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Pitt Meadows Community Foundation leadership overturned

Council members accused of ‘hostile takeover.’
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The team that won a majority of seats on Pitt Meadows council is being accused of a “hostile takeover” of the Pitt Meadows Community Foundation.

Coun. Tracy Miyashita said the group of five council members who campaigned together during the last election have taken over the foundation’s board of directors, which has been run by volunteers.

“They are fantastic people who did a lot for our community,” she said of the outgoing board members.

“We need to support our volunteers more, not take over as councillors.”

New foundation board members include Terry Becker, wife of Mayor John Becker, as the new president, and councillors Bruce Bell, Mike Stark and David Murray as directors.

Mayor Becker is also a new director, as is Wayne Elkerton, husband of Coun. Janis Elkerton, and Norma Murray.

The latter’s husband, Tom Murray, championed the zero tax petition that became a divisive issue in Pitt Meadows during the last municipal election.

He has since passed away.

Former city councillor Gwen O’Connell is an outgoing board member, who as a former city councillor, opposed Murray’s zero tax increase petition, which John Becker instituted after winning the last election.

O’Connell said the foundation has become another arm of city council, instead of a community group.

“It’s a community organization,” she said.

The foundation was incorporation in 1983 as a charitable society, and selects the citizen of the year, offer grants to community groups and bursaries for students.

Members have organized community events, including Christmas in the City and Chinese New Year celebrations.

Membership in the foundation is open to anyone for a fee of $20 per year, and the council members and some of their family joined just weeks before the annual general meeting, last Tuesday.

“We knew something was going to happen,” said O’Connell. “I’m disgusted. It makes me sad this is happening to a community like ours.”

She said the foundation is run by a small membership, and the new members were easily able to vote in their own slate.

Past president Michael Hayes ran against Becker for the mayoralty in the last election, and longtime foundation board member Carole Kubb helped on his campaign.

“The board that left were all hard working people,” said Kubb, who wouldn’t speculate on the changes.

“Congratulations to the new Pitt Meadows Community Foundation board.”

Coun. Murray said he served on the foundation board in the past, with former mayor Deb Walters and O’Connell, so it is not unusual to have council members involved. He let his membership lapse, and renewed it because, “I just wanted to get involved again.”

He nominated foundation president Zabrina Braithwaite-Kelso for positions on the board, and said that he did not have any problem with the job she has done.

Murray ran for his position on the board unopposed.

Coun. Bill Dingwall styled it “a hostile takeover by members of council and their spouses and family.”

He attended for about half of the AGM, then went to city hall for a council meeting that was scheduled for 7:30 p.m. He noted there was a hall full of South Bonson residents to hear the Golden Ears Business Park issue, and they were kept waiting for more than 20 minutes as councillors were at the foundation AGM.

Dingwall said Braithwaite-Kelso tried to suspend the foundation meeting, so she could get more information about the election process. But the council members present insisted the AGM, and the election of a new board, go ahead.

“The tone was aggressive and legalistic,” said Dingwall. “It was wrong on so many levels.

“I was disgusted when I walked out of that meeting.”

Terry Becker said she has been a longtime member of the foundation, was a vice-president of the board and chaired fundraisers. She had not been active in the past five years because of her work with the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows Chamber of Commerce.

But now that she is the past president of that organization, Becker said she will have more time.

Last Tuesday, she won a vote for president of the foundation over Braithwaite-Kelso, the incumbent.

Braithwaite-Kelso then ran for vice-president and lost the vote to Stark.

Becker said other members of the existing board were nominated for positions, but did not accept, and the rest of the positions were filled without votes.

She said members of council serving on the foundation board is not controversial, and “they have always been involved” during her time with the society.

She noted both Walters and her spouse were members of the board.

“I don’t think it’s unusual,” Becker said.

Some of the changes she would like to make are adding a “community chest” program, similar to the Maple Ridge Community Foundation’s, which helps families in financial crisis.

She would also like to see more Pitt Meadows families consider leaving a financial legacy to the foundation in their estate planning, which is again a strength of the Maple Ridge Community Foundation.

That would allow the foundation to disburse more funds to its various causes.

Becker said the changes in the foundation board are not controversial, and she would be happy to speak directly to anybody who has concerns.



Neil Corbett

About the Author: Neil Corbett

I have been a journalist for more than 30 years, the past decade with the Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows News.
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