LAB election irregularities

17. Postscript

Mark Terman, who was elected to the Region 4 Board seat through questionable tactics by his supporters never showed up for duty. He did not attend the Board meeting in October 2003 where he was scheduled to take office. Instead, he resigned and his seat was filled through the transfer of Brenda Pulley, an appointed “at-large” board member.

We have no explanation for Terman’s resignation. The Board is not in the habit of keeping members informed. There was still a vacant seat on the LAB Board until spring 2004.

At the October 2003 Board meeting, the Board passed secret Bylaws amendments that will make it much more difficult and expensive for future petition candidates to qualify for the ballot.

Precedents established in the 2003 election

The Board nominates candidates that have no connection with the cycling community in their region and no knowledge of the interests of the members they are to represent.
A group of incumbent directors including the President and members of the Executive Committee may interfere in the election, giving unfair advantage to endorsed candidates.
The LAB computerized mailing list is available to partisan supporters of candidates for the Board.
A financial arms race has been created for board elections, in which candidates nominated by the members must match the financial resources of a group of incumbent directors who have financial backing from the non-member interests they represent. This is particularly true after the Bylaws changes made in October 2003.
No membership number is needed to vote. This encourages vote fraud.
Vote counting may occur in secret, without the presence of monitors representing the candidates.
A faction of the board may change the election rules during the balloting to favor their endorsed candidate.
A group of Directors including the President and members of the Executive Committee may make false statements to help their endorsed candidate.

Another 2003 Election Scandal With a Different Outcome

We are intrigued by a development at the Triathlon Federation (USA Triathlon). Their election of 2003 was invalidated due to irregularities, a new election was called and there is now a referendum for reform of the bylaws, to increase representation. It seems the board failed to protect the interests of members. This sounds very familiar to us at LAB. For more info. see Emergency Election and you can read the decision of the United States Olympic Committee Blue Ribbon Panel

The decision of the panel was prefaced by a statement beginning with this sentence: Nothing is more important, or sacred, than that an election be conducted under rules that are beyond reproach and which do not give rise to the perception of or cause any doubt as to the fairness of the election.

Where do we go from here?

It will take persistent pressure to force the guilty to resign and return the League to members. The controlling faction is counting on apathy by the members to allow their misdeeds to continue.

We need your help to get our League back. There are many ways you can help. The greatest need is to tell cyclists what has happened. Please contact clubs, newslists and individual cyclists. Whenever there are online messages about LAB please chime in to tell what you know and to offer support for the idea of returning LAB to member control.

Please contact board members — all of them — to tell them what you think of the job they are doing. We know that seven directors (three were still on the board as of early 2007) openly participated in this scandal. Demand that they resign for the good of the League. Several others support the faction, at least through silence. Please demand that they perform their fiduciary duty by standing up for the members.

The tactics by the controlling faction (helped by the inaction of other board members) coupled with the new Bylaws have significantly weakened member control and raised the price of reform candidates to campaign for the board.

Please join us and help restore the BikeLeague to members.

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