Did You Take Over the Saranap Community Association (SCA)?
Some opponents of Sufism Reoriented’s proposed new sanctuary have conducted a campaign of misinformation claiming that Sufism Reoriented 1) deliberately "took over" the Saranap Community Association at the July 2008 annual election meeting in order to get the SCA to issue a favorable review of Sufism Reoriented’s building plan, and 2) did so unscrupulously by busing in people from outside the Saranap, the community where our church is located, to gain enough votes to win the election.
These claims are simply false.
First, the members of Sufism Reoriented who voted in the July 2008 election were not “outsiders,” either to the Saranap neighborhood or to the SCA. One member of Sufism Reoriented was a founder of the SCA. Four members had been serving on the board of the SCA, some for years. In 2007, approximately 50 percent of the dues-paying members of the SCA were members of Sufism Reoriented.
Second, friends of the church project decided to attend the SCA annual election meeting and exercise their democratic right to vote for a more balanced board because 1) the opposing SCA board members would not give a fair hearing and review of Sufism Reoriented’s plans for a new church building, 2) several of those board members said publicly that they would oppose the building of any church in the Saranap neighborhood – whether it was Catholic, Baptist, or Buddhist, and 3) the SCA president published a misinformed editorial against the project, ignoring the SCA’s own established procedures for evaluating projects in the neighborhood. He published this without the approval of the SCA board.
Third, Sufism Reoriented did not “bus in” people to the meeting to add votes. Two hundred supporters attended the meeting, almost all of whom were Saranap residents. With such a large base of supportive Saranap neighbors, Sufism Reoriented had no need to “bus in” anyone. And we did not.
Of the 200 supporters, only twelve came from outside the Saranap area, and they were fully qualified to vote according the SCA’s bylaws. They came to the meeting totally on their own.
Fourth, the members of Sufism Reoriented had no intention of "taking over" the SCA. Their only wish was to increase representation on the board of people who were neutral or friendly to their project, so that the building could be evaluated on its merits and not blindly opposed based on prejudices.
What actually happened at the July 10, 2008 SCA annual meeting? 1) The SCA board presented a slate of candidates, none of whom had read the Land Use Permit Application, yet at least four of whom stated they were opposed to the new church building, 2) four persons were nominated as write-in candidates to run against these SCA nominees who were in opposition, and 3) all four of the write-in candidates were elected by margins of fifty or more votes. Thus the twelve attendees from outside the Saranap area, who voted legally, had no impact whatsoever on the outcome of the election.
The election resulted in five members of Sufism Reoriented being on the eleven-member SCA board. Note that five of eleven did not comprise a majority of the board. Sufism Reoriented never intended to “take over” the SCA.
What happened next was a surprise to everyone. Several weeks later, the opposing board members resigned in a block. The supporters of the sanctuary never intended that to happen. They had planned to work collaboratively with their other colleagues on the board, following the SCA’s established procedures for evaluating building projects in the Saranap area.
It was only because of this unexpected mass resignation of board members that members of Sufism Reoriented found themselves in the majority on the SCA board. Since then, replacements for vacant board positions have been sought based solely on their qualifications, not because of membership in Sufism Reoriented or support of our sanctuary. For example, after the July 2008 meeting, a retired nuclear physicist with extensive managerial experience was elected president of the board. He is not a member of Sufism Reoriented.
Several other highly qualified people have also joined the board, including a financial planner and an attorney from the Contra Costa County public defender’s office. Others include an RN who works in eldercare and a man who grew up in the Saranap and is a purchasing agent for the city of Milpitas. None of these people are members of Sufism Reoriented.
Since the 2008 election, the SCA has been working to provide an open, transparent, public process for evaluating Sufism Reoriented’s Land Use Permit Application.