Budway self-destructs, flies plane into Taxpayers League in attempt to avoid hostile takeover by former board members -- VTL re-births itself in spite of Budway's sabotage

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After his entire Board of Directors resigned to protest Budway's idiotic mismanagement, a group of former board members, including the late Herb Levine, had engineered a hostile takeover by demanding Budway's resignation under threat of legal consequences -- Budway freaked out, called the former board "a bunch of flakes," then tried to destroy the League in an act of political terrorism, ending his childish tirade by blaming the entire world for ganging up against him; unfazed, former board members start re-incorporation process

ref: Gondo story on Budway heroically pushing the self-destruct button on the Taxpayers League (link - pops in new window)

The Venice Taxpayers [League] is alive and well, something that apparently scares the bejeebers out of both ex-VTL dictator Gary Budway and semi-literate newsroom gadfly Greg Giles. After reading Giles' premature article on the death of the VTL, I was laughing like hell. To the casual reader, it appears as though Gary Budway is one very bitter and lonely man while the Gondo couldn't even wait for Herb Levine to be in his grave for four weeks before spitting on it. The Gondo and Budway are behaving as though they are scared shitless that Herb might change his mind about this dead and buried thing he has going.

Nice job, guys. Good to see that the Gondo continues to stay classy.

Now that the Gondo has spun out the fiction, here's what really happened.

Gary Budway resigned under threat of legal action by former board members, including Herb Levine, for a number of reasons, including the fact that he was not legally the President as he has held no annual elections during his two years at the helm. Additionally, he has been unable to form a quorum since July of this year as all but one of his board members have resigned in protest over various illegal and unethical actions that Budway had taken as the VTL's self-appointed dictator.

For the past six months, the VTL was Budway and Rosemary Vauzanges and nobody else.

The VTL's bylaws, as they existed under Budway and Levine's leadership, called for a minimum of eight board members to a maximum of fifteen, with six board members needed to have a quorum at a League meeting. Under Budway, the VTL had two board members in total.

Board elections are held annually in July, with board members serving two-year terms and the President serving a one-year term, elected by the Board of Directors from current active board members.

Budway was appointed President when Levine stepped down in late 2008, and, in true Il Duce fashion, he subsequently suspended elections in 2009 and 2010, thus Budway's term as President expired in July of 2009 and the organization technically has had no legal leader since then. Despite that, Budway claimed himself as President for an indeterminate period without ever calling for an election.

According to notes taken by Gelormino, who has attended every meeting since July of this year, Budway held meetings, conducted business, authorized spending, all under the watch of two board members -- himself and Vauzanges.

That's not only against the rules, but in the case of making ANY disbursements of money, that's illegal, especially when no bookkeeping was being done.

At the October VTL meeting, which Levine, Gelormino, and I attended, Budway stated that there was approximately $500 in the treasury and that he would be pocketing it in the event of the VTL's demise.

It was at that meeting that Levine, Gelormino, and myself all demanded Budway's resignation under threat of legal action aimed at Budway personally.

At the December meeting, Budway stated that he had received notification from the State of Florida that the non-profit status of the VTL was in jeopardy as he had not filed some of the required paperwork necessary to maintain that status. I do not pretend to understand the problem fully at this time, but Budway, when questioned, was not only unwilling to elaborate but became downright hostile to former VTL bookkeeper Ali Hicks. Budway stated that he had already closed down the corporation of the VTL with the state as, in his words at the final meeting, this would "avoid having to pay back taxes" that the organization may end up owing as a result of his mismanagement.

Budway acknowledged that the organization had kept no financial records of donations and what was done with the donation money, as the VTL had been running without a bookkeeper. When asked if he would turn over the checking statements so that we could clean the mess up, he replied, "Hell, no." So we don't (and won't) know who gave money or what Budway has done with it. Given the fact that Budway stated he was going to pocket any remaining funds, it comes as no surprise that he would refuse to turn over any checking statements to the new organization, even referring to us in the Gondo as "flakes" for asking the question.

Budway claimed that the leftover money was a recent "loan" made by himself, however with no quorum of board members ever able to vote to take out any loans (seeing as there was no bookkeeper, it's a sure bet that there is no loan paperwork existing that was ever dated, signed, and notarized by the lender and accepting board members), any VTL money that came from Budway would legally be a donation, not a loan.

Thus any monetary take-back would, in all likelihood, be considered an act of theft. Not bad for a retired sworn law enforcement officer.

Additionally, Budway refused to turn over membership info to the new organization as, in his words, "The Taxpayers League is dead and it needs to stay dead," which is straight out of South Park's Eric Cartman: "It's my ball and I'm taking it home. I hate you guys, I hate you guys, I hate you guys."

It is almost as though Budway has become yet another Dan Boone hand-puppet.

Budway's final words to Levine: "I'm keeping the money."

Levine's final words to Budway, as Budway was walking out of the still-ongoing meeting: "Don't go away mad..."

Budway had left before Levine could finish the sentence. Levine and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Levine's attitude about Budway and the money? "Let him keep it. We're getting rid of him cheap."

The two men would never meet again. Budway subsequently boycotted Levine's funeral and memorial services.

It is interesting to note that despite Budway's use of Levine's death to give self-promoting false praise in the Gondolier's obituary article, Budway did not even make a condolence call or send a sympathy card to the Levine family, not in his name, nor in the name of the VTL. It was an insult that did not go unnoticed by Herb's survivors. Again, very classy, but typical Budway behavior.

In actuality, Budway did us a huge favor by closing the corporation -- it causes Budway and Vauzanges to be solely responsible for their own lack of stewardship with no way to point the finger of blame at anyone else.

The new organization, to be known as the Venice Taxpayers [League] until after board elections in July of 2011, when we will refile as the Venice Taxpayers League, is being started as a new corporation with a new Federal EIN number. This will protect us from liability resulting from Budway's illegal actions.

Then there's this fictional history of the VTL -- it wasn't always a combative organization. That's just simply not true: the VTL was started by Finn Caspersen because Caspersen was accusing the city of ripping off residents with bogus numbers on their water bills. Caspersen had previously tried unsuccessfully to get the city's billing department to change their evil ways. Caspersen was angry -- angry enough to start a protest organization designed to point the finger of accusation at officials who were fiddling with the city's books.

While ex-mayor Dean Calamaras now praises Finn Caspersen, in reality, the two men apparently hated each other. Years back I remember researching and reading a number of articles and documents that referenced some heated arguments between the two men. IIRC, Calamaras thought Caspersen was a busy-body, while Caspersen once referred to Calamaras as a dullard.

So I don't know what kind of imaginary roots Budway claims he was trying to return the organization to, but they weren't any roots that ever existed in this dimension or on this planet.

Here's yet another fine example of Giles and Budway just making stuff up. From Giles' article: "Budway said he couldn’t turn the organization over to Gelormino because he isn’t a city of Venice resident, a VTL criterion."

Heh?

"Membership in this organization shall be open to all concerned citizens of the City of Venice and the surrounding areas who support the purposes and statements in Article II." -- VTL's bylaws, Article III (1).

It was Levine's final stated wish that the VTL be resurrected and that Budway be ousted for his gross mismanagement, this as stated by Levine to myself, Mike Gelormino, Herb's widow, Shirley, and his children. Levine left the duty to Gelormino and myself to rebuild the organization, and we promised him and his family that we would.

That immediately caused a spark of fear to blow out into wild, near hallucinogenic paranoia on the part of both Greg Giles and Gary Budway. Fear and loathing in the Gondo's front office.

And so the demons flew. We are all suddenly in bat country. Giles' article, full of misleading information designed to demean the future of the VT[L] as well as Levine's legacy, caused a very upset Shirley Levine to call me this morning to ask what she had done wrong -- Why was the Gondo trashing her dead husband's name? Why were Gelormino and I breaking our promise?

To Shirley, I can only assure: we're not. The VT[L] will be resurrected and will hopefully continue to fulfill the very vision that Herb Levine (and Finn Caspersen) had for it. The old board is back and membership is already growing. That, apparently, scares the bejeebers out of Giles, Budway, the Gondo, and the CQG, hence the post-mortem attack on Levine.

I love it. It tells me that we're not even fully armed and loaded yet and the attacks against the resident citizens of Venice have already started. These bastards are already terrified. In the morning, in the evening: Ain't we got fun?

The VT[L]'s interim board, pending board elections, is: Mike Gelormino, President; John Patten, Vice President; Alice Hicks, Treasurer; Earl Quandt, Director; Thedeus Koszarski, Director; Jim Leis, Director.

The next Venice Taxpayers [League] meeting will be on Monday, January 3, 1:30 PM at City Hall. Come one and all to see an historic rebirth.

-- John Patten, interim Vice President, Venice Taxpayers [League]