And I want to take some time here to welcome Alan, Jeanne, and Reg to the CA Board of Directors. The position comes with a lot of background information that is not discussed much. In addition to getting acquainted with the rules of Parliamentary Procedure, newly elected members of the CA Board also have a steep learning curve with respect to the Maryland Homeowners Association Act, the American Bar Association Model Legislation for Non-Profit Boards, and the IRS Regulations on 501c(4) corporations. These three waypoints constitute the triangle in which CA must operate, and in some cases, they seem to contradict.
So with all this new information in their hands, I find it wise to give new board members the benefit of the doubt for their first few meetings. Even the best of the best would feel a bit overwhelmed, and mis-steps can be expected. However, the thread that unites these three new faces on the CA board of Directors is transparency. All three based their candidacies on opening up the CA Board and providing residents more input into the decision making process.
That being said, Thursday night’s agenda docket presented four back-to-back meetings (PDF) (here, here, here and here). The serial meetings served two purposes: The first was to transition the elected Columbia Council Representatives to the CA Board of Directors. The second was to address Reg Avery and the ethics conflict.
Prior to the meeting(s), there had been talk that Reg could ask for a waiver from the Ethics Policy and be appointed to the Board of Directors. There is also indication that the Oakland Mills Improvement Village Association Board had sent emails of support with regard to Reg. That seemed to set up an adult conversation about the case of Reg Avery and his waiver petition.
Full disclosure, I attended the meeting last Thursday, but arrived about a half-hour late. As I took my seat, it was clear that the process was fully underway. Reg was at the table and interim CA President Susan Krabbe was presiding over the meeting, indicating a board Chairperson had not yet been selected, and a vigorous discussion was at hand. One thing immediately clear was that a majority of the gathered audience was supportive of Reg Avery, and they weren’t going to let decorum or civility stand in the way. “WE CAN’T HEAR YOU.” “THAT’S NOT RIGHT.” “YOU CAN’T DO THAT” “LET HIM SPEAK.” The catcalls were continuously interjected. Quite honestly, a room full of third-graders hopped up on Pixie Stix and Fun Dip are better behaved than the collection of sextigenarians (+) assembled.
Amid the cacophony, the elected CA representatives were considering a motion put forth by Alan Klein (HC). The motion was to amend the Columbia Association Code of Ethics and Conflicts of Interest Policy by removing the following:
A member of the Board upon declaring a candidacy for election to public office shall resign from the Board.
Alan Klein spoke to his motion, and (paraphrasing here) stated, “This is not about Reg Avery. I have met him, but I do not know him as a person. This is not about him, this is about the policy.” This was a particularly interesting statement in that Reg was sitting next to Alan, less than an arm’s length away. Physical proximity aside, Alan’s approach was intriguing. The ethics policy was not on the agenda. The appointment of Reg Avery was on the agenda. Alan’s words bring up another interesting point. If he did in fact believe that the policy was overly restrictive, it would be informative to understand when he came to this conclusion.
The policy has been in place since 2007. Alan has become a public activist before the policy was enacted (and that is a good thing, people that are involved are precious), but I cannot either recall or find any time in which Alan has stated that the Columbia Association ethics policy was too onerous (my words) with regard to running for public office. Alan has written many letters to the editor in our local paper. He has written on topics as large as the Columbia Downtown Plan, and as small as his thoughts on attendance at local festivals. I can’t find anything on restrictive ethics policies in his letters. Moreover, in the last few weeks Alan put out a lot of material explaining why he would be a great Columbia Council Representative and CA Board Member. I can’t find any language in the materials sent my way in which Alan takes a position on the ethics policy. Now, it may be that some of his campaign material spoke to the ethics policy and the need to reduce restrictions on CA Board members, but I am not aware of this material. However, I would love to see that material. If anything, Alan is gifted with his words, and I would be interested in seeing how he phrased his position.
After Alan spoke about the ethics policy, the Town Center representative spoke and said she agreed with Alan. I would think that her agreement with Alan indicates that she too has opposed the political office language in the ethics policy before the election of Reg Avery by Oakland Mills. Here too it would be helpful to find out when Jeanne thought the CA ethics policy was a problem and needed to be changed. I have not seen any campaign literature from Jeanne, but did she highlight the ethics policy as an issue? An issue so important that it had to be changed even before a board chair was elected?
The motion was then voted, and by my count, Alan Klein (HC), Jeanne Ketley (TC), Russ Swatek (LR), and Nancy McCord (WL) voted to strike the language from the ethics policy. Those four votes were not enough for the motion to pass.
Immediately after the motion failed, Russ Swatek (LR) put forth a motion to change the ethics policy such that a CA Board member would have to resign from the CA board after being elected to a public office. It was at this point that the meeting completely departed from the established agenda. As Alan had stated earlier, this wasn’t about Reg Avery and the Oakland Mills election. This was about rolling back policy. Another round of discussion ensued, and compromise held sway. The policy would be changed, and the only thing left to discuss was the degree. Elected members emphatically stated that there was no known conflict of interest that could arise. No evidence was presented to back up these assertions. In the end, the final motion stated (once again, trying to get the language as precise as I could write down), “Upon swearing in of a partisan public office, a CA Board member must resign.” This wording apparently gives an opening to a CA Board member to run for the HoCo Board of Education and remain on both boards simultaneously. I was thinking that because the Columbia Association provides before and after school care services to about 3000 families, this might be a huge conflict of interest, but I suppose those voting for the policy change did not find it an issue.
Immediately prior to the vote, Tom O’Connor (DS), participating via phone, made a plea for tabling the vote. He implored his other elected members to wait “to allow legal to look at the wording, to allow people to think about it more,” because “when we craft policy like this, we usually get it wrong.” Responding to Tom’s statement, Alan Klein (HC) stated, “this is not a problem, if we find that we don’t like what we did, we can always go back and change it.” One of the members in the audience on Thursday was local architect Cy Paumier. He was seated in the back of the room, and I could not see his face, but I would think that Cy would rather that Alan did not refer to CA’s decision-making process in that way. The motion was put to a vote and passed 8-2. The meeting was in recess shortly thereafter, and because of other commitments, I had to leave.
It has been a few days since the new CA Board’s first meeting, and I have struggled with what happened. The lack of public notice is a huge issue. In addition, the fact that it was the ethics policy that was changed, was troubling. This is a major policy. Given the amount of money residents pay to the Columbia Association, they want to provide input on things like how CA Board members conduct themselves, and they don’t want the CA Board mired in conflicts of interest. The fact that no one knew prior to the meeting that this was up for consideration raises doubts. The CA Board has changed the rules, and did not invite the public to have their concerns heard. Plainly said, they got this one wrong. Halfway through the meeting, I had hope that it was a process to allow new members to be heard, but when it became apparent that this policy was going to be changed, no matter what, my hopes were dashed. Please let your CA Board members know that this is not the way that business should be conducted and that future changes to major policy must be done with public notice and public input.
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