When we left off in part 1, Elizabeth had been presented with a dilemma. If she was to go after a seat on the board, she could not get her hands dirty by collecting signatures to have board members removed. She would have been the perfect person for that job.
In reality she did not want that petition to go forward at all. She just wanted a board position to open up for her to acquire. My position was the obvious choice.
Initially, Elizabeth thought that the petition would wither and die on the vine. She did not think that anyone would have the organizational skills to collect the signatures. Then, a chance meeting between Marie and Holly led to Holly thinking about being the one to collect the signatures.
Holly then went to Elizabeth to get her blessing. Yet again, another dilemma for Elizabeth. If she told Holly to drop it she would expose herself. So, she had no choice but to string Holly along, leading her to believe that this was a serious thing to do. Together they concocted a sales pitch for getting people to sign, stressing that, even though there were 3 names, we were only going after Anna. Holly was now off on a wild goose chase looking for patsies to sign the petition.
Remember, we cannot take this out on Holly. She is very bright, but she is also very trusting. Sometimes the brains intellectual capacity is over ridden by emotional connections.
Two days before Paul’s party planners meeting, I met with Elizabeth and Kope in my unit. I pushed to have the petition presented at that meeting, as this would put the board on notice that we were not going to take their nonsense any longer.
Elizabeth opposed this, saying that the meeting was only to review the reserve fund study and she wanted everything to go quietly and smoothly. In the end, she agreed that we would present the form the day after the meeting. I have some idea now, as to what Jesus felt like, at the last supper when he knew that he was being betrayed but would just have to sit and wait it out.
The morning of the reserve fund meeting, I spoke to Holly and she still had no clue as to what was going to happen. She said that she would give the form to either Elizabeth or me at the end of the meeting.
I skipped the first part of the meeting. I had better things to do than listen to Paul’s party planner explain how he was going to take money out of our pockets, in order for Paul to initiate expensive overruns on projects so that he could put that 3% in his own pocket.
Now this is where the fun begins. During the meeting, Paul got up and almost in tears told his story of how disrespectful I was and that he could not work with me. Now, I am not sure of how one could be accused of being disrespectful when someone is trying to steal from you, but let me think about it. Then, in the magic of the moment he threatened to quit, if I was not removed from the board.
The guy is like a broken record. I think that this is the third time that he has tried that stupid trick. You know what they say about the third time, keep your fingers crossed.
Then spontaneously Kathy Scholes, whose husband Mark, is Paul’s best friend in the building got up and asked how they could have me removed. And magically a preprinted form, containing all the names of those who would sign appeared.
At this point, I walked over to Holly and asked for the form. She appeared to have a nervous breakdown. Obviously, she had been forewarned not to give me the form.
Later that night I received an email from Elizbeth stating:
“You blew it tonight. The deal is off.” Somehow, her conspiring with Paul to have me removed from the board was my fault, and that was her reason for not presenting the form to Anna.
…….Stay tuned for part 3
Bill Siudak
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