DATE: JUNE 4, 2001
TO:
Dennis Cardoza, Chair (email)
Bill Leonard, Vice Chair (email)
Members of Assembly Rules Committee
ASSEMBLY RULES COMMITTEE
CALIFORNIA STATE LEGISLATURE
SACRAMENTO
CALIFORNIA
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am writing to you regarding the recent passage of AB 555 (Dutra and Correa) in the Assembly.
1. Evidence shows that this bill was passed because there was falsification of the public record by the authors of the bill, John Dutra and Lou Correa, John Campbell (vice chair of the Business and Professions Committee), and consultants , Jay Greenwood and Chris Tapio, in order to commit a fraud on the members of the Assembly and the public. An analysis of the fifty-nine pages of alleged support for the bill conclusively establishes three facts:
a. The bill cites "numerous community associations" as supporting the bill. This is false. The fact is that NO community association supported it.
b. The bill has not been put to the vote of any homeowner association.
c. The alleged letters of support by individual board members are all canned, identical letters written by Merit Property Management, the prime instigator of this bill, and Professional Community Management (see # 3 below).
2. The consultant on the bill, Jay Greenwood (who wrote two analyses, one for the Assembly and one for the Business and Professions Committee) and Chris Tapio, have suppressed significant opposition to the bill by individual homeowners and homeowner groups. Letters, faxes and emails have been excluded from the opposition. In at least one case, a homeowner called Chris Tapio to inform him that she was opposed to the bill. Half-an-hour later, Chris Tapio informed a columnist for the Los Angeles Times that there was no opposition to the bill.
On April 17, as several homeowners had informed me that opposition to the bill was being suppressed, I called Mr. Dutra’s office and informed Heather about that opposition. As the Business and Professions Committee was just about to begin, Heather promised to take a message directly to the hearing room.
I also called Mr. Correa’s office at the same time, informed Diane about the suppression of evidence, and asked her to relay a message to committee members that there was strong, homeowner opposition to the bill. She promised to do so.
Despite both messages, Jay Greenwood refused to relay this opposition to the members of the Business and Professions committee.
Letters of opposition from homeowners had been given to Assemblyman Campbell, who promised to relay them to the Business and Professions Committee. He never gave them to the committee.
3. As this bill creates a monopoly for Merit Property Management and Professional Community Management under the false guise of protecting homeowners through improved education, and as this bill was fraudulently foisted on the Assembly without the members realizing the true intent and impact of the bill, I am writing to ask that the Assembly Rules Committee under the authority granted to it, immediately withdraw this bill from the Senate and re-submit it to the members of the Assembly for fresh consideration. For years, Melinda Masson of Merit Property Management has been lobbying for a bill that would grant her company a monopoly in the market for managers, and the imprimatur of the state for her school – which in effect is a certificate mill where the standard is not what you learn, but what you pay.
As the 9 million Californians who live in homeowner associations will be the big losers under this bill, I request that the Assembly Rules Committee take immediate action. Further detailed information can be provided upon request.
Thank you for your attention.
Sincerely
Elizabeth J. McMahon
Executive Director
P. S. Several homeowners and AHRC members have already given your legislative aides detailed information about fraud, misrepresentations by the authors, the analyst Jay Greenwood.
