Question from FP Member: I would like to know if we have had any "legal" contact with either Melissa Franklin or Peter Ramme over the past year, and what kinds of instructions the attorney has given regarding contact with these people and with their organization.
Christina Terranova (to be known as CT in this document): Answer: We have requested via our attorney that Peter Ramme provide a written accounting of his tenure as Treasurer. We have never received a complete accounting of our financial records from that time.
Melissa Anderson Franklin (to be known as MAF in this document): Peter turned in an accounting to the attorney in August, 1998. He never heard from her again, so naturally he thought the documents he submitted were in order.
CT: This has caused difficulties in gaining 501c tax status and as required by Florida State Law. Mr. Ramme maintained the Florence Project treasury in his profit business checking account which is in clear conflict with Florida State Laws for a non profit organization.
MAF: This is not true. Peter was not permitted by his bank in California to open an account in the name of the Florence Project, Inc., until he could show them the minutes of the original incorporation, which took place on January 15. The attorney did not have the necessary papers prepared unil May 13---five months later. The FP had nothing to do with the attorney's delay in preparing the papers.Furthermore, the attorney was aware of the arrangement, and accepted checks from the account as payment for her work on behalf of the Florence Project.
CT: We need an official treasury accounting of all monies donated or held during his tenure in order to apply for grants and 501(c) (3) status. To this date he has refused to provide us with same.
MAF: This is untrue. The account given by Peter is a complete accounting of funds. The attorney accepted it in August of 1998, and again, did not question it. I don't even know what an"official treasury accounting is", and I doubt the authors of this letter do, either. The attorney never mentioned it to me.
Peter tried, during a board meeting on June 18, to obtain the services of a CPA so that he could assure his accounting was correct plus begin applying for the tax-exempt status. Andy Lopez, during the meeting, objected, stating we "needed to know the cost first". As Andy was complaining, he was also childishly distracting an important meeting by passing ICQ messages around to private parties, including Kathy, Peter, and me. Then he started passing Kathy's private responses to me, Peter's private responses to Kathy, and so on. It was an obvious attempt at distraction from the matter at hand, which was Peter's request to obtain the services of a CPA as soon as possible.
CT: In June of 1998 during a BOD meeting, a request by a BOD member was made to get price quotes from potential CPA's in order to initiate our tax exempt status rather than just approve arbitrarily an undisclosed amount of money for this endeavor.
MAF: This "request" was made only after Peter requested the services of a CPA.
CT: When this request was made our then Treasurer became incensed and demanded that we approve his request for CPA consult regardless of the cost.
MAF: This is another lie. What Peter said was that if the FP wouldn't pay for it, he would. Unfortunately, when he got to Pensacola, he was unable to do so. The FP approved $200.00 during the meeting, over and beyond Andy's actions, but the FP never gave Peter the money to go to an accountant here in Pensacola. I ask you this---if Peter was "mishandling funds", as FP board members have said, why would he have wanted to go see a CPA? That does not make sense. He did not want to turn over a full accounting until he saw a CPA, especially after being accused publicly by Michael Berger, a board member who, like Andy Lopez, has since moved on to other things, and the FP reneged on it's offer of $200.00.
CT: The request was then made to the then treasurer to produce an accurate and current accounting of our treasury funds and to establish the cap we should put on CPA costs. In light of recent donations made in the names of our colleagues lost in tragedy in May 1995 we wanted a true accounting of where the organization stood before making the decision.
MAF: If memory serves, this request was made by Andy Lopez, who hassled Peter throughout the meeting. The number Peter gave was close to the final number. Peter sent a certified check for $1490 to the FP before leaving California.
CT: "In light of recent donations made in the names of our colleagues lost in tragedy in May 1995 we wanted a true accounting of where the organization stood before making the decision."
MAF: Before making what decision? Peter was as devastated as anyone---along with the FP and Barb and the crew of WGTK---when Doug and the other cast members died. Peter wrote a beautiful poem that was read at Doug's funeral. Andy Lopez made a cold business decision and bought Doug Fletcher's URL (web address) and used Doug's work for his own business ends.
CT: The treasurer refused, and the conflict escalated over this issue.
MAF: Another untruth.The conflict escalated primarily due to the actions of Andy Lopez, including the private notes sent to others while business was being conducted as noted above.
CT: In response, Peter and Melissa demanded the BOD vote immediately to remove the "offending" BOD member who had requested the treasury report.
CT: The BOD established an emergency meeting, and attempted to resolve the conflict.
MAF: Peter Ramme asked for the emergency meeting, the BOD didn't "establish" it on their own. The meeting turned out to be what my grandmother would call a "kangaroo court".
CT: When the BOD refused to remove the BOD member in question with no basis, Peter and Melissa resigned abruptly and began a public campaign against the leadership of the Florence Project, Inc.
MAF: This is pure libel. During this meeting, on approximately June 21,I resigned as webmaster and board member because of the nature of the "kangaroo court." It was a farce. I wanted nothing to do with a board that acted in that manner. However, I did *not* resign as Florida State Coordinator, or as a member. Peter resigned as treasurer---not as a member--- because the board was going to "sanction" him after all he had done for the FP, including use of his 800 number, sending out informational packets on his own, using his own funds, holding a rally in California, the use of his secure website, and more. We never planned a "public campaign against the Florence Project"---until now. We did post the letters telling us we had been kicked out to NurseNet, to let the other members of the FP know why we would not be able to post anymore. That is called freedom of speech. This is the sort of thing the FP tries to control in its members---as of now, members must go to the board of directors, in secret, if they have a complaint about the board rather than ask the board to be directly accountable on the email list. Apparently, this is legal, but it isn't right, IMO.
CT: During the summer of 1998, when Peter Ramme and Melissa Franklin resigned in mid-June, they kept the corporate records, the corporate seal, and the membership list in their possession while they set up their new organization.
MAF: This statement is libelous. We did not resign. We were both kicked out of the organization on August 8, 1998, because I refused to disable an uncensored email list I had set up for Florida nurses. We were on vacation until July 15, and I turned the corporate records over to the attorney here in Pensacola on or about August 8. There was no list of membership in the corporate records---yet another lie. The list I had, not updated, was in my computer at home. The secretary was to turn them over. The corporate records included only the minutes of the first meeting and the initial incorporation papers. Also, I had written numerous letters to board members, asking to whom I should mail the corporate records. At first I was told to mail them to an officer, then to take them to the attorney.
On June 21, I resigned as webmaster and board member. Since I resigned my presidency in late May for health reasons (In March of 1999, I learned I have "stiff person syndrome", a very rare and painful neurological disease). I had been considering resigning from the board prior to June 21, because I did not agree with their tactics. The board believed in "speaking with one voice", and preferred board members not speak out on their own on the email list. This I could not accept, and I told them so in no uncertain terms. As I have said repeatedly, I told them "You will not silence me. You can try, but it won't work." (I told the attorney the same thing, in person, eye to eye, when she told me that if I mentioned the FP in a negative manner on the 'net it would be "actionable".) Furthermore, the board wanted to keep certain matters of importance from the membership, when I was accustomed, as president, to informing the members immediately of any developments that affected the organization.
CT: They were contacted by the attorney and advised that it was illegal to withhold corporate property.
MAF: This is also libelous. We were never advised by the attorney that withholding corporate property was illegal. There was no need for her to do so. I asked her what to do with them, and she said to send them to the then-president (who has since been treated almost exactly like I was by the BOD of the FP).
CT: Ramme and Franklin subsequently relinquished the property to the attorney approximately 3 months later minus our treasury records.
MAF: More libel. The corporate records book (again, nearly empty) was taken to the attorney as soon as I knew where to take it. I certainly did not want either that or the seal in my house! I was not the ex-treasurer, so I should not have been included in the statement above.
I have read the entire transcript of the "conflict resolution" procedure between Kathy Smeland-Pebler, Cheryl Buswell-Robinson, and Christina Terranova. The transcript contains several frankly libelous statements on Terranova's part regarding me. First, I never, ever, in any manner, threatened her son, and that is how her account sounds. I live in Florida; she lives in New York. I've never ever been to New York, and never met her son. I never threatened her, but I did warn her I was seriously considering suing her for defamation of character and libel. In fact, the only physical threat I have heard of during the past two years was the vile, profane letter to Peter Ramme from the then-treasurer of the FP, Stephen Stone, in which he physically threatened Peter if he "showed up at the NNNHP meeting" last November. (We faxed a copy of this letter to the attorney for the Florence Project, and were never bothered again by Stone.)
Christina's reference to "Mel's Monarchy" was a figment of her imagination. We were democratic, and it was the autocratic ways of the new board that I was fighting. I have heard from nearly every person who left the FP that it is the autocratic style of the current BOD (not including Kathy Smeland-Pebler now) that encouraged them to leave. I must add here that Christina was not a founding member of the FP, as were Peter. myself, and about five others. She didn't join until late spring, and we had all been working diligently on the FP for about nine months prior to her arrival. She has no idea what happened, or how much work we had done, prior to her arrival. Unfortunately, one of my last duties was to appoint people to the board, and I unfortunately appointed Christina. The attorney back-dated the incorporation meeting minutes to January 15, 1998, which is apparently legal in Florida.
In closing, I never "assaulted" Christina Terranova on NurseNet. She was passing on misinformation about COBRA, and, being an ED nurse for so many years, I politely corrected what she said. And yes, I objected to her use of a butchered version of the Alcoholic Anonymous' Serenity Prayer that means so much to so many thousands of people.
I am ready to put this behind us and go on. Isn't it time the Florence Project, particularly Christina Terranova, followed suit?
UPDATE: November 19, 1999: Yesterday, nearly 16 months after the fact, the Florence Project's attorney sent a letter to Peter Ramme requesting information about the treasury. She stated she sent a certified letter a short time ago, but neither of us accepts certified letters due to having received "hate mail" by certified letter in the past. We have learned our lesson about certified letters. If this is civil disobedience, so be it. A regular letter would have been fine, such as the one Peter willingly opened and read yesterday, as would a telephone call or an email. No such effort was made, to my knowledge, although I was the one who communicated with the attorney extensively in the first place. (I, unfortunately, was the person who, in cooperation with their attorney, set up the "corporation" on behalf of the Florence Project, a group of nurses.) I wish to note that Peter has already responded to the attorney.
My opinion: I have not read the attorney's letter; I will not do so. I was not treasurer, and Peter can respond to the attorney himself.I am writing this merely to let the board members of the Florence Project know that such tactics do not intimidate us; on the other hand, they inspire and motivate us to work that much harder on behalf of nurses who care more about patients and the state of health care than they do about carrying on a vendetta that must be a time-consuming and expensive attempt to intimidate other nurses whose goals are similar to their own.
Furthermore, although the board members of the Florence Project appear to be quite concerned about the treasury, they appear to be spending an inordinate amount of the money donated to their organization in an attempt to "punish" the nurses who dared desert their oppressive "corporation".
We want to make it known to all that we tried multiple times, early on, to resolve the issues separating these two organizations, but the Florence Project will not agree to make peace (particularly Ms. Terranova, who considers members of our organization "swine"). In my opinion, her apparently personal vendetta against another group of nurses is an embarrassment to the profession of nursing.
This animosity of nurse-against-nurse on all sides, and in all groups, must end, or it will destroy us all. End of opinion.
Melissa Franklin RN
"Satyagraha is a relentless search for truth and a determination to search truth."
-------------Mohandas ("Mahatma") Gandhi
It is only through sharing our experiences and strengths that we can overcome the effects continued abuse has had on our professional and personal lives. It is through well-focused individual and collective interaction and action that healing and empowerment will come.
I invite all nurses who choose activism over apathy---empowerment over powerlessness---to join us in the Nightingale Network.
Melissa Franklin RN Co-Founder, Nightingale Network