The editors here have given me the privilege of correcting the unfortunate errors in the quotation of my comments in last week’s coverage of the first meeting of the new IVGID Board of Trustees.

The Tribune article stated, “”IVGID has not had a manager capable of managing the organization, [in recent years],” said Michael Abel” The misquote (appearing where it did) gave the impression that I agreed with Noble who wanted to fire GM Walrack. I did not in any way agree with Noble. Leaving out my words “for the last four years” changed the meaning of my comments.

At that time, Walrack was doing a superb job – The first person to do so in many years. He was in fact given kudos by the Nevada State agency looking at IVGID’s finances.

Again, I was misquoted….He (Abel) accused the agency of “doing the same thing with different results.” Actually, I accused the BOARD of doing the same things and that, “the very definition of insanity is, doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

I then stated, “that our facilities are in sad shape. An aging rec center, an ill-tended village green, ancient beach restrooms, giant fire hazards

on the Mountain golf course, a run-down snowflake lodge, and ancient ski lifts. Outsourcing would give the GM and board the bandwidth and time to fix the neglect of the last 10 years.”

Despite 15 people speaking in favor of Walrack’s retention last week, the board chose to fire him. Trustees gave a plethora of lame reasons, but primarily the reason for Walrack’s firing was that he was selected by the prior board. Trustees were like petulant a child on the playground who takes the ball home because he/she was not selected as a player by the other children. Their unbridled hatred of the prior board, causes them to seek reversal of anything done by that board including compromising the privacy of our private beaches. This firing will cost taxpayers at least $300,000 that would be better spent on fixing our facilities and straightening out IVGID’s un-auditable books.

Trustees, Homan, Jezecki, and Tonking ran a slick campaign to get elected, literally plastering our village with promotional signs their message and that of incumbent Trustee Noble was that, “we are different and will do a good job.” Sadly, I see just another four years of mismanagement, wasting of the public treasury, lack of accountability, lack of transparency and blaming the prior board for all of their problems.

Michael Abel
Incline Village