Click bait if i am to be honest; so what is MTM? More Teachable Moments. The Sun City Advocates was formed about 4 months ago. We are in our infancy and feeling our way along as we go. Last week we tried a poll out on the members/readers (you didn't need to join us to respond). It was less than creative, scientific or even well worded. We simply wanted to see is people would respond. Boy, did they. We will be meeting tomorrow to decide how best to show you the comments. I have taken the liberty of posting one of them here: "Too many people are letting Bill run the show and are blindly following him like he’s the Pied Piper. Lots of the people here don’t know about the last time a group tried to force change. The end result was a card holders ended up paying more to defend RCSC in a lawsuit. Somehow, I can’t help but think that this is where this is heading. I agree that we as homeowners are not having enough input in capital decisions and that needs to change. I also understand the urgency in curtailing the Mountainview project before it turns into a disaster." Lots to unpack there, and much of it allows us all a teachable moment. For starters, i am not "running the show." I have no interest in being anyone's Pied Piper. My presence is from more a historical perspective which i try and embed in the writing i do for the SCA. I believe our future is contained in the successes of our past. Which is why the comment above is so important. Actually there were two activists groups in Sun City over the years. The first was the "Concerned Recreation Members" (CRM) and was started back in the early 80's. DEVCO had just left and there was an internal struggle over how to move forward. The CRM wanted to recall the RCSC board president and vice president. There were lawsuits flying and ugly turmoil in the community. The second group began in the early 2000's. As the poster indicated, the ultimate legal challenge lasted near on 20 years. Resources that could have/should have been spent in the community were redirected to legal costs. The Sun City Formula Registry's outcome was to get Sun City to fall under Title 33 of the state statutes. In his post the writer suggested the card holders (we like to think of them as members), had to pay higher fees. After the posting of the 990's, we now know the very large increase in rec fees that year (2018) resulted in millions of dollars added to the cash reserves. It begs the question doesn't it? Anyway, the point here is; lawsuits are folly. We are literally suing ourselves. In my humble opinion, there are a number of "breach of fiduciary responsibilities suits," we could bring against the RCSC, but why bother? We have no interest in suing ourselves. We believe in communication, education and participation for the community to return to its roots. So we are clear, i have been sharing these stories and sentiments with the group for months now. The poster suggested he felt those early outcomes were where he saw this groups efforts going. To be abundantly clear, i don't see it that way, nor would i encourage the SCA to work towards that end. Hope that clears up any misunderstanding on the part of the person who posted it. More importantly, for those out there who see the SCA as some sort of subversive group. We're not. We are members who love all that Sun City is and more importantly, working to help it become all it can be.
There were hundreds of comments on the Sun City Advocates site, most of them in support of our efforts, a handful, not. One in particular was critical and hopefully the response i wrote to it be used in our email to members, will trigger some continued sentiments. We've never suggested we have all the answers or that we are always right. In fact, we are more than delighted to have a free-flow exchange of ideas and information with RCSC members. That's why we haven't limited comments on the Sun City Advocates site to just those who have signed up. Years back while serving on the RCSC board of directors i had suggested we do an interactive blog/message board. Building a site where members could log-in and ask questions. I had used this technique when i ran a non-profit (7500 member union) quite effectively. We didn't censor questions (unless they were gross or obscene). When i suggested it to the board, the look of abject horror was on their faces. The general manager also was taken aback and asked me why we would do that? My answer was so simple it hurt. I told her if i couldn't articulate why we were doing something, perhaps we shouldn't be doing it. Yikes, the look on her face was worth the three years of pain and agony i spent on the board. Think about it; any action taken by the management team or directed to the board to take should be easily justifiable. The question you have to ask yourself, or more importantly, the board and management: "Is there anything that goes on in Sun City that should be kept a secret from the members." And let me be clear, there are things covered under law that would fall under "executive session," but once that small handful of items is removed, why should anything else be kept from the community? The only argument is, they must believe the community belongs to them and not all of us.
Dang yesterday was a long day and when i clicked on TOSC last night and saw MTM as a thread, my first thought was: Why would anyone want to read about Mary Tyler Moore? Yikes, it truly is a bitch to get old. But then the alternatives are way better than MTM's, we lost her back in 2017. So many good shows, great characters. Lou Grant was my favorite; though given my growing senility, Ted Baxter just might replace him.
