Note: When messages "include" correspondence that preceeds it in this file, It is not included again with that message unless it was quoted for detailed replies or is required for the intent of the message. There are references to messages "below" that were correct when that particular message was sent, but to arrange this correspondence for reading, in some cases a reference to "below" really means "you've already read this".
 
 

Darrell-

We are planning a special board meeting for February 5th at 7PM. Hope to see you there.

Doug

Doug,

What happened with the counting of the protest letters? I had an appointment to help count the letters last Thursday, but it was changed to Monday [today] and again it was canceled. I called Mike this morning to find out what he wanted to do and was told he was off on Mondays.

Mary

Jay - If you need help counting protest letters I would be willing to assist you in any way you would like.

Walt Boatwright

Walt,

Thank you very much for your offer. As Doug Cater mentioned in his email, a special Board meeting is scheduled for Monday, February 5, 2001 at 7 PM. I hope that we will agree on the procedure for reviewing the protests at that time. Please attend the meeting?

Jay

Jay - I will be at the Feb 5 meeting and available should you need to use my time. Also, thanks for the VERY QUICK response to my inquiry re budget data.

Walt

Doug,

Many of our constituents submitted protests against the proposed rate increase. Their objections must be heard.

Likewise, our constituents who did not sign protests must also be heard. They are the ones who support our proposal, or perhaps "don't care". They expressed their opinions by not submitting protests. We must also honor their positions.

As a Board member, I will represent my constituents by personally reviewing each protest. I will read every one that has been submitted.

As I want to be able to assure ALL of our constituents that the protests were accurately and fairly reviewed, I propose the following procedure for the consideration of the Board.

First, I propose that a committee of two Board members be appointed by you as Board President. I offer to serve on that committee, and I suggest that the other member be Director Wickham. If you wish, I will accept the responsibility to chair the committee and prepare reports for the Board.

Here's the procedure I suggest be followed:

1. Sequentially number the protest forms, under observation of the protest gatherers who identified themselves at the January 22 hearing; i.e. (in the order they addressed the hearing) Darryl Nelson, Paul Harbert, and Mary Harris. They would be invited to stamp, initial, or otherwise mark each numbered protest so as to be able to show due diligence in maintaining the integrity of the protests as submitted.
2. With the observers, certify the total number of protest forms identified and numbered for validation.
3. Sort the protest forms to match a sorted list of ratepayer accounts.
4. Match the protests with the account information.
5. Prepare a summary of valid (and invalid, if any) protests for the Board. Identify unresolved protests (if any), take appropriate action on any unresolved protests and summarize such action for the Board.

Any part of this procedure not completed at the Board meeting would be done at a committee meeting, noticed in compliance with Brown act provisions. I would envision assistance from the general public at the committee meeting. If the complete review cannot be completed on the day of the first meeting, the Committee meeting would be adjourned to a specific time future rather than closing the meeting. In this way the participating public will be appropriately advised when the interrupted process will continue.

I've bounced this proposal off of Mike; he sees no problems with what I've proposed.

Don't hesitate to call me on the phone to discuss this!  I just put it all down to make it easier to discuss, and I'm very much open to ideas from you.

Jay

PS.. My original take was that we could avoid the step of numbering and certifying the protests.More thought causes me to conclude that each piece of paper should be numbered and identified as it is removed from the container. It is an extra step, but it will help to avoid criticism when and if we visit this issue again. I have a sequential numbering stamp we can use that I will bring to the Board meeting Monday night.

Mary-
We are going to have a special meeting on February 5th.  At this meeting the board will determine who and how the protest letters will be counted.  Along with that the board will also decide on a date that the protest letters will be counted.

Mike took a day of vacation on Monday, normally he is in on Monday's.

I am sorry to hear that you had an appointment to count the letters and it was cancelled.  I was not aware that anyone scheduled a date as to when the counting would take place.   I will keep you informed of when and where they will be counted.

Doug Cater

Jay-

Sounds flawless.  My only concern is that Mary, Darrell, and Paul be notified prior to the February 5th meeting that upon board approval we intend on doing some counting and sorting.  I have sent e-mail to Mary indicating that we would be discussing the counting of the letters, not the actual counting or numbering at that time.

I could let Mary, Darrell and Paul know that there may be board action that night to start the counting/numbering that very night.  I just do not want them to think that we surprised them with the count, leaving them unprepared.

What do you think?

Doug

Doug,

You are right on. I envision that "they" would mark the protests in some way, and I would suggest a rubber stamp that is only accessible to one of them. They certainly can't do that without forewarning.

Let's chat about this on the phone?  I tried to call you, but your phone is busy (no doubt you are on line) and your cel phone goes directly to voice mail. I'll keep trying, but please call me if you get this first.

Jay

Mike, Jerry, Mel, and Robert-

I have asked Jay Obrien to chair a sub committee to count the protest letters.  This should save the district staff time. Jay will bring a proposal to the board meeting on February 5th. We can modify, change or add to it at that time.

Thanks Doug

Darrell, Paul, Mary:

As I suggested in the message copied below for your information, RLECWD Board President Doug Cater has asked me to chair an ad hoc committee to review the protests you have gathered plus the others mailed or turned in to the RLECWD office. I will chair the committee, and we need your assistance.

Director Jerry Wickham has agreed to serve with me on the committee. Walt Boatright has also agreed to serve on the committee, and of course you are invited to observe our committee in action, as are all members of the public. I'm sending copies of this email to Jerry and Walt so that they are totally aware of all correspondence related to this matter.

Here's what we will do Monday night at the Board meeting, and your participation is requested:

Jerry and I will sequentially number each protest as we remove it from the container. We will hand it to you, and request you to mark each protest for identification (I suggest you agree on a unique rubber stamp you will bring, but that's up to you!). We also ask that you verify each protest carries a serial number incremented from the previous protest.

When all protests are numbered and marked, we will agree on the total number of protests we have logged and we will certify that number.

Jerry and I will set a date and time for a committee meeting, at which the protests will be sorted and compared to District account records. A report will then be prepared for the Board, as outlined in the message copied below.

Can I count on your help?

I'm looking forward to seeing you Monday evening at 7 PM.

Jay

Count me in, but no recounts. Not sure what you mean by a special rubber stamp. Please provide for us. I won't complain about the cost. I hope that there is time for other issues on Monday. My damn phone is ringing off the hook and I have all kinds of items that need your attention. Some may be made up rumors but we are going to have to check them all out. As a clarification, I too, did not have to get past 100% to get a signature and no one besides a board member told me know. Over 100 myself. I get the same reports from the other collectors. Yea, there may be a wildcatter out there off on a tangent but I think it was a good canvas.

See ya,   Darrell

Darrell,

I would like you folks to mark the protests in a way that is unique, just so we can all report to our constituents (yes, you have them too) that we are sure that the protests weren't added to or subtracted from after they are initially counted. Certainly initialling them would also work. What is important to me is that you mark them in some manner that you can identify later as your mark. That's why I suggested a rubber stamp, because you probably have something that isn't available to anyone else. It should be a mark of some kind that you folks develop, and to be effective it can't be something provided by the District.

Jay

Doug,

Thank you for the appointment as ad hoc Committee Chair to review and report back to the Board on the protests submitted on or before January 22, 2001.

Jerry Wickham has agreed to serve on the committee with me as the other Board member. Walt Boatright has volunteered to serve, from the public, and he has accepted my appointment to the committee.

As you know, I've sent email to Darrell Nelson, Paul Harbert and Mary Harris and received a response from Darrell. Copies of that correspondence are included below, for the record.

Beyond the procedure outlined in my message of January 30 at 1:18 PM (included below), I plan to prepare a report to the Board that will include the following detail:

• Number of matches with RLECWD accounts
• Number of multiple protests, if any, from individual accounts
• Number of protests, if any, from addresses not served by RLECWD
• Number of unresolved protests, if any

It is my intent to minimize the need for staff assistance in the review process; it is my intent to only call upon staff for assistance if the number of matches is not conclusively above or below 50% (plus 1)of the RLECWD accounts.

Of course this is subject to modification, change or addition, as mentioned in your email to the Board on January 30.

Jay

Jay - This written confirmation is for the record - that I will be at the meeting, 7 PM, Feb 5 to assist you, however you need, relevant to protest letter volume determination.

Walt Boatwright

Walt,

Much appreciated. See you Monday!

Jay

Jay, why wasn't this put on the list? Please post on the Rio Linda list

Mary,

As you request.

Jay

[the message above dated Tue, 30 Jan 2001 20:50:02 PST was copied here]
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Doug, When and where did you appoint the ad hoc counting committee?

Mary
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Hi Jay,

I read in one of your emails on the community bulletin board that you may think that rate payers who did not submit a protest either support the proposed rate incease or simply don't care.

I am not sure I agree with that. I think many did not submit a protest who really do care, but due to busy lives and schedules may simply not have taken the time to submit a protest.

Just my opinion. I plan on being at the board meeting Monday night for a bit.

see you then.

armand.

Hi Doug, I'm glad that there will be a committee appointed and a date set to count the letters of protest at the meeting Monday, Feb. 5 at 7pm. Can I get an agenda for that meeting?

I would like to suggest that the Water Board appoint Mary or Paul to the committee to represent the protesters interest in the counting.

I assume the date will be made public so that anyone who wants to may come and observe.

Thanks,
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Doug -  I'm confused now.  Maybe because I was flipping back and forth between addresses trying to stop sending in HTML but......

There was a message from you to Mary on the 30th (I think) saying you would appoint a committee and set a date to count the letters.

Then there was a message from Mary with messages from Jay and you to her saying the committee has already been appointed and Jay is Chair and Mary is only invited to "observe" and the letters are going to be counted at the meeting Monday night???

Please advise - is the committee already appointed???  Is it to be appointed Monday night????  When and where will the letters be counted???

Where can I get an agenda for the meeting Monday??

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Mary and Charlea -

On January 30th at approximately 7PM I appointed Jay O'Brien as chair to a protest counting committee.

On February 5th at 7PM the Water Board will be having a special meeting to give the committee direction on counting of the protest letters.  At that time I will be appointing three (3) other people to the protest counting committee. Two (2) from the public and one (1) other member of our board. Jay has informed me that Jerry Wickham is interested, I would also like to see if any other board members are interested.  By appointing Jay as chair, it will give him time to prepare a proposal of how the protest letters will be counted. The committee should have the protests counted in time for our discussion of the rate increase at the regularly scheduled Board meeting.

Mike usually posts the agenda for the meetings on the Water District's web site.  I have spoken with Mike and it will be posted tomorrow. The District will mail you a copy of the agenda for all of their meetings if you request it in writing.  Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I too have a full plate.

Doug Cater
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Doug,

I don't believe you are able to appoint a chair or a committee outside of a meeting.  The your board must be present or at least a quorum and the meeting would need to be properly noticed.

I think you should maybe check with your parliamentarian but I don't believe what you are doing is legal.

Just my opinion.

The best that you can do at this point is to appoint Jay at the meeting Monday night and the rest of the committee if you so desire but you cannot have to letters counted Monday night because you haven't yet appointed the committee nor have you set the date, time and place where the counting will take place.  I'm assuming that the chair will poll the committee at some point to see when they can meet and will notify the public when they intend to meet.

Also, the remainder of your Board doesn't know what you are doing or at least they shouldn't know because if they do then you are going to run into the Brown Act.  So I hope the rest of the Board doesn't know and that you and Jay haven't discussed this with any of the other board members.

You could have done it at the meeting on January 22 but you didn't.

Who has had possession of the letters since the meeting on the 22nd???

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Hi Doug,

Of course I have no problem with you appointing more folks to my ad hoc committee. However, as I have already appointed Walt Boatwright to the committee, I would appreciate you affirming that appointment. He's prepared to do his part.

Jay

Charlea,

For your information, the Ralph M. Brown Act is on line at the following url:

ftp://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/code/gov/54001-55000/54950-54962

I appreciate you expressing your concern for me running afoul of the law. I certainly do not want to violate the Brown Act or any other statute. Perhaps you could enlighten me as to the exact section you are using as the basis for your statement about the legality of my mentioning my committee appointment to other members of the Board?

Thanks,

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay, I didn't say that you  were running afoul of the Brown Act - I said Doug was and he is.  He cannot discuss nor make appointments regarding board business outside a meeting.  He also cannot go to one member at a time with board business.  Sorry if you thought I was directing this to you.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea,

Thanks for the clarification. I must have misunderstood you. Having said that, would you please cite the Brown Act section(s) that you are applying to Doug?

Thanks,

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

At tonight's Rio Linda Elverta Community Water District Board meeting, 2455 protest statements were received by the ad hoc committee appointed by Board President Doug Cater to validate and count the rate increase protest letters.

The committee sequentially numbered the statements and marked them for identification. Sorting and validation will begin at the next committee meeting which will convene at 1 PM on Wednesday, February 7, 2000 at the Water District office. The public is invited to attend and observe.

The committee members are Walt Boatright, Joe Gluvers, Paul Harbert, Mary Harris, Jerry Wickham and Jay O'Brien (Chair).

328 protests were received directly by the Water District; 2127 were received at the January 22, 2001 Public meeting.

Thanks to Lou Bryson, Charlea Moore, Doug Nelson, Bill Shepherd and others who assisted the Committee with the numbering and marking of the protests.

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

To: Committee Members
Cc: GM, Board President, General Counsel

Thanks for a job well done last night. Now we know how many pieces of paper are in our validation process.  Here's how it will work next:

FIRST SORT
The protests will be sorted into nine stacks, based on the first digit of the house number. Once we have these 9 stacks, we will see that about 33% of the accounts have the first digit 6, about 20% have the first digit 1 and about 20% have the first digit 7.

SECOND SORT
We will then sort the 6's into four stacks based on the second digit of the house number, and we will sort the 1's and 7's each into two stacks. Those stacks are as follows:

10 to  11
12 to  19
60 to  63
64 and 65
66 to  68
69
70 to  72
73 to  79

ALPHAMERIC SORT DESCRIPTION
The 14 printouts that include the house numbers are sorted in what is called an alphameric sort. That means the sort is first on the leftmost (or "first") digit, then on the second digit, and so on. The number of digits in the number isn't considered. This isn't the way we learned to count in school!  Here's a couple of real examples, just so you won't be suprised:

8547 ELWYN AVE
864 OAK LANE
8721 ELWYN AVE
88 RINETTI WAY
8815 ELWYN AVE

7671 EL MODENA
77 RINETTI WAY
7700 ELMONT AVE
7700 MARINDELL

THIRD SORT
We will then put the 14 stacks in alphameric order.

PRINTOUTS AND CONFIDENTAILITY
For each of the 14 stacks, I have prepared a set of printouts that list the RLECWD accounts in alphameric order. You will note that the first and last pages of the printouts have numbers lined out that are outside of the count of the stack. The numbers that are lined out in one stack are not lined out in the next (or previous) stack.

Each printout has the following information for each account:

Service Account ID ("house number" and street name)
Account number (an 8 digit number)
Name (to whom the bill is sent)
Address 1 and 2 (where the bill is sent)

COMPARE PROCESS START
Using the printouts, we will compare each protest to the printout. The following procedure will be followed for each of the 14 stacks.

1. MATCH
When a protest matches the address and name, the protest number that we stamped on it will be written on the printout to the left of the address. The protest will then be placed face down in a stack called "MATCHES".

2. DUPLICATE
When there are two or more protests for the same address, one will be selected as a "match" and entered into the printout as above. The duplicate(s) will be noted on the printout (to the left of the address) with the letter "D" for one duplicate, "D 2" for two duplicates, etc. The protests will be marked with the letter "D" and placed face down in a stack called "DUPS".

3. NO ADDRESS
When a protest has an address that is not on the printout, it will be placed face down in a stack called "NA" (No address).

4. PROBLEMS
When a protest matches the address but may be invalid for other reasons, such as an obviously different name, a letter "P" will be written on the printout to the left of the address, and the protest will be placed face down in a stack called "PROBS".

DISCLAIMER
This process, of course, is subject to modification as we progress; it's impossible to predict what we will find when we really get into it.

See you all Wednesday at 1 PM!

Jay

Correspondence related to the ad hoc committee has been posted at http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html for your information. Please bookmark this url and check it from time to time.

I just posted a message sent to committee members with more description of the validation process we will follow starting Wednesday.

As many of the mailing list members may not be interested in this level of detail, I opted to place it on the web rather than fill your mailboxes.

Future correspondence will be copied to the web page, which will be retired when the ad hoc committee completes its task.

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

The agenda for the Wednesday afternoon Protest Counting Committee is posted at: http://www.geocities.com/riolindawater/Board/01agenda/10206C.html
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

The ad hoc Committee to validate the water rate increase protests met today at 1 PM. we worked until just after 7 PM and adjourned our meeting to reconvene tomorrow (Thursday, February 8) at 10 AM at the RLECWD office. The public is invited to observe our process.

The first and second sorts went great; we broke the protests down into 14 reasonably sized chunks, sorted by house number. But as predicted correctly by Paul Harbert, we mere humans were not able to sort numbers alphamerically, as does a computer. At least we didn't waste too much time learning what task we were incapable of performing, and after regrouping, we successfully completed the initial reviews of 10 of the 14 stacks.

1321 of the 2455 protests have been compared to the RLECWD customer list; that represents 54% of the 2455 protests filed before the deadline.

Here's the count so far:

  1109 valid protests logged
   108 duplicate protests (from the same account)
    51 "invalid addresses" (many not RLECWD ratepayers)
    53 problems to be resolved (with RLECWD staff assistance)
  ----
  1321 total protests reviewed

Your Committee is Walt Boatright, Joe Gluvers, Paul Harbert, Mary Harris, Jerry Wickham and Jay O'Brien.

If necessary, after tomorrow's session, the Committee will reconvene at 10 AM Friday and 10 AM Saturday.

Jay O'Brien
see http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html for previous correspondence.
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

The ad hoc Committee to validate the water rate increase protests met today from 10 AM to 1 PM. The committee decided to reconvene at 8 AM Saturday rather than on Friday. The public is invited to observe our process.

Even though today's results seem to show little progress from yesterday, we are nearing the end of the comparison with the RLECWD customer list. Eleven of the 14 stacks of protests have been completed, and the results from the remaining three stacks are nearly ready to be added to the totals.

Here's the count so far:

  1293 valid protests logged
   135 duplicate protests (from the same account)
    70 "invalid addresses" (many not RLECWD ratepayers)
    61 problems to be resolved (with RLECWD staff assistance)
  ----
  1559 total protests reviewed (out of 2455 total)

Jay O'Brien
see http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html for previous correspondence.
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay does that include the one's that Jerry and I were working on?
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Mary,

The three remaining stacks are the three presently being reviewed by you, by Jerry Wickham, and by Walt Boatwright (Paul Harbert and Joe Gluvers were unable to participate yesterday). Those three uncompleted stacks are the stacks which include accounts with street numbers in the ranges 10xx-11xx, 66xx-68xx, and 70xx-72xx.

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

The ad hoc Committee to validate the water rate increase protests met today from 8 AM to 10:30 AM. The next step is for RLECWD staff to attempt to identify protests with addresses and names that are not on the printouts the Committee was provided. The committee will meet on Thursday, February 15 at 3 PM in the RLECWD Board room to review the results. The public is invited to attend.

We completed the comparison of protest letters with the current account printouts. When we were through counting, our total was 13 short of the original count; even though everyone had reviewed the 14 protests which are unconditionally bad, I didn't recognize at the time that those were the ones missing from the total.

Here's today's count:

  2017 valid protests logged
   218 duplicate protests (from the same account)
    76 "invalid addresses" (many are not RLECWD ratepayers)
   133 "problems" to be resolved (with RLECWD staff assistance)
    14 invalid
  ----
  2458 total protests reviewed

Note that there were originally 2455 protests; some have been discovered to count for two service addresses.

The 76 "invalid addresses" plus the 133 "problems" comprise the 209 protests that District staff will be requested to review. As Monday is a holiday, the first staff opportunity for review will be on Tuesday.

There were 4235 water services as of January 22, 2001.

Jay O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

To: Ad hoc committee
Cc: Doug Cater, RLECWD President
Cc: Mike Phelan, RLECWD General Manager

Hi folks,

After reviewing my notes, there are some minor changes appropriate to the results posted to the mailing list Saturday. I won't post these on the list, as they are very minor. However, I want you to know about these corrections.

These corrections are as a result of the recounts that you performed Saturday, that I have now included in the overall records. I also re-verified the number of "to-be-resolved" protests ("invalid address" plus "problems").

Corrections:
============
There aren't 2017 valid protests logged; there are really 2019.
There aren't 218 duplicates (invalid); there are really 217.
There aren't 209 to be resolved (by staff); there are really 207.
There aren't 2458 protests reviewed; there are really 2457.

Details to date:
================
  House  Ad hoc   Valid    Dups  To be
  no's   member   protsts        resolved
  -----  ------   -------  ----  --------
  10-11  Jerry      190     27      28
  10-11  Joe        180     13       8
  20-29  Joe        122     19      10
  30-39  Mary/Jry    88      7       8
  40-49  Paul        76      4       3
  50-59  Mary/Jry   121     13      14
  60-63  Jay        187     18      20
  64-65  Paul       127     22      11
  66-68  Mary       251     22      30
  69     Walt        74      7       7
  70     Walt        88      8      10
  71     Walt        92     15       6
  72     Joe        103     11       4
  73-79  Walt       170     22      22
  80-89  Jerry/Mry   88      3      23
  90-99  Paul        62      6       3
                   ----    ---     ---
SUBTOTALS          2019    217     207  >> 2443
Invalid protests                             14
                                           ----
TOTAL PROTESTS REVIEWED                    2457

I'll get the 207 "to be resolved" protests to staff on Tuesday for resolution. I plan to give staff addresses to resolve first, as those are easier for them to work with than names. As we agreed Saturday, I'll be in touch with Walt and solicit his review before I pass anything along to staff. Hopefully we can do that Monday so that staff can begin work early Tuesday.

See you all Thursday at 3 PM to review the results for the 207 protests to be resolved. I appreciate your consideration of my Thursday schedule! My other meetings should be over on this Thursday by 2 PM.

Jay

Jay, Count me in also on reviewing the 217 problem protest letters. I will be available to review them after 1pm  Monday. My phone number is ##### please call this evening to set this up.

Thanks
Mary

Mary,

There aren't 217 to review. The 217 are the duplicates, not the ones that we haven't resolved. There are 207 unresolved protests. Perhaps my message wasn't clear, but that's the situation.

When I am able to find a time convenient for Walt tomorrow, I'll let you know.

Jay

Jay

Jay, for Pete sakes the number of unresolved protest letters is not the issue here. 207, 217 who cares? I am asking to review or be a part of reviewing the unresolved letters prior to giving them to the staff.

Mary

Mary,

I care, as every protest is important to me. There's a difference of 10 between 207 and 217, and I am dedicated to assure that every one is appropriately reviewed in a way that will stand the scrutiny of anyone who would question the accuracy or honesty of our committee.

Just so that everyone understands, there won't be any counting or any validation tomorrow; it will just be a review of the instructions to be given to staff so that they will understand what is expected of them as they compare the protests to the District records at the behest of our ad hoc committee. Validation of the results provided by staff will wait for our ad hoc committee to formally reconvene at 3 PM Thursday.

Jay

Hi Mary,

I just heard from Walt, and we will meet at 5 PM Monday to review what instructions will be given to staff to have them research protests for us. I called you on the phone, as you instructed, and your recorder answered my call. I also left a message on your recorder.

See you at the RLECWD office at 5 PM Monday!

Please keep in mind that this is not a formal committee meeting. This is only an opportunity for you to assist me in preparing the instructions for staff, not an opportunity to perform any validation of the petitions.

Of course, you may review any of the material if you wish.

Jay

Thanks for posting the latest numbers Jay.  I have some concerns which I spoke to you about at the committee meeting on Saturday.  You had indicated that the "209 Problem Protest" letters would be resolved by District Staff.  It is my understanding some of the committee members wanted to be present when staff was resolving these protest letters but you objected.  It is also my understanding that a committee vote was 4 to 2 in favor of the District Staff resolving these letters WITHOUT the presence of any committee members or public. Those voting to have no committee members or public present were Jay O'Brien, Jerry Wickham, Walt Boatwrite and Joe Gluvers. Those opposed to having no committee or public present were Mary Harris and Paul Harbert.  If this is not the case please correct me.

I just wanted to be sure that the community understands that 209 letters of protest will NOT resolved by the committee appointed to resolve the protest count.  This is significant because the count, as done by the committee, is 83 short of the majority the Water District has indicated they required to not impose the 100% rate hike.

The meeting on Thursday will be pretty useless since there will be no way for the committee members to verify the validity of the count as given to them by staff.

Thanks again Jay for working so hard on the count.  And please tell Jan thanks for the delicious cookies

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay

I was under the impression that the committee was to verify all of the protest documents.

How can the committee verify the "209 Problem Protests" if the Staff is doing the checking without community committee members present?

Erwin
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Erwin,

Overall Jay and Jerry is doing a good job and Iam sure they are wanting to be fair. Jay is a little ridged at times when I request something but I will try not to take it personal. Walt and I are meeting with Jay this evening at 5pm at the district office. I can understand Jay's concern with thinking we would be in the way of the staff while they are working, so I will request something this evening and I will let you know how it comes out.

Saturday while I was checking over a list of protest letters Jay had worked on and competed during the Wednesday meeting. I decided to write down four people's names that were in his stack of problem letters. I wanted to check for myself to see if the name and address's from that list were valid names and addresses. It just seemed alarming to see so many letters being classified as problems. This morning I  took a drive around Rio Linda and Elverta to talk with the people to see if they were Rio Linda water customers. I found three of the four at home and all were on the service and grateful that I was looking out for their interest. They said the name on their bill was the same name I had. One man gave me his phone number so I could let him know if his vote was counted.

I also have a problem with the amount of duplicates being recorded. According to my files I had under a 100 duplicates logged in with the majority of protest letters I had in my possession until they were turned in at orchard school. I ask Mrs. Bender at the water district office how many duplicates they received and she told me it was surprising that they had received only 4.

Mary
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea Moore <cgamail@juno.com> wrote:

Thanks for posting the latest numbers Jay.  I have some concerns which I spoke to you about at the committee meeting on Saturday.  You had indicated that the "209 Problem Protest" letters would be resolved by District Staff.  It is my understanding some of the committee members wanted to be present when staff was resolving these protest letters but you objected.  It is also my understanding that a committee vote was 4 to 2 in favor of the District Staff resolving these letters WITHOUT the presence of any committee members or public.  Those voting to have no committee members or public present were Jay O'Brien, Jerry Wickham, Walt Boatwrite and Joe Gluvers.  Those opposed to having no committee or public present were Mary Harris and Paul Harbert.  If this is not the case please correct me.

I cannot commit staff time, and as a Board member I won't stand still for anyone, including me, watching over staff's shoulders as they do their job(except their supervisor, of course). I don't have any problem watching our General Manager (or his designee) do lookups, but in my opinion it is wrong to put that kind of pressure on the non-management staff.

I just wanted to be sure that the community understands that 209 letters of protest will NOT resolved by the committee appointed to resolve the protest count.  This is significant because the count, as done by the committee, is 83 short of the majority the Water District has indicated they required to not impose the 100% rate hike.

The meeting on Thursday will be pretty useless since there will be no way for the committee members to verify the validity of the count as given to them by staff.

Thanks again Jay for working so hard on the count.  And please tell Jan thanks for the delicious cookies

/snip/

Another message will document Walt's and Mary's review tonight of what I will give to District staff tomorrow.

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay I was at the meeting held last week when the committe members were picked.I am sure that you stated that all the committe members and any one from the public was welcome to watch the count. Why not the ones that are protested. Please explain.

Mary Nelson
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Mary,
I don't understand your question. Please elucidate and place in context.
Thanks,
Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Sorry for the length of this report, but as the ad hoc committee to count the protests cannot reach consensus on some issues, this report is written to identify those issues and to document the status of the counting process.

I met tonight with Walt Boatwright and Mary Harris to review the work I will give to RLECWD staff tomorrow. We met at 5 PM, and finished after 6:30 PM. I thought it would be a short meeting only to review the instructions for staff; Mary, however, wished to review many protests and the account printouts.

In preparing the protest package for staff to review, I put the 207 outstanding protests in order. At that time I found there were multiple protests for the same address; thus alerted, I checked the 207 protests against the account printouts. I found 7 apparently valid protests, 36 duplicates, and one unsigned protest. This left 105 protests with addresses that do not show up on the account printouts, and 58 with names that do not match the printouts. It was my intent to have staff verify only the 105 address and 58 name issues. Mary and Walt decided that the 36 duplicates should also go to staff for review.

For the record, even though each protest has been uniquely serial numbered and identified for possible later audit, Mary expressed her displeasure that I had personally sorted them for staff without her observing me sort the protests.

Mary expressed her desire to re-review all protests identified as "duplicates", as she feels that the protesting party may have written a wrong address in error, and therefore, in her opinion, the protest should be corrected and counted as valid.

Our committee is not chartered to "correct" protests; any protests the committee cannot agree upon will be returned to the Board of Directors for Board action.

Mary's position is that the unsigned protest should be accepted. This will be referred to the Board of Directors for action. As it is also an address that is not on the account printouts, staff will be asked to review the address.

Mary has requested copies be prepared for her of all petitions not found to be valid. For customer privacy reasons, I declined to provide copies. This request will be referred to the Board of Directors for Board action.

All 207 outstanding protests will be available for scrutiny when the committee reconvenes, including statements from staff detailing staff findings; also, District management will be available at that time to do any database lookups at the committee's behest. For the record, Mary does not agree with the committee's 4 to 2 decision to not have committee members observe the staff doing computer lookups.

Here's my corrected count to date:

  2019 valid protests logged by committee
   217 duplicates logged as invalid by committee
    14 invalid: unresolvable addresses or names
   105 addresses to be resolved by staff
    58 names to be resolved by staff
    36 duplicates to be reviewed by staff
     1 unsigned protest, address to be reviewed by staff
     7 valid protests to be logged by committee
  ----
  2457 Total protests reviewed by committee
       (Original count was 2455; 2 were found to cover two accounts)

Jay O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea -

For the record - Yes, I oppose anyone other than the District employees reviewing the '209 problem' protest letters and this is why.

1.  ALL of the 209 problem letters will be subject to review by myself and the others of the Committee who so wish, at 3 PM on thursday at the District office. Each individual letter is to have had remarks written on it by the District staff indicating reasons for either validating the letter of invalidating it.  The District staff will have the 13th, 14th, and until 3PM on the 15th to review each individual 'problem', write their remarks and/or decision on each letter,  and have the General Manager present the letters to the Committee Chairman for the review of the Committee.

2.  Jay promised me that all of the letters invalidated will be subject to thorough investigation by the Committee until each Committee member is satisfied with the investigation results.

3.. I assure you that, as a member of the Committee, I will not accept any unproved resolution of any 'problem'  protest letter.  I told Jay that I MUST be convinced of the reliability of any comments on rejected protest letters.

4.  Because the Committee has the opportunity to review staff notes at 3 PM thursday I believe that District staff will do their best to be accurate and complete, knowing that their reasoning will be examined under a magnifying glass .

In summary, I make it a point to trust all of those whom I come upon until such time as I have cause to not trust and, so far, I trust Mike, Jay, the District staff, and members of the Committee.  Let us work together, in harmony,  to determine the best way for us to go forward  having the most efficient Water District for the least expenditure.

Walt Boatwright
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay - this is most interesting since I just spoke with Mary Harris on the phone and she claims that she saw your car outside the Water District about 3 or 3:30 and then it was still there about 4 or 4:30 and so she stopped to see what was going on.  She found you alone in the building with all the protest letters out in front of you.  There was no one else present from the committee, the public or staff.  According to Mary this is when you "found the discrepancies" you list below.

The obvious concern by all of us is WHY were you there alone with the letters????

Why didn't you let the public know that you were meeting with Walt Boatwright tonight at 5pm?????

There were no staff present for the public to offend with their observations.

Lastly, it isn't your decision whether or not to allow the public to observe ALL the procedures including the verification of the so called "Problem Letters".  You were instructed to count and verify the votes. You were not given permission to exclude the public from any meetings.

The fact that you are the only one with a key to the box containing the letters and apparently you also have complete access to the building means that you have now betrayed the publics trust by going in there and handling the letters alone and on top of that coming up with new numbers to which there are NO witnesses.

Mary said Walt was never there.  Was he or not Jay.  Your letter below implies that he was.  If Mary hadn't stopped to see what was going on - how much more would the count have changed.

And BTW everyone, Jay still has the keys and access to the letters and he has now demonstrated that he has no problem going there alone to handle the letters.

This is wrong.  Sorry Jay.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

from Jay 2-12-01
Mary expressed her desire to re-review all protests identified as "duplicates", as she feels that the protesting party may have written a wrong address in error, and therefore, in her opinion, the protest should be corrected and counted as valid.

Jay I have told you from day one that I wanted to be at every meeting. Then we get this note below [Sunday] from you saying that you will be in touch with Walt and solicit his review before passing anything to staff.

____________________________________________________
from Jay 2-11-01
I'll get the 207 "to be resolved" protests to staff on Tuesday for resolution. I plan to give staff addresses to resolve first, as those are easier for them to work with than names. As we agreed Saturday, I'll be in touch with Walt and solicit his review before I pass anything along to staff. Hopefully we can do that Monday so that staff can begin work early Tuesday.

____________________________________________________
from Jay 2-12-01
Mary has requested copies be prepared for her of all petitions not found to be valid. For customer privacy reasons, I declined to provide copies. This request will be referred to the Board of Directors for Board action.

Jay why has this become a question of "privacy" when all I am asking for are copies of letters that have already been made public by those signing them. I'm not asking for information that hasn't been made public and there is absolutely no reason to refuse my request for copies. Who gave you the authority to refuse a committee member any information when requested.

I am disillusioned with being on this committee....Before this whole counting process started, Jay takes it on himself to ask our Board President Doug Cater to appoint him as chair. Then he ask Jerry and Walt to serve on that committee with him. He then sends me a message telling me to come and watch the committee in action. It was only when Charlea pointed out, that appointing a committee had to take place in a public meeting and at that meeting with the urging of the public, I was ask to be on the protest counting committee. I am not here to bicker back in forth with any committee member but I will not stand still and be just an observer . I now find Jay is going to the district office by himself and going through the protest letters without other committee members present.

Mary
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Rio Linda Elverta Mailing list:

I really should not reply to this, as it is patently disrespectful, misinformed and argumentative. However, I cannot allow these allegations and accusations to go unanswered.

The Rio Linda/Elverta Community Water District is under no obligation to do anything with the protests. I volunteered to involve the public, and the Board assigned me the task I proposed. Everything anyone on the committee, including me, has done to sort or analyze the protests is known, public, and subject to verification, recount and review.

The protest letters were individually and uniquely identified at the February 5 Special Board meeting so that any counts could be verified by audit if necessary. All committee members have been "alone" with at least a part of the protests; others present were deeply involved in their specific task and would not notice another member adding to or subtracting from the protests. That is exactly why the protests are marked as they are, to guarantee their security and with the intent to remove all of the committee members from suspicion of fraudulent action.

My responses to Charlea's accusations are included below.

Jay O'Brien

Charlea Moore <cgamail@juno.com> wrote:

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [RL] Protest letters: RLECWD: Update
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2001 22:20:36 -0800
From: cgamail@juno.com
To: riolinda@vrx.net

Jay - this is most interesting since I just spoke with Mary Harris on the phone and she claims that she saw your car outside the Water District about 3 or 3:30 and then it was still there about 4 or 4:30 and so she stopped to see what was going on.  She found you alone in the building with all the protest letters out in front of you.  There was no one else present from the committee, the public or staff.  According to Mary this is when you "found the discrepancies" you list below.

I am sure that Mary shared the corrected numbers with you that I sent to her Sunday, that I prepared after reviewing my notes from our Saturday meeting. The "discrepancies", as you call them, were included in my Sunday email to Mary and the committee and were "found" by the committee doing recounts of the protests on Saturday, not found by me on Monday as you allege.

The obvious concern by all of us is WHY were you there alone with the letters????

Why didn't you let the public know that you were meeting with Walt Boatwright tonight at 5pm?????

I'm sure that Mary quoted to you from my email to her and the committee that I sent sent Sunday evening that concluded with this paragraph:

"Just so that everyone understands, there won't be any counting or any validation tomorrow; it will just be a review of the instructions to be given to staff so that they will understand what is expected of them as they compare the protests to the District records at the behest of our ad hoc committee. Validation of the results provided by staff will wait for our ad hoc committee to formally reconvene at 3 PM Thursday."

There were no staff present for the public to offend with their observations.

Lastly, it isn't your decision whether or not to allow the public to observe ALL the procedures including the verification of the so called "Problem Letters". You were instructed to count and verify the votes.You were not given permission to exclude the public from any meetings.

The Monday get-together was intended to be only a few minutes for Walt to review the wording of the package to go to staff. As it turned out, Mary and Walt modified what I prepared somewhat and added to what I proposed to send to staff. That part took only a very few minutes.

Mary brought in her own detailed master list of the protests from her car and used it to check the protests and the committees work, with help from Walt and me. We finished the reviews Mary wanted about 6:30 PM. I felt the extra time was time well spent as it seemed to assist Mary. It is my impression that her review of the protests with Walt and me are what caused her to suggest that protests presently identified as "duplicates" should be "corrected" if another address can be found with the name on the protest, and her request will be forwarded to the Board for a decision. Much unplanned review took place Monday, but no changes were made, and no protests were logged in, either pro or con. Protest counting will not take place until the committee reconvenes.

The fact that you are the only one with a key to the box containing the letters and apparently you also have complete access to the building means that you have now betrayed the publics trust by going in there and handling the letters alone and on top of that coming up with new numbers to which there are NO witnesses.

Mary said Walt was never there.  Was he or not Jay.  Your letter below implies that he was.  If Mary hadn't stopped to see what was going on - how much more would the count have changed.

And BTW everyone, Jay still has the keys and access to the letters and he has now demonstrated that he has no problem going there alone to handle the letters.

This is wrong.  Sorry Jay.

Jay O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea, Walt was there, he came in at 5pm. I went in much earlier when I saw a white car parked out front of the district office which had been there for some time.
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

OK Mary, I'm sorry I misuderstood you on the phone.  Nonetheless, Jay was there without anyone present for at least an hour and possibly longer. In his report to the RL list he doesn't even mention this.
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

For the record -
I am Walt and I am only a small cog in the Committee to authenticate the 'protest letters' relevant to the propossed water rate increase. I am a newcomer to this type of activity even though I have lived in Rio Linda since 1971. I raised my hand at a public meeting of the District Directors when the chairman of the committee requested volunteers and I was accepted.

People will find me at the district office only when I am requested to be there by the Committee Chairman.  Saturday I was there exactly at 5 PM and there were only two others there when I arrived; Mary and Jay. All three of us left and drove away at the same time.

During the time we three were there, there was no official meeting. Jay asked for our thoughts about the best way to present the accumulated data to the Water Board staff, Both Mary and I expressed our differing ideas with some discussion and we all left together. There is no apparent collusion involved in trying to resolve the 'problem' letters and remember that the conclusions of the District staff are to be thoroughly reviewed by the Water Board customer's representatives on the oversight committee beginning on February 15th.

There is no reason for suspicion, deceit, or animosity among those of us involved in resolving this matter. Let us work together for a fair and just conclusion.

Walt
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Erwin Hayer wrote:

Jay

I was under the impression that the committee was to verify all of the protest documents.

How can the committee verify the "209 Problem Protests" if the Staff is doing the checking with out community committee members present?

Erwin
/snip/

Every staff lookup will be available for review by the committee. As far as I am concerned, the information will then be in the public domain. Staff will note their findings on each protest form and the committee, after review, will reach a decision to accept or question each staff finding.

I will not suggest that staff should be supervised by, assisted by or observed by anyone other than District management; how staff performs the lookups will be determined by District management, not by me. Certainly District management can respond to any questions and may agree to repeating questioned database lookups for the committee or for the public; that's not my call. My part was to hand the request package to the General Manager.

For the record, the committee voted 4 to 2 to NOT have committee watching staff performing the lookups. Mary Harris and Paul Harbert voted that they wished to oversee the lookups. Mary, with her dissenting vote, suggested that she would assist staff in doing the lookups on the District computer terminal.

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea,

Just what are you trying to prove? You interrupt the Water District's legal council as if you know more about law than she. You interrupt Board meetings (including RLE Recreation & Park District) with your legal opinions. You call someone a liar when you don't even have the facts straight. Your dialoque as a non-water district customer concerning the Water District's problems is not appreciated by as many customers as you may think. I, as a paying customer of the Rio Linda/Elverta Community Water District, would like to have the business and operation of my water supplier carried on in a professional manner without false accusations or innuendoes.

As for your apology to Mary that you didn't understand what she told you, the apology should have been directed to Jay O'Brien, and, to all the people on the community net who read your disinformation.  I'm quite certain that the people appointed to the sub-committee to ascertain the validy and number of protests regarding the 100% rate increase are capable of performing that task without a self-appointed legal expert who is not qualified to make those opinions of how that committee should be performing.

Perhaps a better understanding on your part of what is being put forth would be more beneficial than leaping to hasty conclusions and undermining the efforts of those that volunteered and were appointed to the committee to perform their task.

Also Charlea, this email is public domain and you don't need my permission to send it to anyone you wish, particularly if you let make their own interpretation of what it says.

Don Flesch
The NEWS
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Mary Harris wrote:

from Jay 2-12-01
Mary expressed her desire to re-review all protests identified as "duplicates", as she feels that the protesting party may have written a wrong address in error, and therefore, in her opinion, the protest should be corrected and counted as valid.

Jay this is totally untrue. I am very concerned about the discrepancy. I said in an earlier message that I found 3 out of 4 that were actually correct. Monday evening  I found a letter marked duplicate [ E St. ] then I went through the stack of valid letter and found the other duplicate which had someone else name on it. My question to you was how could this be a duplicate when the name was different. I pointed out to you that the address on the first letter might not be an E St. and this is when it would be a good idea to cross reference to check out the name to make sure we were reading the address correctly.

As I have repeatedly indicated to you, the committee will continue to meet until we all agree on the counts to be presented to the Board at its next meeting. If it is impossible to reach agreement, you and any dissenting committee member have the right and obligation to file minority reports with the Board.

My next question to you is why are these duplicates separate from the valid letters. In my opinion they should have been stapled to the back of the original one for quick reference and accuracy.

Jay I have told you from day one that I wanted to be at every meeting. Then we get this note below [Sunday] from you saying that you will be in touchwith Walt and solicit his review before passing anything to staff.
____________________________________________________
from Jay 2-11-01
I'll get the 207 "to be resolved" protests to staff on Tuesday for resolution. I plan to give staff addresses to resolve first, as those are easier for them to work with than names. As we agreed Saturday, I'll be in touch with Walt and solicit his review before I pass anything along to staff. Hopefully we can do that Monday so that staff can begin work early Tuesday.

____________________________________________________
from Jay 2-12-01
Mary has requested copies be prepared for her of all petitions not found to be valid. For customer privacy reasons, I declined to provide copies. This request will be referred to the Board of Directors for Board action.

Jay why has this become a question of "privacy" when all I am asking for are copies of letters that have already been made public by those signing them. I'm not asking for information that hasn't been made public and there is absolutely no reason to refuse my request for copies. Who gave you the authority to refuse a committee member any information when requested.

I am disillusioned with being on this committee....Before this whole counting process started, Jay takes it on himself to ask our Board President Doug Cater to appoint him as chair. Then he ask Jerry and Walt to serve on that committee with him. He then sends me a message telling me to come and watch the committee in action. It was only when Charlea pointed out, that appointing a committee had to take place in a public meeting and at that meeting with the urging of the public, I was ask to be on the protest counting committee. I am not here to bicker back in forth with any committee member but I will not stand still and be just an observer .

I now find Jay is going to the district office by himself and going through the protest letters without other committee members present.

In the future I will tape record all committee meetings. I object to this necessity, but you have left me no other recourse.

Jay O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Well Mark, the reason you don't understand is because you were not the receipient of the letter from the Water District Board of Directors stating that they were "going"  to impose a 100% rate hike UNLESS they received at least 2100 letters of protest.  If they received said letters of protest they said in their letter to the ratepayers that they WOULDN"T impose the 100% hike.

Now it doesn't take much to figure out that the RL and Elverta folks got pretty steamed at being jerked around like that.  The protest letter writing campaign was on and over 2,400 letters were submitted.

It went downhill from there when Jay talked with both Jerry Wickham and Doug Cater via telephone and email (not in a public meeting) about how he would like to chair the counting committee and he had already lined up Jerry and Walt Boatright to be on the committee.

Subsequently, Doug Cater appointed Jay as Chair and Jerry and Walt to the committee.  Because of public input at the meeting he also appointed Mary Harris, Paul Harbart, and Joe Gluver.

The committee meeting was supposed to be open to the public and all the handling of the letters were supposed to be done by the committee.

At this point it is clear that isn't happening.

Hope this clears up all the ruckus for you.

Charlea

(Mark Dempsey wrote)
So I'm puzzled about "voting" against these costs and counting protest letters? I know Rio Lindans re-elected at least one Board member who voted for the defunct pipeline--that was the time for voting. Now's the time to pay the piper. Protest or not, all Rio Lindans can really do, if what I say is true, is haggle about the bill. Not paying it isn't an option.

My question: What would the protest accomplish, even if it succeeded?

Inquiring minds want to know...

Bill - I'm sorry to be so argumentative but the Water District stated in writing in a letter to all their ratepayers that they would not impose the rate hike if they received 2100 protests by January 22, 2001.  This is not just verbal but in writing from the Board of Directors and Water District to the ratepayers.

Charlea

On Tue, 13 Feb 2001 11:46:27 -0800 "Bill Shepherd" <Bill@SECTeam.com> writes:
Mark:  Your question about what the protests will accomplish is a good one. IMO, the whole thing is frought with ambiguity.  Even if there are a sufficient number of "protests", the only committment (verbal) from the district is that it would not invoke the 100% rate increase.

Erwin, once the staff has finished their "look ups" they will make their notations on the letters, the only thing the committee can verify is whether or not there are notations on the letters.  There is nothing for the committee to verify regarding the validity of the letter.

As far as Jay's "unique number" system that's great if they were kept in sequential order so it would be easy to see if a number is missing.  The letters haven't been in sequential order since the first night and there is no way to tell if a letter is missing or not.  Especially when the total keeps changing.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Geez Don - Chill out.

I'm only trying to prove that Jay O'Brian violated the Brown Act and used his trust to enter and count, sort stack whatever the letters of protest all by himself - which he did and Mary caught him redhanded.

I did missunderstand Mary and I said so.  That doesn't alter the fact that Jay was there alone handling the letters and the count has changed -  again.  For what would I apologize to Jay??  He was there alone, the count did change.

Exactly who did I call a liar???

I think Walt is an honorable person and he was where he said he was when he said.  But he admits that he arrived at the correct time for the meeting on Monday night not an hour early as Jay did.  Walt was not there alone with the letters and neither was Mary - only Jay.

I never said that email wasn't public domain - how silly of you.  And I wouldn't dream of asking your permission to send anything to anyone, that's silly too.  I said before and I'll say it again since you didn't GET it the first time.  As a member of the RL list I did not agree that you could use my email for publication in your paper and especially when you only publish half the email.

If in fact, all the email on this net is subject to publication in any newspaper, then I think the folks on this list should be so advised when they join the list.

Jay, as list mom would you care to comment on this issue???

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Sure. I'll be glad to comment. My pleasure.

There is no way that any restriction can be placed on the use of any email sent to anyone, whether sent directly or via an email list. If you don't want what you say or send in a public forum to be quoted, you should be quiet. That also applies to what you say (and how you say it) in a local government Board meeting.

Jay O'Brien
ListMom, Rio Linda Elverta Mailing List
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea

I do have trust in some of our community leaders and elected officials.

I also beleive Jay has been doing this community a very valuable service and getting very little thanks.

I also believe the Water District must get a rate increase, but I do not agree with a 100 % increase at this time.

I have been doing a lot of listening to community members and some of the information that is being placed on the [RL] Net may not be accurate. I was disapointed in your treatment of the Legal presentation person during the meeting on Feb 5, 2001.

Erwin
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay, Thanks for your clarification on the publication of the comments written on this net.  I'm sure that applies to any publication and not just the newspaper?  Correct?  You and the others on this list have no objection to ANY publication of your words???

I'm thinking of sending out a flyer with your quote "The Water District is under no obligation to do anything with the protest letters".  I think your constituants would be interested in your view of their protests.

I'm also sure that the protest committee members would be interested in the community's reaction to your assertion that "all the committee members have been "alone" with the protest letters".

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea,

I must commend you for the amount of time you put into attending public meetings and "looking out for the public". I'm sure you like to think of yourself as a watchdog for your neighbors. It is too bad that you always seem to attack the messenger rather than the issue. It gives you the appearance of being a gadfly rather than a watchdog.

I have copied below the FIRST PART of Jay's email from which you have extracted single sentences.

If you extract the single sentences and publish them in a flyer, you will be distributing misinformation. The single sentences, out of context, are not an appropriate quote, but could be found to constitute libelous action on your part. If you quote someone, it is important to place the quote in context so that the author's intent is not changed. What you propose completely turns around the intent of the original message, from which you "quote".

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [RL] Publication of public information
Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2001 10:16:58 -0800
From: Charlea Moore <cgamail@juno.com>
To: riolinda@vrx.net

Jay, Thanks for your clarification on the publication of the comments written on this net.  I'm sure
that applies to any publication and not just the newspaper?  Correct?  You and the others on this
list have no objection to ANY publication of your words???

I'm thinking of sending out a flyer with your quote "The Water District is under no obligation to do
anything with the protest letters".  I think your constituants would be interested in your view of
their protests.

I'm also sure that the protest committee members would be interested in the community's reaction to
your assertion that "all the committee members have been "alone" with the protest letters".

Charlea

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [RL] Response to Charlea Moore's accusations
Date: Tue, 13 Feb 2001 10:13:40 -0800
From: Jay O'Brien <jayobrien@att.net>
To: Rio Linda Elverta Mailing List <riolinda@vrx.net>

Rio Linda Elverta Mailing list:

I really should not reply to this, as it is patently disrespectful, misinformed and argumentative.
However, I cannot allow these allegations and accusations to go unanswered.

The Rio Linda/Elverta Community Water District is under no obligation to do anything with the
protests. I volunteered to involve the public, and the Board assigned me the task I proposed.
Everything anyone on the committee, including me, has done to sort or analyze the protests is known,
public, and subject to verification, recount and review.

The protest letters were individually and uniquely identified at the February 5 Special Board
meeting so that any counts could be verified by audit if necessary. All committee members have been
"alone" with at least a part of the protests; others present were deeply involved in their specific
task and would not notice another member adding to or subtracting from the protests. That is exactly
why the protests are marked as they are, to guarantee their security and with the intent to remove
all of the committee members from suspicion of fraudulent action.

My responses to Charlea's accusations are included below.

Jay O'Brien

I'm glad that you enjoyed the cookies I sent to the committee meeting. :)

Jan O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Hi Jan, I actually think of myself as having fun and I've never thought of myself as looking out for the "public" so much as trying to keep things open and honest.  The public can take it or leave it, makes no difference to me.  Also, believe it or not - members of the public actually asked me to get involved, although you are probably right and they are sorry now.  And just for the record I do not flatter myself by thinking I'm anything other than a cheerful, loudmouth, know-it-all, who ocassionally manages to get something done.

Regarding your comments about "context" I couldn't agree more.  That was my point about what Don published.  He published my answer to Darrell and then published Mike's answer to my answer.  That's as out of context as you can get.  The least he could have done was publish the very good suggestions by Darrell that I was responding to so that my response would have been in "context".

Do you not object to ALL out of context quotes or just certain out of context quotes?

As far as attacking the messenger, the members of the Water Board have been crying "It's not our fault" since this whole thing began.  Not once has anyone at any meeting or on this net implied directly or indirectly that this board is at fault for past board action.  No messenger has been attacked.

If board members choose to contact each other in violation of the Brown Act and that is made public I would consider that "news" rather than an attack.

If the Protest Committee Chair chooses to handle the protest letters all by himself with no one present - I think that's "news" also.

Maybe I should become a reporter.

As far as libel goes I like that old saying "It ain't libel if it's true".  And no matter how you read it, Jay's intent was to say that ALL the committee members have been "alone" with the letters. And his intent was to say - "The Water District has no obligation to do anything with the protest letters."  There is nothing in his context to indicate otherwise.

And last, your cookies were very good and thank you for making them for the committee members. Oatmeal raisin is my favorite.  :-))

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Well said Charlea, You have a heart of Gold... Few will take the time and effort to deal with these bureaucracies and help protect the less able of our society! Glad to hear you are having fun also... Keep up the good work!

Thank you... foaming at the mouth and all.... :o) Happy Valentines Day
Mary Harris
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jerry, Mike:

Just a confirming wrapup to what has transpired:

This report covers the Ad-hoc petition counting subcommittee.

Members of the committee were Walt Boatwright, Joe Gluvers, Paul Harbert, Mary Harris, Jay O'Brien, and Jerry Wickham.

The committee convened first on Wednesday, February 7, at 1 PM. The committee met as follows:

2/7  1 PM to 7 PM (all members present)
2/8  10 AM to 1 PM (all except Joe and Paul)
2/9  10 AM This scheduled meeting was cancelled.
2/10 8 AM to 10:30 AM (all members present)
2/12 5 PM to 6:30 PM (only Jay, Walt, Mary)
2/15 3 PM to 4:45 PM (all members present)

The committee has completed its work unless reconvened by the Board.

The committee agreed that 2026 protests were valid. The committee agreed that 217 protests were invalid. The committee agreed that 214 protests may be found to be either valid or invalid; The committee declined to perform the additional work necessary to agree on these 214 without further Board direction after the committee provides a report to the Board. The grand total is 2457 protests.

Based on Mike's count of 4,235 water services on January 22, 2001, 2118 valid protests would constitute a majority.

Paul Harbert will make the official report to the Board on February 26, 2001, with more details on the numbers listed above, and the committee's recommendation to the Board.

The petitions have been turned over to Mike.

Mike, if you think it appropriate to pass any part of this along to the rest of the Board and Ginny, please feel free to do so.

Jay

Jay,

What happened at the meeting on Thursday at 3pm????  There hasn't been anything posted on the net and that is most unusual for you since you usually post the results of each meeting right after the meeting.

I had intended to be there but my farrier arrived unexpectedly at 2:30 and so I couldn't make the meeting.  Good farriers are like good babysitters, once you have one you work with them no matter what.

What was the final count on the "problem" letters?  How many did the Water District staff resolve and how many were not resolved????

When and where will the committee meet again???

Thanks for all the work you've done on this project and I hope nothing has happened that caused you not to post the final results.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea:
In reading through my Rio Linda Net e-mail, which you seem to generate a considerable amount of  I have noted that you repeatedly make accusations about the alleged misconduct of Mr. O'Brien and others, but you were not present when these alleged nefarious deeds were done!  How can that be? Additionally, the tone of your comments presents an aura of authenticity and expertness you have not substantiated through proof of legal knowledge or expertise, or by your presence at the location where the nefarious deed(s) were to have occurred.  But yet, you speak in the manner of first person knowledge.  Please, substantiate your accusations of Mr. O'Brien with literal fact and not by supposition and accusation.

Even though Mr. O'Brien and I have our differences.  I will support the fact that in the community activities we have worked on together the last 20 plus years, including the CPAC, Incorporation effort, saving the Fire District, etc. he has been scrupulously detailed and correct in all that he did.  And, I am sure he has been so in this latest activity.

Mel G.
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Gosh Mel, you have all the emails from the net that Jay sent to Mary Harris and Doug Cater in which he has already gotten Director Wickham's agreement to serve on the protest letter committee and he (Jay) would be happy to be appointed as chair. At that point there was communitcation between a majority of the Water District Board of Directors to gain concurrance on an issue within the Water District Board of Director's jurisdiction and authority.  Further, Jay sent Mary Harris an email stating that he had been appointed as Chair by Director Cater and the other committee members were Director Wickham and Walt Boatwright (not a director) and he generously invited Mary to "observe" the committee.  A date and place for the committee meeting was also mentioned.  Again this would be a majority of the Board discussing and making decisions on issues within the jurisdiction of the Board.  Perhaps you weren't "paying attention" when these emails were sent to the net.  I do have copies of all these emails if you would like them.  I do hope this is "literal and factual" enough for you as it is all I have to offer.

I absolutely agree that I was not present - and neither were any members of the public, nor was there any notification that a meeting, of a majority of  the Board on an issue within their jurisdiction, would occur. I probably wasn't "paying attention" again, too busy talking no doubt.

Isn't email wonderful, you don't have to be present to have a print out in black and white (or color if your printer can handle it) of what someone said to someone else and there is no way to hide it.

Mel, I can only say that I'm terribly flattered to hear that you think I have an "aura of authenticity and expertness".  I must confess that the only legal knowledge I have is the ability to comprehend the written English language.  Nonetheless, I'm truly delighted to know that I have such a grand aura.

Thanks so much,

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Hi folks,

We will have a report soon; Paul Harbert was selected by the committee to prepare it for presentation to the Board of Directors. He will be running it by the committee for approval soon.

In the meantime, I've posted the emails that I have on file up to and including February 14th to the protest web page I set up and announced here on the 6th.  I think I have everything posted.

I tried to include only email that deals directly or indirectly with the protest documents themselves, not the proposed rate increases. Of course there are ancillary issues included, to maintain proper and full context.

If I've left something out, or accidentally chopped a letter out of a word making format changes, please let me know.

The only "changes" I made were to delete personal telephone numbers from the messages.

It's really a pretty interesting "book".

http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html

Enjoy!

Jay
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

I've been to the webpage for the protest letter committee and there is nothing there after a February 14 message from one of the committee members.

Would someone who was at the Protest Letter Committee meeting on February 15 at 3pm, please let those of us who couldn't make the meeting know what happened.

There were 207  letters that were "Problems" that were supposed to have been resolved by Water District Staff on Tuesday and the Protest Counting Committee was supposed to have met at 3pm on Thursday to verify the results of staff's research on the problem letters.

I was unable to make the meeting because of the unexpected arrival of my farrier.  I asked for an update yesterday but haven't received any update nor a reply to my request for the date, time and place of the next meeting of the Protest Committee.

The last I know is there were about 83 letters short of the magic number required by the Water District of 2100 to stop the 100% rate increase.

I would appreciate a response from the committee chairperson.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

I'll second that Charlea. Jay, did we get enough signatures?

Troy Hood
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Troy,

Perhaps you missed the message I posted last night, quoted below. Once a report is prepared, I'm sure it will be posted here.

I prefer to not post anything at this time, as the official report is being prepared. If the official report cannot be crafted to be approved by all committee members, those committee members who do not agree with the report should prepare their own versions and make their positions known. But for now, we are all waiting on the first draft of the report.

Jay
(My Feb 17, 2001 24:24:25 PST message was repeated here)
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

I did indeed miss the message below.  It doesn't seem to answer my question though.

I'm only asking for the final count total, not a report.  In all the previous meetings the Protest Committee Chairman posted the count the next day.  Is there some reason that can't be done this time? Especially since this count is the most important one.  Surely, the final count was some number arrived at by the committee.  Is this number in dispute???  Why wouldn't the committee have arrived at a number????  This was supposed to be the final "review" of the problem ballots.  The public has put a lot of time and effort into this and we are all pretty anxious to hear the result.

The quote below also doesn't answer my original question of the time, date and location of the next convening of the Protest Committee??? Since my farrier has already been here I don't expect any interruptions for the next meeting.

When will the committee be meeting to "craft the report"???? And where???  At what meeting will the "report" be approved by the committee members???  Was the comment below about "prepare their own report" voted on or agreed to by the committee???  It sounds odd in that usually a committee will vote to accept or reject whatever it is they are charged to do.

The Chairman of the Protest Committee agreed,at the Feb. 5 Water Board meeting, that the public would be kept informed through postings on the web and the RLnet.

All I'm asking is for the information, not an official report.  Please respond.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay - about your quote from director Blanchard;

"Also, at that same meeting, Director Blanchard expressed support for the concept of doubling the rates coincident with the return to monthly billing. He said "I think it's a good idea because I think that for the most part, that number, if it's consistent with what they are used to seeing, is going to be very palatable. And I think that the fact that we are doing it twice as often, is hardly going to be recognized by the average person out there".

Next we have the Protest Committee meeting of Feb. 15 but no posting of the count or when or where the next meeting is.

Suddenly, we have Director O'Brien posting a message to Director Griffin in which he manages to place the above quote.

Director O'Brien - the public is not distracted by the "old news" of the Water Board's opinion of their customers intellect.

Please post the count that was done at the Feb. 15 meeting as you promised the Board you would do.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

To all those interested in the last meeting of the Protest Committee for the Water District Rate Hike,

I just finished viewing the tape of the committee meeting (thank you Jay for returning the tape to the Water District Office) and really - I don't understand why this couldn't be posted sooner but..........

The bottom line is that there were somewhere in the range of 2,1026 valid protest letters and then comes the fun part...... depending on whose numbers (which committee member) you listen to there are varying numbers of letters that couldn't be resolved for one reason or another.  The committee decided that rather than continue the tedious and time consuming process of verifying those letters they would make a recommendation to the Water Board that while the count wasn't yet completed, it was close enough to the number needed that the Board should not impose the rate hike.  The committee appoint Paul Harbart to draft and present a report to the Water Board to that effect.

The committee did not set a date or time for another meeting and they are emailing each other to approve the report that will be presented at the Board meeting on Monday, Feb. 26, 2001.

I believe that Mr. Phelan indicated the report will be available online at the Water District website along witht the agenda for the meeting.

I hope that the Board will see it's way clear to appoint a rate review committee that includes at least two members of the public and hopefully they will be able to come up with some rate increases that really are palatable to the ratepayers.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Charlea

Could you verify the "2,1026 valid protest letters". I think you have an error or mayby the word processor could'nt understand. I know mine does not understand what I am thinking quite often.

Erwin
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

OOOPs   that should be 2,026.  I must have accidentally struck the 1 when I hit the 2 or something.  Sorry, but would that have been great.

Charlea
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

The agenda for the Monday evening February 26, 2001 Board meeting can be viewed at http://www.geocities.com/riolindawater/Board/01agenda/10226ag.html

The material on the Protest Counting Committee Report can be viewed either through the agenda link or directly at http://www.geocities.com/riolindawater/Board/01agenda/1022617.html

Mike Phelan
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Now that the Committee's report has been placed on line for review, I would like to detail some items for everyone.

1. At the Special Board meeting of February 5, I suggested that I would post interim reports on the mailing list, and I did so.

2. At it's February 15 meeting, the ad hoc Committee agreed that Paul Harbert would prepare and present the Committee's "final" report to the Board. As it was in his hands and no longer "interim", I declined to publish anything, leaving it up to Paul. In my opinion, it would have been improper and impolite to publish anything before seeing what Paul had prepared. I did prepare a detailed recap of the various protests and caveats, however, and I sent that ONLY to Paul for his review and use. I also offered the Video tape of the February 15 meeting to Paul should he wish to review it for details. He declined, as he felt his notes were sufficient, a conclusion later borne out by his excellent report.

3. On February 17, in response to a query that day by Charlea Moore, I posted a message to the RLE mailing list stating that a report was being prepared by Paul Harbert. I declined to post any details. In that message, I included a link to a compilation of emails on the subject.

4. On February 19, Paul Harbert distributed his report to the committee, and he asked me to forward my detailed recap to the committee. He questioned posting the report for the public until it was presented to the Board of Directors. A copy of my response to Paul Harbert is below:

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: Report
Date: Mon, 19 Feb 2001 14:23:43 -0800
From: Jay O'Brien <jayobrien@att.net>
To: Paul Mitchell <pmitch@cwo.com>
CC: Committee Members

Paul and the committee,

Thanks, Paul, for the excellent summary of the committee's action. I completely support your report, as it is exactly what happened and captures the Committee's position. Go with it!

I'm including a copy of the details I sent to you as part of this response, as you requested. I would appreciate comments from the committee on my detailed recap of facts from the meeting.

I disagree with your position on making the report public, however. I agree with Charlea that the public has a need to know, and I feel that the other members of the Board can benefit from the publication, as they can sample our constituents prior to the Board meeting if they wish. The Brown act prohibits me from discussing this with Doug, Mel and Bob, as it concerns an action the Board may take. However, you certainly are not so constrained.

Jay

6. On February 22, I was accosted in the RLECWD office by Charlea Moore, who chided me for not publishing the Committee results. I asked her if she had not talked to Mary Harris, thus determining that it was the Committee's decision that Paul Harbert would write the report, not me. She replied that she had talked to Mary, and she did not understand why I did not make the details public. I then unfortunately raised my voice, reminding her that she previously used incorrect information from Mary Harris to publicly label me a liar ("Mary said Walt was never there.  Was he or not Jay. Your letter below implies that he was.") and a crook ("...you have now betrayed the publics trust by going in there and handling the letters alone... If Mary hadn't stopped to see what was going on -  how much more would the count have changed."). I have apologized to RLECWD staff for my outburst to Charlea in their presence. I guess I can just take so much prodding before I, too, lose my cool, and I regret my action. But it is hard to ignore demeaning and inflammatory statements like "And BTW everyone, Jay still has the keys and access to the letters and he has now demonstrated that he has no problem going there alone to handle the letters." [all quotes are from Charlea Moore email to the RLE List 2/12/01; see complete, "in context", http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html#212i ]

7. After I left the RLECWD office on February 22, I was called by Mike Phelan and asked to return the video tape of the February 15 ad hoc meeting as Charlea Moore and Mary Harris were in the Water District office and were demanding to immediately view the tape. I took the tape to the office and I understand that Ms. Moore and Ms. Harris not only viewed it, but later required staff to make copies of the tape for each of them. I suggest that viewing the tape would be a good experience for anyone who wonders why we did not reach a conclusive consensus as a committee. I regret not video taping all previous meetings; I wrongly felt the committee was based on trust, thus I did not ask that the meetings be recorded until I learned that I was wrong in my assessment of all the committee members. However, I thank committee members Boatwright, Gluvers, Harbert and Wickham for their efforts to work together as a Committee, compromising when necessary, attempting to reach for consensus.

8. I have updated the summation of emails on this subject. To view the entire file, visit http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html ; or to view the file starting with the newly added information, visit http://jay.mbz.org/rl/protest.html#215a . It is an interesting story.

I hope you will all attend the Board meeting tomorrow, Monday, February 26, at 7 PM in the Water District office. I understand that the Community Center will be available to us after 7:30 PM should we be unable to accommodate the members of the public who may attend.

Jay O'Brien

Committee report, as part of the agenda for the Board meeting: http://www.geocities.com/riolindawater/Board/01agenda/1022617.html

>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Jay,

Until now, I have refrained from posting a response to any message on the [RL] list.  However, after reading your latest posting, I feel compelled to respond to several points you made.  I think anyone interested in following the work of our committee should know all the facts, not just one person's recollections and opinions.

1.      The committee agreed that I would write a report, summarizing the statements we all agreed to present to RLECWD Board of Directors at the February 26, 2001 meeting.  It was also agreed that I would email the report to each member of the committee for approval, thus avoiding having to hold another committee meeting to approve it.

2.      I finished the report last Sunday, 2/18/01, and sent it via email to each of the committee members.  I heard immediately from Walt Boatwright. He questioned why I had not included the number (in our committee meetings, we referred to it as "the magic number") of "valid" protest letters needed to stop the increase.  I explained that you had covered it in your memo, which I proposed be included with the committee's report.  I also reminded him that the committee had not given me direction to include that number in my report.  There was no discussion with Walt about whether he felt the report should be published on this net, prior to formally presenting it to the entire Board of Directors.  Walt approved the report, as written.

3.      I received an email from you Sunday 2/18/01, approving the report, as written.  We also had a lengthy conversation on the phone that day.  I told you I felt it would be inappropriate to publish the report on this net, before it was formally presented to the Board of Directors.  We disagreed on this issue.

4.      I received a call from Mary Harris, Monday 2/19/01 approving the report, as written.  She also suggested that publishing the report on this net, prior to formal presentation to the entire Board of Directors would be inappropriate.

5.      I received a voicemail message from Jerry Wickham, Wednesday 2/21/01, approving the report, as written.  He also suggested that publishing the report on this net, prior to formal presentation to the entire Board of Directors would be inappropriate.

6.      I received a call from you, Thursday 2/22/01.  During the call, I explained that I had not heard from Joe Gluvers yet.  I asked you to please call him and ask him to call me with his input (approval, disapproval and/or comments) about the report.

7.      I received a voicemail message from Joe Gluvers, Thursday 2/22/01 approving the report, as written.  There was no other comment.

8.      I called you immediately after receiving his approval on the report, to let you know all committee members had now approved the report, as written.  At your suggestion, I authorized you to email the report to General Manager, Mike Phelan, under the impression that he needed it by the next day to prepare the "packets" to be mailed to the individual Directors by Friday, February 23, 2001.

9.      Committee Members Harbert, Harris and Wickham agreed that the report was intended to be presented at the February 26, 2001 RLECWD Board of Directors Meeting, and it would be inappropriate to publish it on this net prior to the meeting.

For the record, I believe you were incorrect in stating that you were "out-voted".  Only three of the six committee members "voted" (by voicemail & phone calls to me) to not publish the report on this net prior to the February 26 board meeting.  Committee Members Boatwright and Gluvers did not express their opinions to me, pro or con, on this issue.  By my count, that would be 1 pro, 3 con, and 2 who were not asked for their "vote".  I saw the entire report was, in fact, made public, along with your detailed accounting of the protest letters, published on this net on Friday, February 23, 3+ days ahead of its formal presentation to the Board of Directors.  So even if you were "out-voted", you still got your wish.  The report was made public before the February 26, 2001 Board of Directors Meeting.

I was very disappointed to see that you thanked all members of the committee, except Mary Harris, for our "efforts to work together as a Committee, compromising when necessary, attempting to reach for consensus."

Jay, Mary Harris also compromised when necessary, attempting to reach for consensus.  All committee members gave their time and worked diligently on this very difficult task, in spite of disagreements and personal schedules. I think all committee members can recall more than a few issues that Mary wanted to debate and question, but instead, "compromised" and moved forward, in spite of the disagreements.  I think each and every one of us on the committee did the same!  To omit her from your thanks does not seem fair.

I also commend Charlea Moore, and the countless other neighbors and citizens of our community who try to ask questions and become part of a solution to the difficult tasks that face our water district and our entire community. I have personally urged Charlea to stay involved, attend meetings and encourage others to be interested and vocal.  I do not always agree with Charlea, but I feel very strongly that she's doing the right thing by not being quiet.

And, for the record, I am glad to have had the opportunity to work with each and every one of the committee members.  In spite of our disagreements over the course of trying to determine the validity of each protest letter, I feel we can all hold our heads high, knowing that we tried to help make a difference and be involved!  I hope everyone who reads this invites their neighbors, local merchants, and all concerned members of the community to attend the RLECWD Board of Directors Meeting tomorrow night, as well as future meetings.  The Board of Directors needs input from us regularly to make decisions that truly reflect what its constituents want.

Thank you Jay, for providing a forum that allows us to reply.

Sincerely,

Paul Harbert
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Paul,

It certainly is nice to hear from you. We disagree on several issues, and it is reassuring to receive a reasoned, thoughtful and professional expression of your positions.

On the publication of the Committee's report. Once the Board package is prepared for the Board members, it is public information. It is the General Manager's call on what detail gets included in the agenda and what is published on the District's web site. Mike puts everything possible on line, to assure open public access to what goes to the Board. The report was published on the District web site as part of the meeting agenda for the Board Meeting; once the agenda was on line, Mike posted a link here, as is his practice. My understanding of the Brown Act is that the agenda must be posted at least 72 hours before a regular meeting.

Sincerely,

Jay

>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Dear Jay,

I am writing to respond to some of the accusations and gross inaccuracies in your email dated sun. 25 February 2001 at 4:16 PM.

Perhaps you were not aware that I had made an appointment, in advance, to view the tape. I hope everyone reading this, will come away with a better understanding of what is going on.

To set the record straight, I went to the Water District office Wednesday, February 21, about 3 PM to make an appointment to watch a video. I asked Vicky Bender of the district staff, if I needed an appointment. She said that was probably a good idea. She told me she would talk with Mike Phelan and give me a call to let me know what time would be convenient. She called me later that afternoon and told me I could come see the video anytime after 11 am, Thursday February 22nd.

I arrived about 1:45 PM on Thursday to watch the video of the last meeting of the protest letter counting committee, as per my arrangement with the district staff. The staff tried to find the video but couldn't locate it. I assume that's when Mike Phelan called you to see if you had the tape. About 10-15 minutes later, you arrived at the office with the tape.

Your statement that I was "demanding to immediately view the tape" implies that I showed up unannounced, when in fact, I had taken the time in advance to make an appointment.

I never demanded to immediately review the tape. In fact, I waited patiently for 10-15 minutes until you returned it to the district office. I never "required staff to make copies", as you stated in your email. Liz ( of the district office staff ) asked if I would like her to make me a copy of the tape. I said yes and made arrangements to provide a blank tape the following day.

I would really appreciate it, if you would refrain from using my name until you have the facts.

Mary Harris
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

Mary,

You are right, I was not aware that you had made previous arrangements to view the tape. You arrived at the Water District office as I was leaving after my encounter with Ms. Moore, which I recounted in the email you reference. I made an incorrect assumption that you had joined Ms. Moore, and when Mike Phelan called me to obtain the tape, it was my understanding that the principal requestor was Ms. Moore, and my impression from Mike was that she had issued such a demand.

I was wrong, and I apologize to you for my mischaracterization of your visit to the District office. I also was not aware that Liz Myers had offered to make you a tape; I learned of the requirement Friday morning when I attempted to retrieve the tape again for review; I was informed that I could not take the tape as two copies were to be made; one for you and one for Ms. Moore. I wrongly stated that it was a demand, and I apologize to you for that incorrect statement.

Jay O'Brien
>From the Rio Linda mailing list

You are at the end of a correspondence file; please click here to review the "Rate Increase Story", which refers to this correspondence file.

/end/

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