This Thursday, April 25, at 10:30 a.m., four International Village Board of Directors members plan to meet at the clubhouse to fill the Board vacancy created by Sunday’s resignation of Board member Sharon Treppicione. Board President Marvin Tow has insisted on holding the meeting Thursday morning despite the fact that I and fellow Board member Jerry Mirrow have informed him that we cannot attend. Our requests, and those of a number of unit owners, to reschedule the meeting for the evening when we and working unit owners can be there have been ignored. I don’t know who will be chosen to replace Mrs. Treppicione, but I believe that whoever it is deserves a process that is seen as fair and satisfactory to all Board members and unit owners who wish to participate or attend, which means holding it in the evening when it is convenient for people with working schedules.
A decision of such importance also should be one that we take our time on if we take our fiduciary responsibility as Board members seriously. We should be giving unit owners the opportunity to express to us their interest in the position, interviewing candidates and examining backgrounds and experience, as any corporation hiring an executive officer would do. All these things take time.
We have not even been given the courtesy of a satisfactory explanation as to why there is such a rush to fill this Board vacancy. Nothing in Florida statutes or in our bylaws requires us to fill a vacancy immediately upon the resignation of a Board member. As long as we have a quorum of four Board members, the association can continue to conduct its business. In fact, Mrs. Treppicione has not attended a regular Board meeting since before the last election, and we apparently have been getting along fine. On the other hand, if we choose to fill the vacancy, there is no reason why we couldn’t do it at our next regularly scheduled meeting on May 20 or at a special meeting held at a more convenient time in the evening. It’s ironic that at last week’s Board meeting, when I tried to make a motion to discuss how we would handle Mrs. Treppicione’s expected resignation, I was told that I couldn’t do so because it wasn’t an emergency. So why is it suddenly being treated as an emergency now?
There may still be time to get one or more Board members to change their minds about this. So far, besides Mr. Tow, three other Board members have said they plan on attending Thursday morning’s meeting: Marc Richman, Collette Goslin and Frances Mesirow. If any one of them decides not to attend, the meeting will lack a quorum and will have to be adjourned with no action being taken. I urge you to contact all Board members and ask them to do the right thing and not to act in a way that results in more acrimony and suspicion. (See Board member email contact list here.) We all deserve a process that is seen as fair, open and deliberative. And we especially owe it to whoever will be joining us on the Board so they do not have to come into this position under a cloud.
A decision of such importance also should be one that we take our time on if we take our fiduciary responsibility as Board members seriously. We should be giving unit owners the opportunity to express to us their interest in the position, interviewing candidates and examining backgrounds and experience, as any corporation hiring an executive officer would do. All these things take time.
We have not even been given the courtesy of a satisfactory explanation as to why there is such a rush to fill this Board vacancy. Nothing in Florida statutes or in our bylaws requires us to fill a vacancy immediately upon the resignation of a Board member. As long as we have a quorum of four Board members, the association can continue to conduct its business. In fact, Mrs. Treppicione has not attended a regular Board meeting since before the last election, and we apparently have been getting along fine. On the other hand, if we choose to fill the vacancy, there is no reason why we couldn’t do it at our next regularly scheduled meeting on May 20 or at a special meeting held at a more convenient time in the evening. It’s ironic that at last week’s Board meeting, when I tried to make a motion to discuss how we would handle Mrs. Treppicione’s expected resignation, I was told that I couldn’t do so because it wasn’t an emergency. So why is it suddenly being treated as an emergency now?
There may still be time to get one or more Board members to change their minds about this. So far, besides Mr. Tow, three other Board members have said they plan on attending Thursday morning’s meeting: Marc Richman, Collette Goslin and Frances Mesirow. If any one of them decides not to attend, the meeting will lack a quorum and will have to be adjourned with no action being taken. I urge you to contact all Board members and ask them to do the right thing and not to act in a way that results in more acrimony and suspicion. (See Board member email contact list here.) We all deserve a process that is seen as fair, open and deliberative. And we especially owe it to whoever will be joining us on the Board so they do not have to come into this position under a cloud.
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