By Sandra Forsey | Sun City West
I attended the Sun City West recall meeting, on Tuesday, Oct. 10, and I left with feelings of hopelessness and despair for what I believe Sun City West stands to lose with the escalation of this recall.
It is extremely divisive to our community. I feel we are each fortunate to live in a community such as Sun City West and have so many ways in which we can support and give back. In addition to the beautiful facilities and many recreation opportunities. This recall is going to have great repercussions as to any individuals that care to give their time and energy in serving in the many volunteer positions in this community.
I believe this recall is personal and vindictive with a motive to have as Jolene Piaskowski said, “Lisa Vines will then be the new president since she as vice president and will appoint someone.”
Regardless of the outcome of this recall, I strongly believe we need a rule put in place that those active in a recall effort cannot be appointed as a replacement board member. This is a huge conflict! When a person stands back and looks at the dynamics, one can see the orchestration of these events being to supply the necessary board members that will be willing to vote to remove Bill Schwind. I see and feel the anger that each Jolene Piaskowski and Lou Mancuso and Dennis Hanzel have. They were very good at highlighting hot buttons within the community, however only snippets and fractions were provided with each of their points.
Jolene was the driver and the filer of the recall for Lou Mancuso. Fast forward to present day and the two of them announced their regrets for doing this with, I was wrong and shouldn’t have filed it, coupled with the “excuse” of it is Bill Schwind’s fault I lost my temper that cannot be controlled because I grew up in New Jersey and I am an Italian. They have now rallied together using Lou’s old website to build a platform of a recall of three board members and the removal of Bill Schwind. Is there a concern once we pay another $7,000 for a recall that at some point, we will turn to each other and say sorry I shouldn’t have done that?
Jolene painted the picture that Jack Leary acted on his own to rewrite the associations RR&Ps and insinuated that Kasey Huata should have been the one doing this. When the truth of the matter is this was done and is still being worked on by nine members of the Charter Club Committee with Jack Leary as the chairperson.
To become a Charter Club Committee member, residents can apply by completing an application and are selected by the Chartered Club chairperson. Part of their duties, as found in board documents policies C-03 1.3.3, are “annually the charter club committee is supposed to review the RRPs and make recommendation to the board for changes.” After this process is complete it is reviewed by the general manager and recreation manager and then submitted to the board for approval.
To point a finger at Jack and discount the hours of work that our Charter Club Committee has done is rather incorrect. I believe it is difficult to come up with travesties strong enough for the cause of a recall on each of the three board members — Jack Leary, Tim Hurley, and Dick Rhoades — nonetheless the recall committee needs these individuals “gone” so that the remaining board members as planned can stack the deck with board members who would vote in favor of removing Bill Schwind.
Village Store concerns: I personally think the PORA location for the village store is excellent and it is run by a person who understands retail and knows how to set out displays and provide warm friendly hellos.
Another point made by the recall group is that Tim Hurley and Bill Schwind golf together. Do you know that corporations pay big dollars to build cohesion between GMs and board members in creating opportunities for their being able to get together and know each other on a personal basis? I really do not understand why this point is constantly brought up and needled at the various meetings.
The claim Dick Rhoades is responsible for the lowered investment gains is ludicrous. Didn’t we each lose money? How could anyone have anticipated the effects of COVID and what has gone on in our world the last couple of years. Are we highlighting the years of gain we have had in the investment account? In addition, Sun City West hires Cap Trust as their financial advisers and this is their expertise and what they are trained in.
I am a volunteer and currently give back to Sun City West as a president for one club, vice president for another in addition to other ways. After this meeting ended, my thoughts were of the bitter vindictiveness of personalities with personal agendas and part truths coupled with their desires to get even and be put in power. It made me think I would never want to be a board member if board members can be targeted and taken to task for such menial things in an attempt and purpose to stack the board with individuals to vote to remove Bill Schwind.
We need to stand for our democratic process and board members need to be elected by the public and since they are elected, we need to support them as our representatives and not turn ourselves into vigilantes with power hungry ideals and a desire to take over.
