Folks,
Wow, what a shock to read this below.
It would seem to me to be an inappropriate and unprofessional use of this
(otherwise professional) forum to publicly post, in this manner, one
member's privately-expressed, wildly speculative, ill-informed and
misguided
negative opinions about another member, especially about the president and
leader of our organization, without checking and verification through
other
sources (such as other FLEAA board members). This kind of
misrepresentation
and impugning of character, based on incorrect assumptions, attributed to
erroneously inferred motives, and by jumping to unjustified speculative
conclusions, is nothing more than irresponsible calumny and something I
would suggest we should all use a little more forethought, restraint,
discretion, prudence, and maturity, before just carelessly forwarding
something like this to our public discussion list.
To set the record straight here, Shawn, myself, and the entire FLEAA board
have been guided in these matters, first and foremost, by the overridding
principle of self-determination, both at the state level and at the local
level. For a long time now, we have consistently taken the position that
it
is up to each local region within the state to make their own decisions
about whether to form their own independent EAA chapter or alternatively
to
become a regional group within and under the auspices of the FLEAA as the
statewide umbrella organization, and there might well even be different
variations, permutations, and combinations of those two alternatives, as
has
been discussed from time to time. Furthermore, some local areas may
decide
to start out as regional groups within the FLEAA and then later transition
into breaking off and forming their own independent EAA chapter, once they
have larger numbers of members. So there are many different options here,
and we on the FLEAA board have consistently encouraged folks in different
regions to consider all of the options, the advantages and disadvantages
of
each, think it through, ask questions, discuss it with all their local
colleagues, and then make their own decisions. The position of the FLEAA
board towards various regional groupings, in whatever form, has
consistently
been one of encouragement, collaboration, cooperation, communication,
camaraderie, and mutual support, whether regions decide to form their own
independent EAA chapters or to be part of the FLEAA statewide umbrella
organization, or some combination of the two. I myself have had a number
of
such discussions along these lines over the last year and a half with
people
around the state, where I have stated exactly what I just wrote here, and
the FLEAA board has had a couple of conference calls over the last year
which have included some of the principals representing various different
regions of Florida to discuss all of this. In all of these board
discussions and conference calls, Shawn's and the board's positions have
been as I have described here in this post. In one such series of
deliberations, we even discussed and prepared for an orderly division of
the
state into various different regions for the formation of multiple
independent EAA chapters. That possibility is of course still there. It
really just depends on what everyone in the various different regions
wants
to do. The decision is up to each individual region and is theirs to
make.
Again, self-determination is the guiding principle here.
Speaking for myself and my own substantial and close personal interaction
with Shawn and the rest of the FLEAA board, I have never seen Shawn or any
other board members get "angry" throughout any of these discussions.
Shawn
and the board's primary concern has been to try to promote and make sure
of
adequate communications and coordination between various regions of the
state and the FLEAA board in such processes and deliberations. In all but
one case, through the outstanding efforts of all involved, there has
indeed
been excellent communications and coordination. In the one case where the
communications and coordination seemed to be lacking, Shawn and the board
did express some concern about that, but I would not characterize Shawn's
and the board's attitude as one of "anger". I would also just second
Fran's
comments below that she was in no way responsible for the lack of
communications and coordination in that one particular case and in fact
had
absolutely no knowledge of it, as she stated, and Shawn and the board
fully
understood and recognized that.
Speaking of communications, this is a subject that obviously needs some
explanation and clarification given the glaring misunderstandings of one
of
our members, reflected in her comments below, that have arisen out of an
apparent gap in communications and the misguided highly speculative
assumptions, motives, and conclusions that she has unfortunately inferred
as
a result. There are always going to be gaps and time lags in
communications
by any one individual board member, sometimes shorter, sometimes longer,
depending on one's own individual circumstances and the ebbs and flows in
one's personal life. That is why we have a board of several individuals
and
not just a single individual -- among other things, so that we can all
support and help each other with the communications load. This is how we
function and operate as a board, especially with respect to
communications.
We do it in a tag-team or relay-rally type of fashion, passing the batton
back and forth between board members, according to the ebbs and flows of
each one's personal life, which will generally vary from person to person
and from time to time. Let's please not forget that this is an
all-volunteer organization and that we do this as a passion, but a passion
that doesn't put food on anyone's table nor pay the rent or mortgage, and
therefore our FLEAA activities and duties, including communications, must
necessarily take a back seat to higher priority commitments like work and
family. This means that we are occasionally (even *often*, at least in my
case, as I'm one of the worst offenders in this) not as timely and
responsive on communications as we would ideally like to be. What happens
on the board is that we pass communications duties back and forth between
us
according to who has got some slack capacity and bandwidth at any given
time. There are times when I am just swamped and I ask for Shawn's or
Matt's or Allan's help in responding to someone about something, and
someone
is usually able to help me out, or I will say to Shawn that I just can't
handle any communications and respond to any email for the next two weeks,
and could you please help me out?, and Shawn is often able to do so.
Likewise with Shawn, there are times when he is swamped and has no spare
capacity and asks for my or Matt's help, and one of us is usually able to
pick up the slack for him. That has been the case for the last few weeks,
as I know that Shawn is absolutely swamped at work right now. In fact I
even heard Shawn express some exasperation a few weeks ago about so many
people that he has not been able to get back to and respond to, and Fran
was
one of the names he mentioned. (I should have, and would have, offered to
help Shawn if it weren't for the fact that I myself am stretched pretty
thin
right now.) I also know, from what Shawn has often said to me, that he
has
the utmost, highest respect and admiration for Fran and all the great work
she has done and continues to do to promote and advance the cause of
electric vehicles in Florida, both in North Florida and throughout the
entire state. There has been no greater supporter of Fran and her
family's
ambitious EVI statewide tour than Shawn!
So what I would ask people here is just to have a little bit of patience
and
understanding on such communications time lags and not go off the deep end
in reading too much into such gaps by jumping to unwarranted conclusions
and
acribing and attributing such negative motives to people and engaging in
this kind of wild speculation and inferring such negative things about
them
and impugning their character in this kind of way. Folks, there are
several
people on the FLEAA board. If you can't get a hold of one of us and get a
response out of one of us, it's probably because that particular
individual
is swamped and maxxed out on bandwidth at the moment. So please then just
try others of us, until you get one of us who can respond to you in a
timely
fashion. On behalf of the board, I apologize for the frustrations caused
by
having to take this kind of Russian Roulette, hit-or-miss type of approach
to finding which one of us currently has enough slack capacity for quickly
responding to you, but again, that is just a fact of this being an
all-volunteer organization that all of us do on the side, as time permits.
Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the
outstanding leadership of our FLEAA president, Shawn Waggoner, who gives
selflessly and tirelessly of himself to this organization and movement and
has done more to promote and advance the cause of electric vehicles in the
state of Florida than anyone else I know. I could go on at great length
here about Shawn's many outstanding contributions and achievements, but it
would take me several pages of writing, and most of us already know and
appreciate everything that Shawn does if you are actively involved in EVs
around the state. This calumnious impugning of Shawn's character is most
unfair to him and is completely uncalled for on our public forum. It is
something that I as Shawn's colleague on the board, having the utmost
respect for him and his leadership, take umbrage to. I would humbly and
respectively suggest that Shawn is owed an apology. No offense or
disrespect is intended to anyone here.
Thanks & best regards,
Charles Whalen
Florida EAA
----- Original Message -----
From: "TED" <[email protected]>
To: "fran sullivan-fahs" <[email protected]>; "FLEAA Mailing List"
<[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, May 30, 2009 7:30 AM
Subject: Re: [FLEAA] hi ted & bobbye from fran
Sorry to hear. I hope you will still write to us. We so enjoyed EVI in
Fort Myers. TED
From: fran sullivan-fahs
Sent: Friday, May 29, 2009 2:34 PM
To: TED
Subject: Re: hi ted & bobbye from fran
Thanks, Ted. It is probably too late, but I was so snowed under when I got
back from the trip that it took me too long to pull this together.
I guess you heard that Shawn got angry when the Tallahassee group formed a
chapter that was independant of the FLEAA. I wasn't even a part of that.
It
was already formed when I got back from the EVI. I didn't even know the
people who formed it. But somehow Shawn must have felt that I was
responsible so he quit answering my emails and calls. It is sad. I thought
that we were good friends, but, oh well...
I will continue to promote EVs with whoever is willing to do that!
Happy trails. Fran
----- Original Message -----
From: TED
To: fran sullivan-fahs
Sent: Friday, May 29, 2009 9:27 AM
Subject: Re: hi ted & bobbye from fran
Forwarded you email to Chad. TED
From: fran sullivan-fahs
Sent: Tuesday, May 26, 2009 10:19 AM
To: Edward Ellyatt
Subject: hi ted & bobbye from fran
How are all things Ev down by you folks? Did you hear that we have a
chapter up in Tallahassee now?
Do you remember that guy who did the great interview down by ya'll when
we
were there? Chad Oliver was his name. I have been trying to get a copy of
his interview since it was so good! Could you guys call him locally to see
if he could get me access to that tape? If this is too old of an issue at
this point, don't worry about it. His number is 239 939 2020. Thanks,
friends. Fran
Fran Sullivan-Fahs & The EVI
w 850 656 5409
m 850 524 1972
http://eviblog.floridaeaa.org
"There can be no purpose more
enspiriting than to begin the age
of restoration, reweaving the
wondrous diversity of life that
still surrounds us." E.O. Wilson
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http://www.floridaeaa.org
_______________________________________________
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http://www.floridaeaa.org
