Jordon Neighborhood Controversy: The "Poppycock" Email

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I've been in possession of an email since January 20th, and only more pressing matters in the Jordan Neighborhood controversy kept me from publishing it, since it contains a substantive and detailed discussion of the arcane, highly-involved issues surrounding the JACC Board election...

The email is from (New Majority Member) Dan Rother to (Old Majority Chair) E.B. Brown, and the subject line is "Poppycock!" I think the email contains a number of rough sentences which I have tried to clean up. Boldface headers not in orginal document, plus I've put in more paragraph breaks.

...

A public response from Daniel Rother to Ms. EB Brown's letter distributed by Mr. Steve Jackson at the JACC Press Conference on January 17, 2009.

Such Poppycock!

It is very disappointing that a member of JACC would be so disgruntled they would come up with such poppycock. The letter goes on about the correct method (of?) removing (a?) Board Director, the implying (implication?) (being?) that such a thing happened or was attempted. The truth is that there was no call for the removal of any board members and no board members were removed.

How it really happened:

The old executive committee, and in particular Mr. Jerry Moore, undermined the October 2008 election process to the extent that the annual elections had to be postponed. The City of Minneapolis and NRP had already advised that if the elections went forward under the questionable conditions that had been created, they would have been invalidated.

At the annual meeting in October 2008 the membership in attendance overwhelmingly voted to postpone the elections due to the circumstances described above. Following the postponement of the annual elections the old board illegally and unneccessarily extended the terms of two board members and in the absence of an election and then voted in and seated new officers.

Illegal Extension Of Terms

The illegal extension of the terms of two board members was done in violation of JACC bylaws which clearly state that board members shall serve a term of only two years. Neither one of the board members receiving an extended term was a board officer and their board tenure had ended as called for under the bylaws. If the selection of new officers had not taken place in November the board would have still held a sufficient number of directors to meet the minimum complement required under the law.

Further, the bylaws provided for new officers to be elected after the annual election so that the new board elects and seats their own officers at the first board meeting following those elections. It is that sequence of events described in the bylaws that is integral and necessary to this process. As the annual elections had not yet taken place, the elections of new board officers should not have been undertaken. Doing so was a deliberate action and had it been allowed to stand would have served to deprive any board members who would be elected in the January 2009 election their right to participate in the election of their new officers.

"Mutiny?" Hardly!

As a point of clarification, an assistant Minneapolis City Attorney has provided an opinion to NRP indicating that the election of new board officers follwing the January 2009 elections was not only a legal and proper action, but that it would have been irresponsible for the board not (to?) have done so.

It is unfortunate that some members of the board (Ben Myers and EB Brown in particular) and a small part of (the?) community have chosen to characterize this as mutiny. This is participatory democracy at the grass roots level and in a democracy majority rules. The fact that the old officers would describe and publicize this as "mutiny" is a disservice to the community they claim to serve and a distortion of the truth by a disgruntled few who failed to get their way.

After new officers wre elected on January 14, it was discovered that the old officers, like thieves in the night, came in and removed from the JACC offices at 2009 James Avenue North computers, fax/copier, financial documents, and the check book and register. This action was taken without board knowledge or approval and can only be considered outright theft.

Desperation And Malfeasance

The removal of this property has rightfully been reported to the Minneapolis Police Department as a theft. This type of vigilantism is especially troubling because we expected better from someone like Ben Myers who is a licensed attorney (at the time of this writing). Ben Myers has announced publicly that he has knowledge of the location of the property that has been reported stolen. I speculate that the level of desperation shown here is directly in proportion to the level of malfeasance that will be discovered when we retrieve the records.

Mr. Ben Myers and Ms. EB Brown have additionally failed to disclose what authority they believe they have to act outside of a board meeting and remove any JACC property from the established JACC offices.

This Is The New Agenda

JACC did hold a regularly scheduled board meeting in January and it did not adjourn until the time ran out at about 7:45 PM. There was a portion of the meeting that was closed to the public to discuss an employee's conduct, which I will not comment on in a public forum. This was on the agenda (nothing hidden here) and that agenda was adopted by the majority in a vote by the Board Members in a public meeting. It must also be recognized that part of the Executive Committee's role is to "propose" an agenda for the board but it does not become the agenda unless it is adopted by the Board of Directors, by a majority vote.

No Proper Disclosure, Documentation

As for JACC being the fiscal agent for any other organization; that action was taken without board prior knowledge or approval. To make matters worse, Board Members have not been made privy to any substantive financial information including bank statements dated between July of 2008 and today. In fact(,) Mr. Jerry Moore reported that he has sublet the office in the past to other businesses and done so without proper disclosure or documentation to the Board of Directors and also includes hired and paid employees unbeknownst to the board.

It also appears now that Mr. Ben Meyers or Mr. Jerry Moore may have told the counselors (for whom JACC may be the fiscal agent) they had to be out of the office by Friday(.) (T)his action did not come from the current officers as it is alluded to in Ms. EB Brown's letter.

What About The Youth?

It is also worth mentioning that no member from the old board has brought forward any youth programs in the past year except in secret meetings that the full board was not invited to and no recorded minutes of such meetings have been made available (to?) other board members despite multiple requests to provide minutes from those meetings.

Stop Acting Outside The Law

I sincerely hope(,) wish and encourage the old officers to bring forward any grievances they may have or to seek mediation rather than (...) continuing on this injurious path of acting outside the law and further damaging their creditability in the community. Mr. Myers(,) please return to the community the property reported as stolen from the JACC office at 2009 James Avenue North.

A Side Remark Directed At "Jane Northside" (No Relation, Thank Goodness)

On another note, Jane Northside failed to do her research in a resent (sic) article before going to print. If she had(,) she would have know(n) that every candidate went through the same process for vetting. Just sending your autobiography to the nominations committee was not good enough for any candidate to get on the ballot. All candidates had to verify their residency, or that they worked in the neighborhood, or that (they) owned property or a business here. Documentation could come from a Hennepin County property record, or a written statement from an employer or landlord(,) etc.

Unfortunately, one individual (WHO?!!!) repeatedly was sent requests for such written documentation over and over and over again in writing and in documented phone calls and failed to respond at all until the ballots were closed! This individual was given more opportunities than any other to respond and failed to do so until it was too late.

Daniel Rother 01/19/2009

ADDENDUM: Rother did submit this entire document as a "comment" to the article written by Jane Northside. But I consider my extensive blog posts about JACC to be a kind of historical record and, in any case, the Rother "Poppycock" document represents a "response" to the January 17 EB Brown Letter, so I prefer to include it on this blog.

Also, I just loved the idea of publishing a picture of "Poppycock" snack food along with this document about the JACC controversy.