Letter: Tea Party members reject new board

Lance Thate, Director
St. Augustine Tea Party

Dear Editor:

The chaos that erupted Tuesday night at the general meeting of the Saint Augustine Tea Party was the reaction of the membership to the hostile and unlawful takeover of their organization.

A group of members of the Republican Executive Committee tried to force control on the general membership of the Saint Augustine Tea Party by moving the meeting place and organizing the room in the same manor and style that the Republican Executive Committee uses.

Gone were the Gadsden Flags. The proposed leadership was seated in the front at a long table — looking like Republican potentates with gavel and all.

Gone were the Saint Augustine Tea Party t-shirts that the membership so loves. There they were looking down their noses in their Republican attire.

This new board was created in secret without proper notice with a total disregard of Florida Statutes Chapter 617 which governs.

In one move the board would have been expanded from 3 to 12 members. All power would then reside in the board. The general membership powers would be eliminated.

Membership would be determined by the board. With this move, all standing committees would have eliminated, the Officers duly elected by the membership were allegedly terminated without cause.

Now, the Saint Augustine Tea Party and the Republican Party have had a good working relationship. One is a non-profit identity the other is a political party.

The focus of the Saint Augustine Tea Party is education. The Republican Party is about promoting Republican candidates.

Merging these functions is clearly a conflict of interest — if not unlawful.

Members of the Saint Augustine Tea Party are contacting Republican leadership at various levels to encourage the Republican Executive Committee to curb the efforts of the Republican operatives in the Saint Augustine Tea Party.

Photo credits: © 2011 Historic City News contributed photograph by Bob Kuczewski