Bill Goichberg wrote (Sat Aug 19, 2006 7:37 pm):

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samsloan wrote:
Virtually All USCF Financial Records have been
Destroyed
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This headline appears to be a gross exaggeration.
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Quote:
When I ran for election to the USCF Executive Board,
one of my key campaign promises was that I would
study the USCF financial records to determine how
and why the USCF has lost nearly two million dollars
since 1999 and to investigate the possibility that some
of this money may be recovered.
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After I was elected, at my first meeting of the board, I
politely asked to be given certain documents, such as
the Truong correspondence and contracts under which
the USCF ultimately paid $39,000 to Truong and the
AF4C contracts under which Eric Anderson agreed to
sponsor the US Championship.
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In each case, I was informed that the documents could
not be found.
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USCF did not pay $39,000 to Truong. There was a contract
between USCF, KCF and two Polgar groups which resulted
in USCF paying between $19,000 and $20,000 reimbursement
for training expenses for the Women's Olympiad. Most of this
money paid for GM training sessions and player expenses.
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Quote:
Finally, Executive Director Bill Hall confessed that virtually
nothing from the former USCF office in New Windsor New
York had ever reached the new USCF office in Crossville.
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According to Bill Hall, USCF's financial records are intact, but
he has had difficulty locating some contracts and believes this
is due to the move. I believe that the claim that virtually nothing
from New Windsor ever reached Crossville is absurd.
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Quote:
The rest of the board was obviously well aware of this.
None of the other board members expressed surprise
at this starting revelation.
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I have since been asking around trying to find out how
this could possibly have happened. The best explanation
that I can come up with thus far is that after the vote by
the old USCF board to move from New Windsor, New
York to Crossville, Tennessee, it was discovered that
the USCF did not have the money to hire professional
movers to move all the old archives and financial records
from the New Windsor offices to Crossville. As a result,
a team of high school students led by Jay Sabine, son
of Harry Sabine, former USCF Vice-President and the
architect of the move to Crossville, was dispatched to
New York to move all the stuff. Upon arriving in New
Windsor, they found that the quantity of material that
they were expected to move was huge, far greater than
they had anticipated.
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USCF used a professional moving company for the move. I
believe that sending Jay Sabine to New Windsor to work on
the move was considered, but not implemented.
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Quote:
They were faced with a dilemma: They knew that the new
incoming board was opposed to the move to Crossville.
They knew that if the move was not completed by the time
that the new board took office, the new board would reverse
the move and would stay in New Windsor.
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Therefore, they had no choice in the matter. The only thing
left to do is to throw all the USCF files and records into the
local garbage dump, which is what they did.
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According to Bill Hall, this did not happen.
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Quote:
There is only one little problem with this, which is that the
destruction of corporate financial records is a crime which
may be punishable by up to ten years in prison.
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We need to ask the following questions:
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1. What was the role of USCF President Beatriz Marinello
in this? She had hired herself to supervise the move to
Crossville. Was she aware of the dumping of the records?
Did she order it to be done? Did she witness it? Did she
participate in it?
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2. The same questions must be asked of Grant Perks,
who was Chief Financial Officer at the time. Perks has
been extremely upset at the results of the election just
concluded. Perks has been doing everything in his power
to stop Sam Sloan from being certified as a member of
the board. Now we understand the reason. Perks does
not want to spend time in prison and he obviously
realizes that once Sam Sloan gets on the board he is
going to find out about this and make it public.
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To suggest that Grant Perks may be guilty of a crime is an
utterly outrageous attack; there is no evidence that Grant
destroyed any financial records or did anything improper.
During the period when USCF recovered from near
bankruptcy, Grant served the Federation well, as an interim
ED. a CFO, and a Finance Committee member. He is also
probably the most prominent chess promoter in Ohio. A
tragic result of the election, perhaps worse than who was
elected, is that Grant has become so embittered as a result
of the attacks on him that he may drop out of USCF.
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Quote:
3. Similar questions must be asked of Randy Bauer,
who is always writing about how he is Budget Director
of the State of Iowa. Did Bauer know about this? After
Bauer lost his campaign for re-election to the board in
August 2005, he became Chairman of the Finance
Committee, a position he still holds. Bauer must have
been aware of this problem. Why has he remained
silent?
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4. The same questions may be asked of CPA William
Brock, who was a member of the Finance Committee
until he resigned in protest to Sloan's election? Is this
the reason why Brock fought so long and hard to stop
Sloan from being elected? Is this why he resigned?
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Speculation regarding who might have destroyed records
serves little purpose other than to injure the reputations of
those named, and the concept of the Finance Committee
asking that records be destroyed is bizarre.
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We cannot ask these questions of Tim Hanke, who was
USCF VP of Finance when these events occurred,
because Hanke has skipped town, vanished and
disappeared. Is this the reason why Mr. Hanke is no
longer available.
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In view of these developments, it is not a surprise that
the new accounting firm hired by the USCF in Crossville
still has not produced a certified financial statement for
the recently completed 2005-2006 fiscal year. It has
been a standard rule that the CPA Report must be ready
in time for the USCF delegates meeting in August. This
year, the delegates were just given a small paper
printout showing a small loss and no details. Is this the
reason why a certified financial statement has not been
prepared? Will it ever be prepared?
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The annual audited financials were distributed to the
Delegates as usual in Oak Brook.
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Quote:
Where exactly is the garbage dump or landfill located
where the USCF Financial Records were dumped? Can
we still go to the garbage dump and possibly locate
some useful records?
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Is it possible that some records were left behind in the
basement of the old building in New Windsor and that
the new tenants have not bothered to throw them out?
Can they be recovered?
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What about the computer hard drives where some
records were maintained? Have the computers been
moved to Crossville or were they dumped too? Can
those records be recovered?
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I believe all New Windsor computers are now in Crossville.
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Bill Goichberg
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Quote:
Why has the new board been stonewalling about this
problem? Why has Sam Sloan been asked to hold off
on revealing this?
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These are some of the questions that we need to be
asking.
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Sam Sloan