Santa Clara Vanguard 2024

[Jeff Ream]

2 hours ago, IllianaLancerContra said:

Yes,  the Corps are DCI.  So if Cadets lawsuit is allowed to add DCI as a defendant (with SoA lawsuit already naming DCI), does that mean if judgement is against DCI then all the Corps (that are DCI) will have to chip in to pay the settlement?   

could be that way yes. we'll have to see.

[RiverCityAndTroopersFan]

3 hours ago, Jeff Ream said:

Cadets were on probation. they were never suspended by DCI unless they didn't change leadership. Pio i believe was suspended unless they changed leadership which they didn't.

 

oh and technically the corps are DCI

Pioneer’s website still talks about how they intend to return to the competitive field. Their interest form is still up (?)

[cixelsyd]

13 minutes ago, Boss Anova said:

That’s not my “ premise “ at all . I made no contention that DCI  would be ( your words ) “ guilt by association “ if the actions of any member Corps was listed on DCI’s official website . 

Okay, then.  Here is what you did say, quoted for accuracy:

On 11/25/2023 at 8:26 PM, Boss Anova said:

The Corps name should be removed from DCI’s  official website for the simple reason of limiting financial liability exposure in any future lawsuit by virtue of anything that the mercurial and wholly unpredictable SCV organization might do that could expose DCI as a party to any future lawsuit .

Should a lawsuit ever develop , DCI would have a challenge attempting to claim immunity from what SCV might do by claiming “ SCV is not a member of DCi “, but their current official website of DCI organization itself clearly states otherwise . Any plaintiff’s atty in any future lawsuit  would  have an easy time of it seems to me ( and I’m no lawyer ) shooting down any claim that “ SCV is not a member of DCI “ when your own institutional website states otherwise .

And my response - I do not see the word "member" attached to the listing of SCV to which you refer.

[cixelsyd]

5 hours ago, DFA1970 said:

Everyone is typing these long response. Why? SCV is competing in 2024.

At this time last year, the vast majority of us would have presumed the same about plans for 2023.

[scheherazadesghost]

2 hours ago, Richard Lesher said:

That's where folks are not entirely up to date. 

March 2020 = SCV registration expires with the state. 

November 2020 = CA DOJ notifies SCV they are in violation and delinquent

September 2021 = CA DOJ Notifies SCV again they are violation and delinquent

October 2021 = once again CA DOJ sends notice there were errors in the submission and they are still in violation and delinquent

2022 the DOJ goes silent for a while on SCV, there are no new notifications. 

September 2022 SCV terminated Vanguard Cadets. 

Nov/Dec SCV conducts auditions for the Vanguard. 

December 2022 SCV terminates the Vanguard

April 2023 I made public all the DOJ notifications and SCV's delinquent status. SCV finally openly STOPS soliciting donations. To this point SCV illegally solicited over $1,000,000 of donations per their own 990's from the time the delinquency started. 

August 2023 yet another Delinquency Notice is given by the CA DOJ, but this time it is for Fiscal Year 2021 (prior to that the problem had only been FY 2019). FY2020 SCV get's off a little because they claim unaudited that their revenue is $1.95M, not $2M or greater. 

September 2023 the new CEO of Vanguard gives a BS statement about their regulator compliance. 

November 2023 ANOTHER DOJ notice, this time the verbiage has changed a little and includes the DOJ now notifying the State Tax Board and requesting SCV non profit status be terminated. Referencing the CEO statements it's very counter intuitive that things are getting better when the CA DOJ escalates their actions. 

None of the filings that happened in September 2023 were actually anything done after the previous CFO retired. None of them were signed by any current representatives of SCV, and the CPA's signature on the 2021 990 is for an unaudited 990. So at best the CPA is only saying they had a part in the filing, but in no way attest to any of the numbers. 

************************

So yea, SCV says they are going to tour. 

Perhaps this is the final tour. 

There is nothing mechanically in place to stop a bunch of people with a wad of cash to fill the fuel tanks of a tour fleet and continue the ruse while the operations of the organization goes straight into the toilet. That is what they did in 2022. 

They could very well start a tour, and at the end of it lose the right to operate as a non profit, and lose their Bingo cash flow. 

They are entering 2024 much weaker than they were in 2022. 

From what I gauge by looking at other California nonprofits that are in the same boat as SCV in regard to DOJ notifications there are going to be two more DOJ notifications. 

1) Intent to revoke non profit status (be given another time line of 60 days for example). 

2) Cease and desist to operate as a non profit. 

So we are 120 days out from the last November-16-2023 notice when we can expect a cease and desist. 

***************

A cease and desist still doesn't stop people from getting on a bus and touring, lack of money does. 

I totally see SCV just blowing it off once again and trying to figure it out after tour, then perhaps try and say they are taking another year off when in fact there is a for sale sign on the Bingo Hall.

All this and...

...I would be more supportive of their recovery attempts if they hunkered down and created a strategic plan/annual report. They had one under the previous CEO and... before that right?? Sure hope so.

Or in this case, an emergency strategic report. This is a formal document healthy NPs produce every several years in order to scrutinize, democratize, and (possibly) broadcast their strategies, budgets, lessons learned, mission, and vision statements. Any of these awful outcomes above could be averted in an orderly plan. If they have one, then not broadcasting it for any number of reasons almost makes it worse than not having one at all.

I'll just leave this here: https://bloomerang.co/blog/nonprofit-strategic-planning/

[Boss Anova]

2 hours ago, Richard Lesher said:

I totally agree with that. It irks me as well, it is an indication from my interaction with DCI that they too are just as inept as the corps I am complaining about. 

 

 

 I simply made an observation that if SCV is not currently a member of DCI that it really would not take much to add even just as asterisk beside a member corps ( especially that of a world Class Division DCI member ) to then post  currently on probation , or suspension or    on restricted , provisional membership for 2023 or 2024 or whatever .

Plaintiff’s  Lawyers pressing forward on lawsuits are known to gum up the works to their client’s advantage when attempting to extend lawsuit potential culpability as far and as wide a net as possible . In instances such as this , I merely pointed out that if DCI is stating that SCV for 2024 is not a member of tge World Class Division with the same membership status as all the other World Class Division Corps listed on their website ,then  maybe it should . But if others think it’s ok to leave it as is on there , I won’t quibble with that assessment .

As for SCV , I’m just watching and reading what is being posted . I stated I believe they will be fielding in 2024, and that DCI has investigated the claims similarly as was done with ( for example ) Pioneer and at the moment DCI BOD seem to be satisfied with the situation there … or we would have heard about it from DCI by now . But , you seem far more tuned in to what is going on there than me , so I’m watching this unfold .

[IllianaLancerContra]

20 minutes ago, RiverCityAndTroopersFan said:

Pioneer’s website still talks about how they intend to return to the competitive field. Their interest form is still up (?)

Bless their heart. 

[cixelsyd]

3 hours ago, scheherazadesghost said:

Not replying as an expert at all here... but just piping in to say that I've mentioned in the past that drum corps could forgo the nonprofit status thing and possibly cure a lot of headaches. Most really aren't using the np model to its fullest anyway. There are B corp- (as in social benefit corps) style business models that totally fit their missions. It would be a sea change, but not impossible. I will throw babies at Vanguard if they're considering such a switch. And definitely offer, again, to lend a hand.

But more than for any other reason, they'll keep fighting for NP status, I believe, because they don't want to lose bingo.

Would DCI even allow that?  It appears that DCI requires all of its participating units (even SoundSport teams) to be non-profits.

[Richard Lesher]

1 hour ago, Boss Anova said:

................. After an 8 day investigation , DCI concluded that there was sufficient evidence DCI found in the allegations to suspend the Corps for the 2019 season until they terminated the Executive Director there . .........

ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I went through the DCI Ethics Manual line by line, and pointed out violations of DCI Ethics and State Law by SCV employees and core leadership, and I provided the proof and sent that to the entirety of the DCI board at the time, and the generic ethics e-mail, and here we are a YEAR LATER, and SCV is potentially 120 days away from non profit revocation. 

[IllianaLancerContra]

1 minute ago, Richard Lesher said:

ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I went through the DCI Ethics Manual line by line, and pointed out violations of DCI Ethics and State Law by SCV employees and core leadership, and I provided the proof and sent that to the entirety of the DCI board at the time, and the generic ethics e-mail, and here we are a YEAR LATER, and SCV is potentially 120 days away from non profit revocation. 

Some Corps are more equal than other Corps. Especially when the other Corps doesn’t really fit the brand DCI is trying to maintain.