CLAUS AND COOK NEED TO FIND SOME PLACE ELSE TO CAUSE TROUBLE. Teri Nigretto, Jim Nelson, Mike Cleveland and Leith Templin are long time Orcas and know what they are
The implication that, because these three Board members are in the minority that they must be wrong, and presumably replaced with three new officers who all agree with the majority is disconcertingly flawed logic. If you believe that questioning the several serious financial and other issues that have occurred under the present Manager is causing trouble, then it’s fortunate that you are not occupying a seat on their Board, unless you’re a fan of “groupthink.” I’ve attended all their meetings since the election, and they’ve been poorly managed and often descent into chaos. Last meeting, most of the EWUA staff appeared to have been present and at times shouted at the three “trouble makers.” I’ve also attended most of the OIFR meetings this year, and Brian Ehrmentraut provides a model for how a Chair should should run a meeting.
I know Teri has attended some of those as well and is getting up to speed with how to run a meeting as quickly as she can, but isn’t quite there, yet. Most toxic of all is the “us against them” mood, that seems to mirror our current national political partisan craziness. I’ve disagreed with some of what the Board and General Manager have done, and they no longer make eye contact with me and rarely call on my if my hand is up. On the other hand, the Board has gradually become more financially transparent, with much progress since refusing to divulge any details at all other than the IRS 990 returns, as they did early this year.
It’s hard to find members who have the ability and time to serve on a Board, so the quality of who might end up serving can vary. How long someone has lived on Orcas or whose family has history here has no bearing on their competence, at all. How many of those of you reading this are up to speed with Robert’s Rules for running meetings? Yes, some sort of boot camp for new Board members is needed, and the dark secrets that organizations prefer to be hidden (like large legal fees due to the manager or chief’s actions) should be clear to all of us.
Lets all take a deep breath and not jump to conclusions based on who your friends are or whatever. If you care about EWUA or OIFR, pay attention to the underlying facts, and try to obtain those that the organizations don’t want you to have, or signed NDAs about. Did someone get reimbursed for $25k in legal fees, spent in preparation for suing an organization? Why do we even hire leaders–however talented and qualified–who take legal actions, or threaten to, against organizations with such limited resources? OIFR can’t afford maintenance or to replace old vehicles, while EWUA is looking at taking out a $1 million line of credit–at over 6% interest–presumably in part due to huge legal and CPA fees, not to mention the large increases in the compensation of the General manager, that the “good” board majority apparently signed off on. Caveat emptor.
That’s like suggesting that Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor should resign from the Supreme Court because the other six “justices” are unwilling to address corruption within their own ranks. Holding a majority of the seats doesn’t mean they’re providing effective governance of the organization.
Furthermore, the paragraph which mentions the 2023 board election implies that this “majority” only exists because the board election was manipulated through an artificially delayed vote. This manipulation was apparently so egregious that a lawsuit has been filed.
You nailed it, Robert. Going along to get along, as Ken and John suggest, makes sense if everything is OK, but it ain’t.
@Bowman…And the legal costs of defending that suit being borne by the Association…costs being blamed on those acting in opposition to the Dominant Board Faction…are costs which could have avoided completely had the Board simply admitted that the election was seriously flawed and have the election re-run.
Before jumping to conclusions, readers may benefit from reading a detailed, fully-footnoted account of the goings on between the Board and the Association’s General Manager over the past several years:
https://recallwater.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/ThingsFallApart615.pdf
Pretend that you give your spouse your check book and he/she loves to shop. Then pretend you give credit cards to your ten kids with no limit on spending, including filling their cars with fuel. No receipts necessary because there are no rules. Then pretend that you have no way to tell what money has been spent and for what. Then pretend that when you try to help fix the problem everyone gets mad at you. Get the picture?
How would you propose this problem should be fixed? I would suggest you go to recallwater.com and find out.
This tops the charts for silliness. Beware of talking down to the membership please. You embarrassed yourself here. These monetary accusations have been addressed, and debunked, by people way more qualified than you or Steve Smith. To persist in making simplistic accusations over and over as though repetition will make it so is counterproductive.
Many people argue that bullying, which is Carol Anne Anderson, Jim Cook and Ron Clauds’s most current mode of navigation through the ranks of the EWUA is a natural part of society and that the only way to prevent the more serious effects of bullying is to punish those who do it and help the victims. But I believe that this is only doing something after the fact, and we should be working toward prevention of this bullying from the beginning. Once bullying has started to the point that it has been brought to the obvious attention of everyone, a cycle is in place that is hard to get out of. The bullies feel in power and sometimes also ashamed and embarrassed by their actions. . Sometimes there are others involved, spectators that keep the bullying going by laughing or joining in. And often the victims have internalized some of the messages they have gotten, and feels that no one can help them, although not the case here, ….this bullying, a major coverup attempt to compensate for the inadequate abilities by these board members ( Anderson, Claus, and Cook) and fuel for the hecklers in the crowd that encourage unrest in a board that wants to work without the unknown motives of these people as a blockade to success. Ridiculous behavior, for what endgame? What a waste if time, resources, and sensibilities.
Orcasonian readers need only access the link provided by Fred Klein above to find a thoroughly documented White Paper that details the arguments that Martha incorrectly claims have been “debunked.” If she still feels that to be true, she should present that analysis and the evidence for it, rather than just making unsupported statements.