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Crossroads Board Chairman: “We’ve made no decisions at this point.”

   Written by on February 1, 2016 at 11:33 am

By Evan Jones, Assistant Editor

The Crossroads Community Services Board of Directors met Tuesday night and, among other business, was addressed by current and former employees about the future of the organization.

The meeting was opened by Chairman Sid Smyth representing Lunenburg County. Michael Mayhew, a CPA from the firm of Snead, Williams & Mahew, PLLC, presented a report of the prior year’s audit. “In essence, we’re giving a clean opinion for Crossroads’ financial statement, that they are fairly stable,” Mayhew stated. He continued, “We did not identify any deficiencies in internal control at Crossroads.” Further, he reported, “In our opinion, Crossroads complies with all the compliance requirements of the Federal programs” Crossroads receives money from. “It’s a good report, it’s a clean report,” he concluded.

The Board asked Mayhew for his opinion on an additional audit that was performed in January of last year, a “comfort review,” that provides an additional check in between the yearly audits. “In my opinion, I don’t think you need a comfort review. Given that the audit went well, and we didn’t identify any problems in your internal controls, I would not recommend that,” Mayhew said. The Board voted unanimously to not do another comfort review for this year.

Smyth opened the floor to public comment. The first to address the board was Nellie Smyth Parrish. “I’ve been with the agency for eight years. I’m here tonight to speak on behalf on my community, my coworkers both past and present. The elephant in the room is the layoffs that occurred last week. …I’ve been told tonight that I cannot ask questions of the Board, but I wanted to give you an idea of what we’ve been wondering. We’re wondering are we to expect any other future workforce reductions. What’s the new vision for our agency, our community and what we have dedicated so much of our lives to? Given the harshness of the terminations we want to know where it came from. What business plan? Is there anything concrete because if there was, we weren’t included in that discussion.”

The floor was then turned over to Jonathon Crawford, the former Substance Abuse Coordinator at Crossroads. Crawford distributed a handout to the Board members present that detailed the recent dismissal of four of Crossroads’ staff, including himself.

Crawford, representing the other three also in attendance, addressed the Board, “In an effort to save the Board’s time, we’ve consolidated what we want to present and this is on behalf of Cindy Morris [former Coordinator of Nursing], Larr Daniel [former Office Manager] and Marina Sinyard [former Director of Long Term Care], who are previous employees at Crossroads.”

“Lloyd Banks [representing Cumberland County], the previous chairman of the Crossroads Board of Directors had asked the management staff to come to the Board of Directors meeting back in October of 2015 and to discuss any concerns about the Executive Director [Susan Baker.] Several of us did so that night and the Board members that were here remember, and we were promised from multiple members that there would be no retaliation for the concerns we shared.” “There were many occasions after that Board meeting where the management staff attempted to resolve operational and budgetary issues with [Executive Director] Susan Baker with no success. As a result and per the policy of Crossroads, Sid Smyth, the current Board Chairman, was contacted and a meeting was requested.”

“Mr. Smyth’s response suggested that we conform or get another job and he suggested that Susan Baker fire me on the spot for following the procedures laid out by this Board and you can see that [in the packet handed out to Board members].” “On January 20, Susan Baker terminated four management staff, all of whom had expressed concerns about her leadership and operations of the CSB. The unsigned document with incorrect titles that was given to each of us indicated we were being terminated due to a reduction in workforce and for us to exit the premises as soon as possible.” “These terminations are clearly retaliation for whistleblowing, which is illegal on both state and federal levels.”

He continued, “Since these terminations, Susan Baker called a staff meeting to inform the staff that she has full support of the Board of Directors. The Board members we have spoken with did not know about the layoffs.”

“The agency is being run with a management of fear which is ineffective and unjust.”

“Due to the many violations of Virginia Administrative Code, the performance contract, and the concerns about client care, the [Virginia] Department [of Behavioral Health] is currently investigating.” Maria Reppas, Communications Director for the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services confirmed on Wednesday that the department had “received a complaint and there is an investigation underway.”

“Without the Board’s immediate attention to these issues, the community will suffer, as programs will destruct and staff will resign. We’re asking you to fulfill your fiduciary responsibility and do the right thing. We’re asking the Board to continue our pay and benefits until this is straightened out,” Crawford concluded.

Smyth stated, “This will conclude the public comments. I need a motion to go into executive session under personnel.” After an initial motion and second that failed to satisfy the procedures laid out in Code of Virginia § 2.2-3712, [“A. No closed meeting shall be held unless the public body proposing to convene such meeting has taken an affirmative recorded vote in an open meeting approving a motion that (i) identifies the subject matter, (ii) states the purpose of the meeting and (iii) makes specific reference to the applicable exemption from open meeting requirements provided in § 2.2-3707 or subsection A of § 2.2-3711.”], the Board was provided with a copy of § 2.2-3711 to make the motion properly.

The assembled public was escorted outside and the board spent more than an hour behind closed doors. As the public was invited back into the boardroom, Board Member Lloyd Banks motioned to return to open session and was seconded by Board Member Bill Talbert [representing Buckingham County]. Chairman Smyth addressed the public, “We’ve made no decisions at this point.”

The meeting continued with Executive Director Baker presenting her report detailing upcoming events and challenges to the organization including the closure of group homes in Virginia and how that might affect five of Crossroads’ facilities. “We built four group homes side by side. We also have another one that is a double building with essentially two group homes in it. What they’re saying at this time is, to do that, to have a group home in immediate proximity to another one or to other services in effect creates a mini-institution and that’s not acceptable. So we are waiting for someone to say, ‘Okay, we’ll grandfather this one, we won’t do this one.’ At this point we really need some guidance on what’s okay and what’s not. We could be looking at a pretty substantial capital outlay to solve this problem, but hear me, these people are in our care, they are our charge and I will advocate for whatever it takes to continue the group homes even if they have to go up in houses around town. At this time, we don’t have an answer. It’s kind of disrupting.”

The meeting was then adjourned without any further comment from the public or the board.

According to their website, Crossroads Community Services Board was organized in 1973 as a cooperative venture among the counties of Amelia, Buckingham, Charlotte, Cumberland, Lunenburg, Nottoway, and Prince Edward. The fourteen-member Board is made up of one representative from each county’s Board of Supervisors, and one citizen from each county. The organization employs more than 400 people at facilities in Prince Edward, Lunenburg, Charlotte and Amelia and serves thousands of county residents each year.

About Evan Jones

Evan is the Assistant Editor at the Southside Messenger newspaper in Keysville, Virginia.

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