Post by Admin on Sept 13, 2016 20:55:18 GMT -7
Administrator's Note:The following open letter to Charlene Murphy and the GLA Board was released by Debbie Blais via the GLFPC email list.
Good Morning, Charlene,
I want to sincerely Thank You for your motion yesterday evening to stop all GLA Annual Assessment Discounts beginning Jan 1st 2017. I look forward to seeing the Board vote on this motion that was seconded by Kevin Newby. The discussion and vote on this was interrupted due to the power outage at Emigrant Hall last night, and I sincerely hope it is continued at the October Board meeting - or some other open forum in the meantime. It is important for landowners to know which Board members support Discounts and which do not – especially as the November elections approach and landowners will vote on their next set of Board Members.
It is clear that this area of Board discretion is out of control:
· There are no GLA policies nor procedures to guide consideration and approval of discounted Annual Assessments.
· Even Alanah Griffith’s letter of August 16, 2016, giving her opinion of granting financial hardship requests, specifies that the landowner’s contention they “cannot afford to pay the amount due” must be verified and the Board must be convinced that the landowner cannot pay. She further specifies this is a Board decision; not a decision to be independently made by the GLA Treasurer nor some other subset of the GLA Board members.
· One landowner has received a continuous 11 year 50% discount of her Annual Assessments without proper documentation, and most recently without approval nor oversight by the GLA Board.
o Those familiar with GLA finances have said that discount was discontinued by GLA President Alyssa Allen in 2014.
o Early in 2016 this discount was retroactively re-instated for 2 years ($210 per year for a total of $420) by GLA Treasurer Rudy Parker in apparent communication with Board Member Dan Kehoe. It is unclear whether President Charlotte Mizzi was involved in that decision. Communication Committee Board members Charlene Murphy and Dennis Riley said they did not participate in the decision.
o The information on exactly which GLA Board Members were involved in making the decision to re-instate this Discount in 2016 has been purposely withheld for months – even internally from other Board members. That was made clear during the Board Meeting, when Kevin Newby had to publicly request this information of the GLA Treasurer, when multiple internal emails of his own to the Board and to the Treasurer had gone unanswered.
o Treasurer Rudy Parker stated there were “no irregularities” in the 2016 decision to re-instate this Discount made by himself and Dan Kehoe. He also stated that this landowner continues to receive a discount on her Park County property taxes – and that seemed to be the basis of any verification of current financial need. The fact that (what were then) her minor children 11 years ago are now grown and able to contribute to the support of their own property “held in trust for the children” was not mentioned.
· Chris Williams outstanding landowner request of July 17, 2016 (2 months ago) for any GLA records/documentation regarding this Discount remains unanswered by the GLA Board, despite mention last night that there was documentation of a GLA Board motion in 2009 regarding this Discount. The landowners were not apprised on whether the GLA Board voted to approve the Discount at that time – or not. Nor are they aware of what time period that motion applied to.
As it appears that the GLA Board as a whole, to date, has NOT verified individual landowner inability to pay and NOT voted to grant any landowner Discounts this year, that any such Discounts that were independently granted by the GLA Treasurer should be immediately revoked. Even in the absence of any GLA policies and procedure regarding Discounts of Annual Assessments, the conditions and procedures specified by Alanah Griffith have not been followed by the GLA Board of Directors on behalf of the GLA membership.
In regards to this, I’m re-surfacing my attached Complaint submitted July 28, 2016, that GLA Treasurer, Rudy Parker, acted independently, without GLA Board oversight nor concurrence (a vote) to grant a landowner discount. He has further stated in GLA Finance Committee meetings that he has discretion in making GLA Annual Assessments and in collecting Past Due amounts.
Debbie Blais, SG 39-D
