Eastman Right to Know??

Eastman owners have NO “Right to Know” rights. That means that at an Eastman Forum meeting, an Informational meeting, a Charette, a Special Place meeting or a Committee meeting:

1)    You as an Eastman owner have no right to record the meeting

2)    You have no right to know who attended the meeting

3)     There is no transparent, accountable criteria for meeting minutes which can be independently validated

Put another way, any document purporting to be “minutes” of any of the above mentioned meetings is nothing more than a self-serving document from the Eastman governance. Based on this lack of rights, Eastman governance can tell you whatever they wish about a forum meeting, a charette or any other governance sponsored informational meeting.

The lack of Right to Know rules for Eastman governance (municipal governments are bound by Right to Know Law) means they often spin what occurs at meetings they sponsor. Documenting statements made which positively reflect on the governance’s agenda and in some cases expanding those favorable remarks, while at the same time omitting or diminishing opposing points of view do this. When governance is held to no standard of openness, transparency or validation, it provides that governance with authoritarian powers. A virtual dictatorship is created to "define the facts". This power can include all matters including financial information, with the exception of an Audited Statement. Unfortunately, audited statements are not only insufficient to define the financial matters of an entity they also can be designed in variable ways. This is why the Sarbanes-Oxley law was passed and why Eastman needs to conform to it, even though it is not required to do so.

When one's governance looks for loopholes in terms of being held accountable, in terms of being open and transparent, you can be sure this does not benefit the owners.
It benefits those who find the loopholes and exploit the loopholes: governance members who seek to minimize visibility of what they are doing. This of course, is why Eastman governance officials and VDE officials refused Phil Schaefer's request to have a truly public informational meeting in the town hall in July 2013, thereby orchestrating a Forum they totally controlled which met no public meeting criteria.

As for the Non-Public meetings that the Board holds, here is an excerpt from the Eastman Board Meeting of May 19, 2014 --Open Forum portion:

"Mr. Nintzel said he read the Board By-laws and did not see any specific references to reasons the Board could enter Executive (private) Session. He noted that public bodies have strict rules they must follow regarding non-public sessions. Mr. Ryder said Eastman is a corporation and under corporate law may go into executive session for any reason." (see http://tinyurl.com/kvxs4nw under Board Documents 2014)

The policy Mr. Ryder stated applies to “Board Workshops” as well as to other closed meetings such as those held by Mr. Goldman to eradicate the Community's former financial reports which identified by cost center, the expenses and income of the four major operating entities within the Eastman community. Mr. Goldman and his fellow allies in the closed sessions, declared Eastman an “Enterprise” and therefore integrated, from a financial reporting point of view, all of the operating entities within the community golf course, restaurant, recreation, South Cove etc.

How is this different than what a fascist group might produce and communicate to their subjects?

Submitted by Robert Logan