Here is a well thought presented letter supporting the illegality of the so called special election. and the refusal to allow any community members to join the election committee as the charter requires.
Sent Wed 8/17/2005 9:44 PM
8-17-05 Mr. Antonovich, It pains me to have to do this, but as a candidate for the Agua Dulce Town Council, I am compelled to bring this matter to your attention, and to all others listed in the email. Last Friday, I forwarded a copy of the email below to Ms. Holland, Agua Dulce Election Committee acting Chair.
, I specifically invoked the rights under the Brown Act, ADTC Charter, and ADTC Bylaws and requested that all emails pertaining to any official matters pertaining to the ADTC and its subcommittees and Election Committee be forwarded to me without delay.
I have just been informed that Ms. Holland, acting Election Committee Chair has purposely withheld information from me, and with regards to her emails, has purposely left me off of her distribution list.
The judge that handed down the judgment in favor of her private group, which sued the Town Council for allegedly keeping secrets, withholding information and not allowing video taping, stated that the ADTC (which includes all committees that report to it) must comply with the Brown Act. Failure to due such is an overt violation, which is prosecutable and subject to fines.
I will fax a copy of this email to the officiating judge, Dzintra Janavs, so that it can be seen that Ms. Holland has openly violated what it was that they were fighting for. Open records!
Additionally, in reviewing the minutes of the Wednesday night Election Committee special meeting, which was held at Vincenzo's pizza, the only person at that particular meeting who had attended any other Election Committee meeting and remained a member of the Election Committee was Dee Holland.
Marylyn ? and Park Overall had not attended any other meeting, and Park had not even submitted her name to be on the Election Committee. That Wednesday night, both Marylyn and Park were allowed to become members of the Election Committee, yet Ms. Holland's refused to allow any other person to join the Election Committee.
This not only goes against the ADTC Charter and Bylaws, it goes against the ethical practices of all California based Election Committees. Since Marylyn and Park had no desire to become acting chair, it left only one person to become the acting chair.
Had many other people been allowed to become official members of the election committee, the make-up of the Election Committee board may have turned out to be completely different. Since Ms. Holland openly refused to allow people to become members of the Election Committee, on the night that she was coincidentally voted to be the acting Election Committee Chair,
I must lobby my protest that the Election Committee is in serious violation of the Town Council Charter, Bylaws and California Election rules and code of ethics. Finally, yesterday Ms. Holland provided to me in email format, a re-typed copy of my candidate statement. She then forwarded this re-typed statement to Lillian Smith of the Country Journal. This evening, Ms. Holland emailed Charles Brink of the Vanguard News, a copy of Jim Duzicks candidate statement and also posted it on her WEB site.
It is interesting that on her WEB site, she indicate that my statement is not yet available, which she had received over a week ago.
Coincidentally, on Lorene Cangiano's WEB site, both my statement and Ramona Hall's statements are missing. Aside from Lorene failing to fulfill her promise to keep the community informed, Ms. Holland's inability to have my statement posted on her WEB site shows extreme bias and unethical practice.
She was part of a law suit that demanded the Town Council to pony up and take the high road, yet it is very easy for her to follow the steps of the old ADTC and be quite as remiss in her duties.
In closing, I feel that it is time that the County take an official position and reign in this renegade crowd, bringing a sense of order back to our community.
A small group of people needs to be taught what respect, integrity and honesty all mean. Until this is remedied by your office, Agua Dulce will continue to run without any control.
Respectfully submitted, Mark Flath
Prior Eimail sent Friday, August 12, 2005 11:18 AM
As a candidate for the Agua Dulce Town Council I feel that I must impart my opinion regarding the emails below, and the previously received email: If I am to be CC'ed regarding any election matters, I must insist that all other candidates receive the same email.
This is not only a matter of fairness, but also a matter of ethics. From this point forward, in accordance with the ADTC Charter and Bylaws and the Brown Act,
I am requesting that all correspondences coming from or going to any ADTC representative and its associated subcommittees, election committees, etc. be forwarded to me without delay. The Bylaws state that an election committee chair be elected at the first meeting. Since Dee Holland was elected acting Chair a week and a half ago, that meeting in question must then be considered the First meeting.
When I asked if the election committee would accept new members, I was told that new members would not be accepted. This goes directly against the Agua Dulce Bylaws. Even if the meeting last week was not considered the first, the Bylaws do not state that new committee members can only join at the first meeting.
Since new members were denied the opportunity to join, I must take the position that the election committee is openly violating these laws. As such, I now place the Town Council and the Election Committee on official notice that the current election process is not valid.
As with the previous complaint filed against the Town Council, all rules must be followed and since people were openly denied the opportunity to join the election committee, this entire process goes against the ADTC Charter and Bylaws. Because the election committee openly refused to allow people to join the election committee,
I must insist that the election committee be re-formed and the whole process of the upcoming elections be restarted in fairness to the community. The Bylaws state that the Election Committee Chair must be installed by the ADTC. Since there is no quorum of the ADTC, there is no official Chair for the election Committee.
The ADTC Charter and Bylaws do not provide provisions for an Acting Chair, only a Chair, who must be installed by the Town Council. This nullifies the validity of the Election Committee. Since the election committee must be re-formed and the election process be restarted as a result of the overt violations of the ADTC Charter and Bylaws, the upcoming forum can not be held.
Since an official place of business within Agua Dulce suffered a financial loss as a result of the meeting held last week, I must insist that the persons who made the arrangements to hold the election committee be held financially accountable. Since there was no election committee Chair when the location for the meeting was made, the election committee funds can not be used. Financial restitution must come from private funds. This is an Ethics issue.
The statements that I have made above are based upon my candidacy for Agua Dulce Town Council and I openly state that if elected, any deviation from the ADTC Charter and Bylaws will not be tolerated. I will ensure that all rules and procedures will be followed without hesitation.
Any violation of the rules will result in censorship of the offending party(ies). The current state of the ADTC and its associated subcommittees and election committee is deplorable. They are all running out of control with too many people in a hurry to make decisions instead of waiting for the county to provide the town with feed back. I
t is this rush to act that has taken the entire structure into areas that can be deemed illegal and unethical.
Mark Flath