David Poniatowski and the BOERA Story

Today we have a guest author that will provide context to an upcoming article concerning the Platte Canyon School District school board, their mistreatment of this former BOERA Board member and the school board keeping individuals from exercising their 1st amendment rights. For those that are not familiar with BOERA click here . This is who they are from their website: "BOERA was created in 2006, in agreement with PCSD, by a small group of community members with the intent of making this 72-acre parcel of property into a destination for students of PCSD and the Bailey community alike. The BOERA Board oversees the fundraising activities and development of this property in accordance with PCSD guidelines. All activities and events held on this property must benefit the students of the Platte Canyon School District. BOERA is home to the annual Husky Invitational Cross Country Meet, several disc golf tournaments, two mountain bike events and the Annual Bailey Turkey Trot, which is sponsored by BOERA."

This is a long read from David Poniatowski. He is a well liked community member that has dedicated close to 2 decades of service to the BOERA organization. Please enjoy his story in his words.

It pains me to say that after faithfully serving BOERA, the PCSD, the PCSD Students and my community for the past 9 years (and another 5 years prior serving the community through developing the disc golf course on the property prior to BOERA's existence, a total of 14 years), I have resigned from the BOERA board. This was not my desire, I do have some accountability, but please understand that in my opinion, I should still be on the board.

I need to state that I am no longer affiliated with BOERA and the below, albeit accurate to the best of my memory, is being made by me, David "Ponto" Poniatowski, and not by BOERA.

What happened? Buckle up.

In May of 2022, I reached out to the PCSD (Platte Canyon School District-1) Board of Education (BoE) Secretary, Ms. Ryan Korthius. At the time, I requested a meeting with the PCSD BoE to discuss the upcoming contract renewal between BOERA and PCSD. I received a response suggesting the contract would be renewed for 2 more years. I responded requesting a meeting as there were details in the contract that I felt were outdated and some, unnecessary. That response was not returned by the Secretary. I followed up again about a week later, again, no response.

Fast forward to June. BOERA held a meeting in which PCSD's Board of Education member Sherri (sic) Bezzant was invited and attended. It seemed like a good conversation, discussion around the pending contract (at this point expired) and Sherri (sic) making the point that BOERA needed to help the PCSD BoE understand the value financially that BOERA makes to the public. We discussed what we have done (over $60,000 contributed to both students through scholarship, grants, and other projects we have helped with) since our inception. Sherri (sic) and BOERA agreed to have Sherri (sic) be the new PCSD liaison to BOERA during that meeting.

At 5:16PM on Thursday, August 4, I received another email from Ryan requesting BOERA to attend the regularly scheduled PCSD BoE meeting on Monday, August 8 to discuss, and I quote, "the PCSD contract with BOERA". I had plans on Thursday evening and I did not read this email until the afternoon of Friday, August 5. At that time, I responded, saying I likely could attend but on short notice, not sure who else would be able to attend from BOERA. I also asked for clarification on what exactly we would be discussing. Was the PCSD board really interested in discussing finite details of our contract in an open session? Were we going to hash out specific language on the contract during a normal PCSD meeting? These were questions running through my mind. Again, Ryan did not respond to my request for more information. '

On that same day, Thursday, August 4, Sherri (sic) Bezzant reached out direct to BOERA's Certified Public Accountant (CPA) requesting the last 3 years of BOERA's financials. Please understand, Sherri (sic) did this WITHOUT cc'ing anyone from BOERA. Although BOERA's mission is to serve both PCSD and its students, the relationship between BOERA and our CPA is BOERA's relationship: BOERA pays for these services, and although BOERA would have been happy to provide the PCSD BoE with BOERA's financials, I found this to be highly inappropriate. As an example, consider if you run a business and one of your non-employee partners (a third party) were to request financials from your CPA without including you, how would you feel? Fortunately, our CPA brought this to my attention on Friday, August 5 and did NOT just send over financials without verifying.

After not hearing back from PCSD BoEd or the Secretary, or anyone from BOERA that they would be able to join me at the PCSD BoE meeting, I decided I would attend and represent BOERA at 6PM on Monday, August 8. Prior to doing so, I sent an email to Sherri asking her to call me (I didn't have her phone number). During the meeting, Sherri acknowledged she received my email, but again, she didn't bother to call me. For those that care to watch for yourself, the meeting recording is available https://live.myvrspot.com/iframe..., fast forward to 35:29 (although this streaming service doesn't seem to work very well). In retrospect, and in my opinion, BOERA and myself would have been better served if I didn't show up. Here's what happened at the meeting.

After a brief introduction to the topic by PCSD BoE VP Frank VandeHey, Frank motioned to me to go ahead. I'm thinking to myself, go ahead with what? I don't even know what I'm here for (keep in mind, nobody gave me any detail). Almost immediately after, Sherri responded with a comment along the lines of being disappointed she did not receive BOERA financials prior to this meeting. I responded, in kind, with something along the lines that likewise I was disappointed with how that request was made by Sherri (direct to the BOERA CPA). To provide some context here, the mention of BOERA financials to begin was highly inappropriate by Sherri. Financials were NOT on the agenda. The only item on the agenda was to discuss the expired contract between BOERA and PCSD. Period.

Sherri proceeded to make several outlandish statements during our meeting. She didn't ask me questions, just made statements. I'm paraphrasing, but this is what I recall:

1) Disappointment that the BOERA CPA didn't send her financials (although she doesn't reference that she sent this email direct to the BOERA CPA, but I of course have that email as proof).

2) Sherri said her husband is a lawyer and that BOERA should have to pay to have the 599 Rosalie Rd (BOERA) property assessed.

3) BOERA doesn't pay PCSD for use of the property (ie. No lease agreement with BOERA monthly paying for the property use).

4) BOERA's grant program requires 'Athletics' for approval to fund grant requests made by PCSD programs.

There were more outlandish statements made by Sherri, but I can't recall all of them and the link to play the recording drags terribly.

Regarding 2, BOERA doesn't own the property. PCSD owns the property. If they want an assessment of the value of the property, it's their responsibility, not BOERA's.

Regarding 3, BOERA doesn't "Use" the property. BOERA maintains the property for PCSD, including maintaining the access road, maintaining the parking lot, paying for all the signage on the property, paying for CPA and waste management fees, etc. BOERA doesn't profit after all, BOERA is a not-for-profit and all proceeds from cash box collections, electronic payments, and events goes back to the district, to its students, or to the property itself.

Regarding 4, absolutely false. Sherri went on to say she felt conflicted about this because she participated in the Yacht Club, which BOERA has funded through grant applications from that group since its inception. BUT BOERA's grant application never has included a requirement for 'Athletics'. To date BOERA has funded many non-athletic grant applications from PCSD programs including music, science, murals, etc.

There's more that happened that evening that I was disappointed about, but this is already long and there's more to the story. I will say this, I have NEVER been so humiliated in a public setting in my entire life. Furthermore, I was not understanding at the time why Sherri was attacking BOERA. What was her motive? It's now crystal clear that Sherri felt she had to discredit BOERA because the PCSD BoE is planning on selling the property. Why did she have to discredit BOERA? No idea. Keep in mind this is an organization that has given over $60,000 back to the district and its students since inception! Maybe because she felt this was a requirement in order to get approval to sell the property? Totally not true, but I guess you'd have to ask her. She didn't ask me questions; she simply made several disparaging statements towards BOERA.

Fast forward to the September PCSD meeting where BOERA was again asked to attend. Not sure why, we were expecting to have an open dialogue with the Board, but instead they voted to appoint PCSD BoE member Garrison Genschorck the new BOERA liaison (great, a fresh start, or so I thought) and approved a contract between PCSD and BOERA only through the end of 2022 AND with additional requirements for BOERA to fulfill (no consideration for any suggestions BOERA was making regarding changes to the contract). Shortly after this action, we left.

During the October PCSD BoE meeting, the BoE approved a motion for consideration of selling the 599 Rosalie Rd property. This was only a consideration, and my terminology is probably not accurate. This is my opinion but try to prove me wrong: they needed confirmation that the November Bond issue would fail before considering selling the property. As expected, the Bond issue did not pass.

Fast forward to Halloween. After nobody in BOERA attempted to connect with Garrison, nor Garrison attempted to connect with BOERA, I decided I would reach out. We traded phone messages. I ran into Garrison at Will-o-Wisp Halloween (totally unplanned), and I decided to ask for Garrison to meet with me in a casual setting so we could get to know each other better. He was insistent on attending a BOERA board meeting. I explained we haven't scheduled another one since all this had happened (we did not have a BOERA meeting between our June meeting and this time). I asked to just have a meeting with the two of us. I was acting on my own, without informing BOERA, that I was doing this. Why? Because if I didn't initiate things regarding BOERA, they usually didn't happen. That's how it's been for years. I've been the face of BOERA for many years, even though I wasn't the President of BOERA. Dispute this if you may, but I think it's pretty damned accurate. Garrison wouldn't agree to this. I expressed my frustration about Sherri and her actions at the August meeting. I regret doing this at Will-O-Wisp Halloween. When things weren't going in a positive direction, I apologized to him, said I would call him the next day, and left. The total interaction was probably less than 5 minutes, but 5 minutes too long. I did call him the next day, and again, he was insistent on a BOERA board meeting. So I pushed BOERA to get one on the books ASAP.

On Tuesday, November 8, Garrison attending a BOERA meeting with full BOERA member participation. Another board member expressed frustration with the limited contract in place between PCSD and BOERA, which made it difficult to schedule events for the 2023 calendar year. The PCSD/BOERA contract even states that BOERA is supposed to provide a list of anticipated events before the end of the year. How is BOERA supposed to do that when we don't have a contract in place? Garrison began to say that BOERA should not look at this as if PCSD is attacking BOERA. I piped in, very calmly, and said, "But PCSD BoE did attack BOERA", referencing the August meeting. Garrison immediately stood up, got loud, said this was the 4th time I brought this up (not accurate, but whatever), and declared either he goes (me), or I go. Garrison left. I was left feeling awful. I maybe shouldn't have said this, but I took offense to the fact that I felt personally attacked at that August meeting, I felt BOERA was attacked at that meeting, and I wasn't going to have someone say that BOERA wasn't attacked.

After Garrison left, my mind was racing, I was so upset and hurt. Here I am, having dedicated myself to this property and BOERA for the better part of 14 years! I have done so much, including almost all the administrative stuff for BOERA, I have poured my heart and soul, blood and tears into that property, I've worked every Turkey Trot since its inception, organized events, built the disc golf course, on and on, and immediately I'm feeling it crashing down upon me. Shortly after, I got up and left. I was asked before leaving if I was resigning (really classy, but I'll protect that name) and I said I don't know.

I decided later that evening that I would resign for the betterment of the relationship and BOERA. I'm not going to judge Garrison, I don't know him beyond these few interactions, never met him prior, but it's clear he's judged me. Talking about what happened at the August meeting was not appropriate at Halloween, but I found it to be very appropriate at the BOERA board meeting when he suggested BOERA shouldn't feel attacked. His words he chose to use. Again, he doesn't know me, my character, or all I've done for BOERA and my community.

I want to state that I am not necessarily in opposition of PCSD selling the property. I would be extremely disappointed if the property was sold to someone who did not intend to keep the property a resource to our community and the students of PCSD.

Part two of Dave's story with the board will be out later today.