Several issues have arisen from the misguided effort of the Columbia Association Board of Directors to gag one of its members. First of all, how can the charges against Alan Klein be "anonymous"?
If in fact they are truly anonymous, i.e., no one knows their source, then they have no standing and should never have come before the board. On the other hand, if someone on the board does know who filed the charges — as is almost certainly the case — and allows them to be aired while refusing to reveal their source, then Mr. Klein, and the public, deserve to know who brought them and who placed them on the board's agenda.
Finally, the effort to remove Mr. Klein from the Board is clearly an illegal effort to disenfranchise his constituents. The board, in my opinion, should drop this ill-advised project and should begin to look at such staff-instigated efforts with a good deal more skepticism and independence than it has in the past.
Michael Berla
Columbia