[Peace-discuss] lawyer stuff

[Sandra Ahten]

I know I haven't been attending much... but I was at the meeting when 
Gerstien as the lawyer was first brought up. In fact I raised the issue of 
his appropriatness, so people did have a heads up on that account. AND it 
was agreed to pay the $100 to go ahead with the initial meeting.

This is as I remember. I would follow Peter's advice in this case.

Sandra


>From: Peter Rohloff <rohloff at uiuc.edu>
>To: Peace-Discuss Listserv <peace-discuss at lists.cu.groogroo.com>
>Subject: [Peace-discuss] lawyer stuff
>Date: Mon, 19 Apr 2004 10:28:35 -0500
>
>
>Howdy all,
>
>I hate to bring this up, but one issue remains outstanding after three 
>weeks of discussion about the lawyer situation. Maybe we can discuss it on 
>the list and thereby avoid taking up more meeting time.
>
>Basically, several persons have raised blocking objections to the use of 
>Gerstein (sp?) as AWARE's lawyer. At yesterday's meeting, those objections 
>stood, and we decided to spend time looking for another lawyer and also 
>trying to do our own homework (filing complaints, pressing charges etc etc) 
>better.
>
>However, the outstanding issue, as far as I can tell,  is that several 
>persons are also blocking disbursement of funds to Gerstein ($100) for 
>services already rendered--i.e., for meeting for one hour with Carl and 
>Ricky. Am I correct on this? If not, someone please correct me, and 
>disregard the rest of my message.
>
>Here's how I see it.
>
>To block payment of the $100 to Gerstein would be a show of really bad 
>faith. It has been alleged that AWARE never agreed to a billed meeting 
>(some people thought this meeting was going to be free). Even if this might 
>be technically true, its not a very good reason for blocking payment--in 
>fact it goes against the way, historically, AWARE has run and cut checks. 
>Ricky and Carl had been talking about this meeting for AT LEAST one month 
>before it happened. The fact is that no one else bothered to do any 
>research on Gerstein until after the meeting and after the N-G article. The 
>time to raise an objection would have been before the event. AWARE has a 
>long-standing policy of one week from proposal to approval for raising 
>objections. This policy was honored in the Gerstein case and no objections 
>were raised. Granted, new information has come to light, and it has been 
>carefully taken into consideration. But I don't see how we can with 
>integrity apply our policy changes retroactively.
>
>What's more, AWARE has always allowed considerable leeway for the 
>disbursement of small ($50-100) funds for working group activities without 
>much oversight by the large group, especially by long-standing members 
>(i.e. Ricky and Carl).  To block payment of such a small amount, after the 
>fact, will reflect badly, IMHO, on Ricky and Carl, who exerted considerable 
>time and energy on the project. It also sets the bad precedent that members 
>who put energy and time into a project may find themselves unsupported 
>finally, by those with no interest in working on the project themselves. I 
>think we should not set this precedent. I for one would find these sorts of 
>things discouraging to my own self-motivated enterprise on AWARE's behalf.
>
>So I propose the following:
>
>1. The objection to not hiring Gerstein should stand.
>
>2. The objection to paying him $100 should be withdrawn.
>
>3. If people are interested in formalizing our policy of cutting checks, 
>that could be an agenda item on a future meeting.
>
>
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