The Chadds Ford Civic Association Board of Directors is trying to put its best foot forward, but it still has to do a better job of cleaning its shoes.
In a letter sent to members of the association last week, the board said it will hold a meeting within 60 days to address issues surrounding the events of the Nov. 8 election and getting member input on new bylaws.
Of primary concern was the use of proxy ballots to, as one person said at the time of the election, "stuff the ballot box" with Republican candidate names.
Six Republicans and four Democrats ran for six vacancies on the 11-member board. One of the Democrats, Rob Porter, was recommended for election by the nominating committee, and he in fact won based on votes cast in person that night. However, that result was overturned when 45 proxy ballots listing only the names of the six Republicans were counted.
Those proxy ballots were handed out during the general election the day before at St. Cornelius Church from the Republican Party table. They were handed out by the association president, Marc Altman, who also waxed eloquently about the need for the Civic Association to be nonpartisan. His actions were inconsistent with his words.
What is most interesting about the letter sent out is that after admitting proxy use is not justified by the bylaws and that proxies had never been used before, the board members, as a body, attempt to justify their use by saying they heard that other candidates were going to do the same.
To borrow from what each us were taught as children, two wrongs don't make a right, especially when the opposition hasn't initiated any wrong action.
As one township Republican said after reading the letter, "nice excuse." Another said it was an insult to his intelligence to have the board try to justify the use of proxies: "Just be honest and admit you made a mistake."
A third Republican said it was just typical trying to blame Democrats.
Ironically, a Chadds Ford Democrat seemed to be the most gracious, at least to a point: "I'm glad to see them making some attempt to remedy the situation." That person did add, however, "but I do not believe it can possibly be fully remedied without Marc Altman and Mary Kot (at least) stepping down from the board."
The issue with Ms. Kot is that she is the chairman of the Republican Party executive committee while being a member and recent past vice president of the supposedly nonpartisan association board of directors.
On the positive side, the letter does mention attempts to correct the situation, at least as far as future elections go, with changes to the bylaws.
But the bottom line is that the Civic Association is supposed to be nonpartisan. The only way to do that is to either eliminate party politics completely or to go multi-partisan and open the board to all political parties active within the township. But neither can happen as long as there are those who believe that winning at all costs is the only thing of importance, as the Republican controlled board displayed in November.
As one of the township Republicans also said of the mea culpa and finger pointing aspects of the letter: "Too little, too late." |