[Ansteorra] Accountability... (was: The original complaint..)

[Galen Bevel]

Well said and absolutely on target.

Graf Galen Kirchenbauer

On Fri, Feb 10, 2012 at 11:05 AM, Lori C. <countesskat at yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>
> I apologize in advance for this little wall of text, and I know I'm
> risking the apocalypse by posting to the Ansteorra list twice in one
> week... but...
>
> Before this slides under the rug (where it likely belongs) I just wanted
> to mention something. It annoys me when anyone suggests that we are all
> responsible for the current situation. None of us is responsible for the
> actions of the crazy people who harm children, or for the repercussions
> that harm generates.
>
> I choose to believe that this lawsuit isn't about punishment. I think
> it was about forcing change in the SCA. And you know what? Many, many
> changes have been made to the way we deal with kids in our organization
> since 2005. We (even those of us without kids) are all now very aware of
> the liability we face for having official children's programs, and the
> corporation has tried to implement things that will limit our risk. Mission
> accomplished. Lesson learned.
>
> But please, don't let it end there, because there is a second lesson to
> learn... and the future of our game depends on it. This lawsuit was
> inevitable from the moment the SCA appointed kids activity officers and
> started sanctioning kids activities. We knew it at the time. Someone wise
> even said "all it will take is one lawsuit to wipe us out." Thankfully,
> through a lot of legal effort and the generosity of the kingdoms that isn't
> going to happen. This time.
>
> Folks, this is about organizations that work with kids being sued right
> and left, especially those with - as someone said earlier - deep financial
> pockets. We were naive to think we could weed out the predators and
> subsequently dodge the lawsuit bullet. Even with all of our safeguards in
> place to protect our children we are only doing half of what is needed to
> protect our organization going forward. What Robert Fitzmorgan so
> eloquently said earlier is true... the part about the dangers of keeping
> all our financial asset eggs in one basket.
>
> See... so many of us knew this was a problem long, long ago, back in '95
> when we discovered that the corporation could (and would) take money from
> kingdoms to pay corporate debts. Back then, several kingdoms looked into
> incorporating independently as a safeguard to protect our local assets. A
> few even succeeded, but it wasn't a very well implemented rebellion. In the
> end we proved that the kingdoms could find ways to protect our assets, but
> no real and lasting changes were made. Time and distance from the crisis
> made us forget how vulnerable we were. Now we are literally paying the
> hefty $1.3 million dollar price for our own lack of follow through.
>
> Our organization is just flat too big - and too well off financially - not
> to find a better way to protect the hard earned assets of our groups and
> kingdoms. Hopefully, before we all decide that serious discussions are no
> fun, before we insist this isn't going to affect our game, before we return
> to business as usual and become sitting ducks for the next financial
> disaster... please give some serious consideration to how we can
> prevent this from happening again. A kingdom committee maybe? A group of
> smart people who are motivated to come up with ideas that can
> be presented to our corporate officers? People who will make sure there is
> some follow through... some accountability at the corporate level to ensure
> there will be change... people who won't walk away until the job is done...
> because believe me... affecting a corporate change in the SCA is a long,
> hard road...
>
> We've already proven how amazingly generous our people are and how
> resilient we can be at moving on. Yes, we are awesome. But let's fix the
> rest of the problem. Our kingdom, actually our entire game, deserves better
> than for everyone to turn a blind eye. We already did that years ago and
> now look what it is costing us. Once our kingdom treasurer has to cut a
> check to corporate for $62,041.21... geez, that should be a huge wake-up
> call... It isn't about this money, this time. We'll be fine. It IS about
> finding a different way to organize SCA finances so we are not doing this
> again ten years from now.
>
> OK, I'm going to crawl back under my comfy rock now... :)
>
> ~ Kat MacLochlainn
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