Letters to the Editor
It involves the word ‘trust’
Editor:
On Thursday, May 27, I attended a meeting by the New Mexico Attorney General (Gary K. King) on the subject of scams, which was held at the Senior Citizens of Socorro (center). After listening to him, I realized as American citizens we are scammed by phone, letters, e-mail and people coming to our front door wanting us to give them money in exchange for whatever they have.
I came to the conclusion that as a citizen and member-owner of the Socorro Electric Co-op, I’m being scammed by the trustees.
TRUST: something committed or entrusted to one to be used or cared for the interest of another.
TRUSTEE: a natural or legal person to whom property is legally committed to be administered for the benefit of a person or organization.
Since the co-op board, on the advice of their attorney, (Dennis) Francish, were told to ignore what the members had voted on at the April meeting, we will have to wait until he has time to take it to court, after he returns from his other business sometime in July. He commented at the April meeting he wasn’t getting paid. Who is paying this person? WE ARE, with the money we pay the co-op every month for our electric bill.
As member-owners, our money is used to buy electricity, pay wages, overhead on the buildings, board members and we as members are suppose to earn capital credits. This is OUR co-op, not the trustees. We vote them in to work for us, but at the expense of what we had to pay them in 2009, which was half a million dollars for board expenses — that amount is outrageous.
To force the people to forget the meeting we received the warning in the paper that there will probably be an increase on our electricity bill sometime SOON. I say make the trustees return some of this money they have taken willingly to go on trips.
Who do they report to? The New Mexico state statute should dictate the per diem for food, lodging, miles traveled and workshop expense. They cannot pay for spouses or family travel.
That warning has now increased by attacking Mr. (Charlie) Wagner on what he allegedly said. We in New Mexico are a combination of many nationalities and many different languages. Somehow this has been a problem in New Mexico, where we are not known as human beings but as a race or by what language we speak.
Since Mr. Francish said in the April meeting that democracy was at work, it is now time to show him that we SEC members are fed up with people taking advantage of us just because he thinks we all are “wannabe trustees.” That is further from the truth. When we vote for individuals to be trustees, we are hoping that we can trust and believe they are doing it for the member benefits, not their pocket books.
It is time for the members to begin to see democracy at work. Let us start a petition to force the trustees to do what 400-500 members voted on in April.
If you wonder why I’m writing this it is because for the last 20 plus years, I was being charged city taxes (I live in the county) on something I did not have. I didn’t catch the mistake until April 2010. I was given a small credit but not for all those years. Again, TRUST. I expected the co-op to do the right thing. We could blame the last administration, but now that it’s been proven that we can’t trust the board members or their lawyers, we will have to watch them closely.
Betsy Francois
Socorro
SEC needs to apologize
Editor:
Are Hispanic people the only ones who are not allowed to be insulted as alleged (re: Charlie Wagner’s comments) as purported by “Pablo” Martinez, director of LULAC, and condemned by the Socorro Electric Co-op board of directors?
I, and the other 16 member-owners who attended the Wednesday (May 26) SEC meeting, were insulted by the board’s lawyer Dennis Francish (whose salary is paid by the member-owners) by being referred to as “wannabes who want to be involved but can’t get elected (to the board).”
Does he infer we are stupid, inept or what?
Mr. Francish owes us an apology for his disrespect. The board should have reacted to his negative, slanderous statement by censoring his remarks. By letting his statement go unchallenged they are accepting the rude statement that characterizes us unfairly.
The member-owners are frustrated at the negative dismissal and total lack of acceptance of our overwhelming vote to make changes to the SEC board and the way it conducts itself. That does not qualify us as “wannabes.”
We have been discriminated against and are owed an apology.
Ruth White
Socorro