Since the city made the decision to foreclose on DACHA (Davis Area Cooperative Housing Association), DACHA exists only on paper and has no assets and no ability to defend itself against legal action – this according to the city attorney, council and residents alike.
What ensued last night at the city council meeting was an almost surreal exchange, in which the Davis City Council, powerless, implored David Thompson of Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation to bring his partner Luke Watkins down to the council chambers to represent Neighborhood Partners and resolve the matter.
“DACHA is dead,” DACHA President Ethan Ireland explained to council. “It went into cardiac arrest when its accounts were levied, and it finally expired when its properties were foreclosed upon and sold at auction. It’s a corpse; it has nothing but liabilities and it exists on paper only.”
However, it represents a very dangerous corpse. “As long as this corpse – the corpse of DACHA – remains unburied, DACHA’s creditors, represented by Neighborhood Partners and Twin Pines will never stop in their efforts to revive it – to save their own business reputations. Their desperation to exact vengeance has driven them to attempt conjuring up the dead,” he said.
“We live in fear,” he said. “Fear of our doorbells and mailboxes. Fear that upon opening the door there will be yet another process server with yet another subpoena in hand ordering us to yet another round of questions structured to only have wrong answers. Fear that there will be yet another shrewd and legally questionable attempt to levy our personal accounts.”
Mr. Ireland told the Council that until DACHA is dissolved, the DACHA residents cannot move on.
“I’m a volunteer, but DACHA has turned into way more than a full-time job for me,” he continued. “I cannot legally resign because State law does not allow the last-standing board members to resign until the corporation is dissolved.”
David Thompson responded, asking why the city has not taken the lead in solving this problem.
He told the Vanguard, “Both NP and TPCF have offered at the podium on numerous occasions to meet with the City to look for ways to settle the issues. We have agreed to mediate. Regretfully for all concerned, the City has refused all our offers. It is a shame that the City is not willing to mediate as the City has created an unneeded difficult impact on all the parties.”
“TPCF/NP continues to offer to mediate with the City and we continue to wonder why the City resists attempting to solve the problem and why the City told the Grand Jury that ‘settlement discussions have begun.’ Everyone, TPCF, NP, the City and the residents of DACHA will be better off if this were settled,” he said.
“DACHA is a public benefit corporation and that type of corporation, its board and its members have serious responsibilities for the corporate assets of the organization,” Mr. Thompson continued.
“No matter what was said last night there seems to be an unwillingness by DACHA, its board and members to follow the laws governing public benefit corporations,” he said. “Last night no one from DACHA or the City mentioned that DACHA is a public benefit corporation and there are specific laws and regulations governing its actions.”
He argued that the members of DACHA owe DACHA over $47,000 – an amount owed to a public benefit corporation.
“DACHA has obligations to the dissolution process which it refuses to carry out. For months DACHA has refused to provide TPCF and NP with documentation that would make for a more effective hearing. Lacking DACHA’s provision of appropriate documents there cannot be a fair and proper hearing,” he argued.
But the DACHA membership sees it differently. As Elaine Roberts Musser, who has been providing legal services pro bono to DACHA members argued, “DACHA is left incapable of defending itself, because corporations are required to be represented by an attorney, and no lawyer has been willing to take the case.”
“As long as DACHA technically remains in existence, burdened with two more potential default judgments, DACHA’s judgment creditors will use these judgments to continue severely abusing legal process,” she continued.
“NP has served 27 subpoenas on DACHA homeowners post judgment, and in one instance served a minor child. DACHA homeowners have been repeatedly dragged into debtor’s exams, then subjected to inappropriate questioning designed to obtain incriminating testimony for use in other lawsuits,” Ms. Roberts Musser continued.
Elaine Roberts Musser and the council argued about the need to re-notice David Thompson, Twin Pines and Neighborhood Partners which would restart a lengthy 120-day noticing period.
As Ms. Roberts Musser put it: “To what purpose? The city properly noticed all cooperatives in the region 4 months ago, including TPCF, an organization David Thompson himself represents. All that was required by statute was notice by first class mail, postage prepaid, which was accomplished as required.”
However, City Attorney Harriet Steiner, while clearly apprehensive about the need to do this, believes that without re-noticing, the matter could be tied up in court for six months and drag out far longer. She stated that, while it is not the city’s desire to re-notice, she believes it is faster and better than redoing this a year from now after a lengthy process.
She argued that it was unclear how much relief the members of DACHA would get from the dissolution of DACHA.
Ms. Steiner also said it it appeared that we gave them proper notice. During discussion it was fleshed out that, while they sent the notice to the right address, they may have slightly altered the name of the foundation from Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation to Twin Pines Community Cooperative.
As such, Mr. Thompson claimed that they sent the notice to the wrong cooperative at the right address.
This began a cat and mouse game between Council and David Thompson. David Thompson told the council that Luke Watkins was the only one authorized to speak on behalf of Neighborhood Partners.
The council was attempting to get some sort of resolution that evening.
Mayor Joe Krovoza said pointedly that if anything is filed on DACHA that would not have been filed otherwise, as the result of the continuance, that he wants to know immediately.
The council left the hearing open in hopes that Mr. Thompson would ask Mr. Watkins to come down that evening.
Following a break, there was a strange exchange in which Mr. Krovoza asked Mr. Thompson if he had spoken to Mr. Watkins. Mr. Thompson said that he had.
When Mr. Krovoza asked if Mr. Watkins was coming down, Mr. Thompson said that he did not know.
When asked if Mr. Thompson had passed along his request, Mr. Thompson said that he hadn’t.
“You’re kidding, right?” the Mayor asked.
Mr. Thompson would clarify with the Vanguard, “I think there was an accusation that people were being asked for personal financial information, bank accounts, etc.”
He said: “That is not true. People have been asked about the list of delinquencies and debts provided to us by DACHA that show what they, as members, owed to DACHA, a California public benefit corporation.”
Ethan Ireland, in a second round of comments, informed council that Twin Pines and Neighborhood Partners had already engaged in legal actions, attempting to take advantage of the non-dissolved status of the cooperative.
In the end, the council felt their hands were tied, given the legal stakes. They believed that they had to properly notice Twin Pines, despite their belief that they already had, in order to avoid a lengthier delay.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
David:
Since my name was mentioned in your article, I wish to comment.
The Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation and the Neighborhood Partners, LLC has asked the City of Davis to resolve this issue through mediation. This is the quickest path to resolution.
Mr. Ireland has a pattern of using emotional theater to mask the actual legal facts of the situation. And his “facts” are often inaccurate. It has not been a helpful approach to resolving the issues.
Using the full scope of the legal system to resolve these issues is an expensive, and confrontational process. I don’t recommend it to anyone. But our rights have been violated, and we have no choice, until the City of Davis offers one.
[quote]In the end, the council felt their hands were tied, given the legal stakes. They believed that they had to properly notice Twin Pines, despite their belief that they already had, in order to avoid a lengthier delay.[/quote]
At the end of the evening and for the sake of greater accuracy than this article has stated, Mayor Krovoza asked the acute and correct inquiries, and questioned whether DACHA’s judgment creditors were using the re-noticing argument for the purposes of “merging with an existing cooperative” as is required in the pertinent CA statute, or for the purpose of abusing legal process. Mayor Krovoza also noted that if the latter is the case, and if DACHA’s judgment creditors are going to continue filing lawsuit after lawsuit against DACHA anyway, then it was time to dissolve the organization. I am paraphrasing Mayor Krovoza’s comments, so he may feel free to correct anything I have said here if I have misconstrued his comments.
The City Council has TABLED THE DISCUSSION UNTIL ITS NEXT MEETING, so no decision by the CC on when to approve the dissolution of DACHA has been formerly made as of yet. Council member Steve Souza got to the bottom of the controversy, with some very, very acute questioning. City Attorney Harriet Steiner advised the City Council if it wanted to, it could indeed choose to dissolve DACHA within a much shorter time frame, rather than allowing this to drag out another 120 days.
The reason for dissolving DACHA IMMEDIATELY is crucial – DACHA must be represented by an attorney, but no attorney will take this case for various reasons. As a result, DACHA’s judgment creditors can go into court, say anything they want, and obtain two default judgments, and DACHA will not be permitted to even speak/defend itself. Then another round of subpoenas to debtor’s exams will probably be issued against DACHA homeowners. They could be dragged in again and again and subjected to more inappropriate questions that go far beyond what is permitted in a debtor’s exam, questions designed to obtain incriminating statements, as has already happened no less than 27 times. In one case, a minor child was served a subpoena. Many of these homeowners speak English as a second language, are not represented by an attorney, and are hardly in a position to understand legal language or how to answer a cleverly formulated question designed to elicit an incriminating answer.
I have agreed to draw up the dissolution plan pro bono (for free), which has taken up an inordinate amount of my life in the past 8 months – because I was disgusted at how ill used these homeowners have been and how much advantage has been taken of them. I also gave two seminars to them on how to handle questions in a debtor’s exam, after I learned about the inappropriate questions these homeowners had already been subjected to. So another attorney has been brought in and is being paid for the limited purpose of filing a motion to quash subpoenas and for a protective order, but there is no guarantee that motion will be granted. Not all of the DACHA homeowners felt able to pay this attorney, so will not be protected by any such motion and protective order even if it should be granted.
Meanwhile David Thompson is already at it again, last night threatening a new lawsuit against the city and the now defunct DACHA and its homeowners for the costs of the dissolution hearing his lawyers have allegedly incurred (he never stated exactly what those costs were beyond his little speech to the City Council) – the dissolution hearing he wants to drag out for another 120 days incurring more costs. WHO IS ENGAGING IN LEGAL HARRASSMENT HERE? WHO IS TRYING TO RESOLVE THE ISSUES HERE? DACHA homeowners want nothing more than for this nightmare to end. The city certainly wants this mess over.
YET WHO IS REFUSING TO COMPROMISE ON SHORTENING THE 120 DAY NOTICING PERIOD? WHO IS THREATENING MORE LAWSUITS, WHILE AT THE SAME TIME CLAIMING THEY ARE TRYING TO “RESOLVE” THE MATTER? WHO ARGUED THAT THE DACHA HOMEOWNERS NOT EVEN BE ALLOWED TO SPEAK DURING PUBLIC COMMENT LAST NIGHT? BOTTOM LINE – ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS…
[quote]Mr. Ireland has a pattern of using emotional theater to mask the actual legal facts of the situation. And his “facts” are often inaccurate. It has not been a helpful approach to resolving the issues. [/quote]
Mr. Ireland, the current Board President of DACHA, has been an extremely effective advocate for DACHA homeowners. He and I have worked tirelessly in unity with the DACHA homeowners to dissolve DACHA, and end this unspeakable nightmare. What happened last night at the City Council meeting speaks volumes with respect to DACHA creditors’ claims they are somehow trying to “resolve” things…
Not every group in Davis which manages low-income housing projects is out to enrich themselves at the expense of the residents and the taxpayers.
As far as I can tell, the Solar Community Housing Association ([url]http://schadavis.org/[/url]) is a well-run outfit, staffed by honest people who are not in the “affordable housing” business to enrich themselves. I am aware that even SCHA had a controversy among its ranks in 2009. But that appeared to me to be more of a personality conflict than anything else. Unlike some of these other travesties, where the management company tried to rig the system from the start so that the owners of the management company would make hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees and other renumeration, no one at SCHA is ripping people off. No one at SCHA is suing the City of Davis or its former residents, most of whom are unable to afford lawyers to defend themselves. The people who do run low-income housing projects for the purpose of ripping off the people they “serve” should be ashamed of themselves and should be shamed by our community.
Part of the blame for last night’s unnecessary fiasco of an improperly noticed dissolution hearing lies at the feet of city staff. It did not need to be that way.
TPCF wrote a long letter to the City in April this year offering to help structure the dissolution hearing as it was the first one under the new law. In the letter, TPCF made it plain that we wished to participate in the hearing and would provide extensive testimony.
The law governing the dissolution of a housing cooperative requires:
(b) The city or county shall provide notice to all interested parties. The notice shall be given at least 120 days prior to the date of the hearing.
City staff completely ignored our letter offering help and then went on to notify only the second group (housing cooperatives) required by law.
The City chose not to notify any interested parties. Did staff honestly believe that there were no interested parties? How about Neighborhood Partners to whom DACHA owed a judgment of $330,000? How about other creditors to whom DACHA owes over $100,000? How about banks? DACHA was the subject of a number of law suits would they not be interested parties? TPCF was the sponsor, a lender, the beneficiary and a plaintiff would we not be an interested party. Among the many responsibilities DACHA has for the dissolution of a public benefit corporation is an accounting of all its assets and liabilities and to who it owes money and how much.
When asked last week by City staff for a list of ”Interested Parties” I gave them names of 20 entities and asked them to get a list from DACHA of who they owe money to. Send out to that list and TPCF is satisfied on that matter.
The Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation was not noticed. Twin Pines Cooperative Community. Inc. is a 90 unit housing cooperative in Santa Clara with a business address on Capri Court, in Campbell. The City mailed to them on Capri Court in Davis of which there is no such street in Davis. The City also mailed to Twin Pines Community which was then also on F Street.
When I asked at a Council meeting in August when might the dissolution hearing be? No one on the Council answered, the City Attorney did not answer and City staff did not answer. They all knew…
It would have been so easy to follow the law and surely we are an interested party. The City and DACHA do need to follow the law.
David Thompson, President
Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation
Last night it was very telling David Thompson wanted the opportunity to speak during Public Comment, but requested that the City Council not allow any further testimony than his own – as DACHA homeowners lined up to tell their side of things at the City Council meeting. Fortunately Mayor Krovoza ignored David Thompson’s completely improper request, and the DACHA homeowners were finally allowed to have their say on what has happened to them collectively.
[i][quote]“As long as this corpse – the corpse of DACHA – remains unburied, DACHA’s creditors, represented by Neighborhood Partners and Twin Pines will never stop in their efforts to revive it – to save their own business reputations. Their desperation to exact vengeance has driven them to attempt conjuring up the dead….”[/quote][/i]As long as this “corpse” repeatedly pops up to spew this kind of slander, it has to be considered among the undead.[i][quote]“…the Davis City Council, powerless, implored David Thompson of Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation to bring his partner Luke Watkins down to the council chambers…and resolve the matter.[/quote][/i]Given the history here, this cannot be a serious approach (“Get down here and handle this like a man!”) The City is not “powerless,” in spite of the questionable way it’s handled this issue over the years.
We should be moving out of mediation/settlement attempts–our present track looks expensive and ultimately unsatisfactory for all involved–regardless of how we feel about the participants.
[b]Elaine[/b], good of you to donate your time and devote your knowledge and energy to this can of worms.
Mayor Krovoza and members of the City Council
My name is David Thompson, President of the Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation.
Although TPCF has made a number of requests, city staff continues to refuse to uphold California’s Law on cooperatives.
On dissolution (b) The city or county shall provide notice to all interested parties. The notice shall be given at least 120 days prior to the date of the hearing.
TPCF, Neighborhood Partners and other “interested parties” such as lenders, creditors, etc, holding interests of over four million dollars have not been notified. Why is it so hard for your staff to obey California law?
TPCF provides funding that creates ten million dollars of capital for food cooperative development. We rely on our many partners to ensure that organizations that receive our funds obey their bylaws, operate according to their loan agreements and state and federal laws.
By their conduct, the staff of the City of Davis has lost our trust.
Let’s look at the DACHA that borrows over $4 million in public funds from the City of Davis/RDA.
All the DACHA board members were ineligible to serve as they should have been automatically removed for being delinquent more than 30 days to the organization. So the DACHA board had no legal quorum.
However, Harriet Steiner later says that was okay because the city then asked the members to vote. But it seems only about three of the members were eligible to vote (the same 30 day rule disallowed almost all of them from voting legally) so there was no legal membership quorum of eleven eligible members.
So at a later meeting the DACHA board President (with city staff Danielle Foster present) recommends that the DACHA members vote to suspend the bylaw that prohibits them from voting if they are more than 30 days behind. So a membership that has no legal quorum suspends the bylaws so that they can all illegally vote on a loan of public funds from which they all gain. Suspending the bylaws in this manner required the approval of TPCF as a lender but TPCF’s rights are ignored.
At this time the 20 DACHA members were delinquent to the tune of $54,123 dollars. So we appear to have a new city staff program called Davis Dollars for Deadbeats.
DACHA’s minutes show city staff members Jerilyn Cochran or Danielle Foster participated in most of the meetings were the breaking of the bylaws, the articles of incorporation and loan agreements occurred.
The conduct of Danielle Foster and city staff is an affront to both the lending and the cooperative community in Davis and should be investigated.
I ask you the City Council to override staff and vote to uphold California Law by re-noticing the dissolution hearing and providing TPCF, NP and interested parties with a 120 day notice of the hearing.
Spetember 6, 2011
The Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation only learned of the dissolution hearing for the Davis Area Cooperative Housing Association (DACHA) from a story in the Davis Enterprise of August 11. City staff has confirmed that they did not send notice to any interested parties. A review of the city’s records show that no notice was sent to the Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation as required by law.
TPCF is an “Interested Party” and is required to be notified. TPCF has asked City staff to re-notice the dissolution hearing and inform TPCF and other “Interested Parties.” We are grateful that the notice is now for January 24, 2011 and are now preparing. We don’t know why the City refused for too long to re-notice the hearing,therefore not complying with California’s co-op law.
TPCF is an “Interested Party” due to it;
Being a sponsor of DACHA
Being the charitable beneficiary named in the original Articles of Incorporation
Holding a permanent seat on the DACHA board
Having the right to appoint up to five sponsor seats on the DACHA board
Being owed money by DACHA
Having a lawsuit against DACHA for breaking numerous California laws
DACHA is one of the few housing cooperatives in the past fifty years in the US to go through foreclosure and attempt to dissolve. The dissolution hearing was intended by Assembly Member Jones (now State Insurance Commissioner) to provide a mechanism for there to be a full and impartial review of whether DACHA has conducted itself among other standards according to state and federal law and whether IRS rules have been met etc.
Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation approves of the January 24th date but will trongly opposes approval of dissolution given what has been done to destroy a mutual benefit corporation by an ineligible board and an ineligible membership.
I compare the arrogant conduct of city staff with the understanding staff of the Davis Food Co-op (DFC). As one of the 10,000 DFC members I was informed that there had been a small error in the recent bylaw election. The DFC President and General Manager did another mailing to the membership and apologized for missing the error. The DFC provided me and all the other members with a chance to change my vote.
I am beginning to wonder if there is any co-op law that city staff is willing to follow.”
David Thompson,Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation
I have known Luke Watkins and David Thompson since the early 1980s. When I was on the CC from 2000-04, both Luke and David brought many types of affordable housing and coop issues to the CC. I never, ever had them misrepresent facts or law or analysis to the CC. David and Luke always seemed to be representing the side of fairness and truth.
I do know that the DACHA membership a few years ago attempted to take the DACHA coop homes for themselves, and that would be improper. This entire mess stems from that attempt to help themselves to this city-subsidized public resource. Twin Pines also contributed substantial sums of its members resources to help what should have been a very cool, and very progressive, housing coop work. Instead, DACHA members flat out tried to gain the homes for themselves. Without David and Luke and Twin Pines stepping in and going to court, the plan would have surely succeeded.
No legal board quorum. No legal membership Quorum.
But staff let DACHA borrowed $4 million of public funds from the City of Davis
We should all be this fortunate.
The board which authorized borrowing the $4 million did not have a legal quorum. According to the bylaws most board members were ineligible to serve. If you were 30 days delinquent you had to be automatically removed from the board. (No one was and the City staff said nothing)
However, it did not matter says the City Attorney because we had the membership vote (Council meeting in October 2010).
So with the city staff in attendance at different DACHA meetings (Danielle Foster and Jerilyn Cochran) they then discussed a membership vote. But then they figured out there are not enough eligible members for there to be a quorum. So they came up with the idea of suspending the bylaws (which said you could not vote if you were delinquent 30 days or more to DACHA). If they suspended the bylaws (not allowed by the bylaws and any change in the bylaws without permission was against loan conditions) then they would have a quorum but not a legal one. However, the entire vote was illegal and city staff was at most of the meetings where this was discussed.
Anyhow, there were not enough legal members to create a quorum to suspend the bylaws in the first place. So three illegal votes to borrow $4 million of public funds.
City staff knows that all this went on and this seems to be OK. Sure sounds like some third world country.
Then the City Attorney had the board vote again to confirm that the first board vote was valid.
Did this really happen in Davis? Well Yes.
And the Council allowed this to happen with $4 million in public funds?
Worried about management of public funds?
David Thompson, Twin Pines Cooperative Foundation
[quote]I ask you the City Council to override staff and vote to uphold California Law by re-noticing the dissolution hearing and providing TPCF, NP and interested parties with a 120 day notice of the hearing.[/quote]
For what purpose?
[quote]I do know that the DACHA membership a few years ago attempted to take the DACHA coop homes for themselves, and that would be improper. This entire mess stems from that attempt to help themselves to this city-subsidized public resource. Twin Pines also contributed substantial sums of its members resources to help what should have been a very cool, and very progressive, housing coop work. Instead, DACHA members flat out tried to gain the homes for themselves. Without David and Luke and Twin Pines stepping in and going to court, the plan would have surely succeeded. [/quote]
In one lawsuit against the city, its demurrer was sustained. That means the court held the city was not at fault, despite claims to the contrary. An audit and a Grand Jury report do not comport with the allegations made above…
ERM: it’s a long way from being done in Yolo County Superior Court. We shall see. Given the clearly questionnable DACHA Board votes and the alleged give away of $4 million of public money to DACHA, I would bet on Plaintiffs. I saw the contract in one of the agenda packets for CC, and I believe there is an attorneys fees and costs clause to the prevailing party? I hope that the homes go back to a reconstituted DACHA and are occupied by lower income residents pursuant to coop and affordable housing law.
One thing that has always stumped me about the case is: Why is the City Attorney litigating this case? I believe she drafted the contracts; she drafted the loan documents; and her recommendations and advice were involved at every step of the way to the current mess.
She is a fact witness. In a case like this, the attorney would almost certainly be called to testify.
My basic understanding of the rules governing attorneys is generally the one who drafts the contracts cannot or should not handle the litigation, because the drafting of the contract is a factual issue as to the meaning of words, and the parties. Also, if the contract was alledgely poorly worded or improperly handled and results in years of litigation, the client may sometimes have a claim against the attorney.
The attorneys I know who draft contracts and whose advice is at issue in a case do not litigation their handiwork; they tell the client to hire indpendent counsel who handles the litigation and evaluates the work product of the drafting attorney.
Why is the City Attorney even handling this case?
She has made a small fortune off of the litigation that arises from her work product and recommendations to staff and the CC, and there are probably $100,000s of fees yet to go til the case is over.
Rochelle and Joe and Dan: I hope the two of you will really look at this, and hire independent counsel to give you advice on how to proceed.
[i][quote]“In one lawsuit against the city, its demurrer was sustained. That means the court held the city was not at fault….”[/quote][/i][b]Elaine,[/b] “the city was not at fault” with regard to what? (The quote from Michael charges DACHA members with bad deeds/intent, not the city.)
I guess I have the same question about the significance you see in the audit/GJ report. “Comport with” what allegations? I can’t remember being very impressed with the Grand Jury work on this–too restricted a look considering all the problems becoming apparent in this project.
In spite of Michael’s hopes for a “reconstituted DACHA,” I can’t imagine this mess ever turning out to be a positive for any of the present parties. The city needs to get out of its forever failing affordable housing ventures…for good.
To JustSaying: Because this matter is still under litigation, I cannot comment further.
[quote]ERM: it’s a long way from being done in Yolo County Superior Court.[/quote]
1. Whatever happened to the notion of “innocent until proven guilty”?
2. David Thompson’s claims in one case against the city have NOT been sustained. That should lead one to wonder about the rest of the “charges” against DACHA.
[quote]I saw the contract in one of the agenda packets for CC, and I believe there is an attorneys fees and costs clause to the prevailing party? I hope that the homes go back to a reconstituted DACHA and are occupied by lower income residents pursuant to coop and affordable housing law. [/quote]
The DACHA homes were foreclosed on and has no assets whatever. Wherever did you get the idea DACHA would ever be reconstituted?
Correction: The DACHA homes were foreclosed on and DACHA has no assets whatever.
[quote]I can’t remember being very impressed with the Grand Jury work on this–too restricted a look considering all the problems becoming apparent in this project. [/quote]
There was an audit; a Grand Jury Report; a letter from the former head of Legal Services of Northern CA; a judge in the bankruptcy hearing; a judge assigned to the subpoena situation, who do not agree with David Thompson’s version of events, nor Mike Harrington’s. That, unfortunately, is all I am at liberty to say on the matter…
[quote]By their conduct, the staff of the City of Davis has lost our trust. [/quote]@Mr. Thompson… would that be all staff, in all departments, or just those directly involved in the DACHA matter?
[quote]@Mr. Thompson… would that be all staff, in all departments, or just those directly involved in the DACHA matter?[/quote]
I would argue many in the public have perhaps lost trust in Mr. Thompson… I know the DACHA homeowners certainly have…
[i]”I would argue many in the public have perhaps lost trust in Mr. Thompson… I know the DACHA homeowners certainly have…”[/i]
Would that be all of Mr. Thompson or just the part of Mr. Thompson trying to enrich himself in running affordable housing programs?
Rifkin: all of these public benefit programs have to have professionals who set them up and make them work. For example, CHOC is another affordable housing provider, and they make money to pay themselves, and no one criticisms them, do they? I don’t remember the amounts of the professional fees for Neighborhood Partners, but I can tell you that for 4 years the CC closely studied those numbers for projects at that time, and all of it seemed in the normal range.
This is funny. The negotiating tactics I’ve watched David Thompson use at City Council over the years have really made me think of the negotiating tactics used in this video. Guess I wasn’t the only one considering Ethan Ireland’s statements as reported above.
[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOlznuyPOeM[/url]
Latest update in so far as I am aware: City’s demurrer on second lawsuit was sustained as to fraud charge, and sustained with leave to amend on remainder of charges. What that means in layman’s terms is the fraud charges were dismissed; the rest of the charges would be dismissed if the pleadings are as written – the attorney is being given the opportunity to add information if there is anything more. I will leave it to the readers to judge how much credibility there is in Mr. Thompson’s charges…