Richard Kimball abandons Vote Smart

Kimball abandons Vote Smart

• Richard Kimball 

  From:rk@richardkimball.org

  To:Mr. Mark M. Giese

  Sat, Jun 1 2024 at 2:38 PM

  Richard Kimball’s Desk

   

   

  You had my back and I let you down!

  You supported our creation of Vote Smart, my dream and life’s work for 33 years.

  Entering my late 70s I wanted my wife and I to step back as we continued to closely watch and advise those anxious to replace us.

  We had worked toward a smooth and seamless transfer, handing off Vote Smart’s reins to a former staff member and volunteers who had never raised money for Vote Smart but had culled my confidence. I left them a record $4,000,000, much of it my untaken salary; a proven fundraising plan to ensure its immediate growth; and a history ensuring Vote Smart’s continued transparency, independence, and unquestioned integrity. That, along with my discussions with Google about the A. I. essential to the explosive growth we had all desired.

  But my dreams crashed on the very day the transfer took place. On that day I entered a Twilight Zone, where I was sealed out of all important budget, fundraising and policy discussions, and my board membership eventually stripped away.

  I can only presume that this was because of my intense and angry objections to the dramatic changes instantly adopted by new leadership, including enormous wage increases for the former staff member who replaced me without commensurate increases to other loyal staff, and their dismantling of a proven membership recruitment program that could sustain Vote Smart. That along with a failure to maintain non-partisan equity amongst controlling board members, and finally the discontinuance of financial and staff transparency, all essential to public trust.  Changes that all violated the core principles upon which I had built Vote Smart—and what I had promised you when you first chose to support my efforts.

  The last time I was permitted to see Vote Smart’s current financials was more than a year ago, when they had already spent through almost a fourth of the funds I left them.  Although I have continued to support Vote Smart in my messages over these many months, the changes in policies and protections I had thought locked in have made the Vote Smart I tried to build unrecognizable to me. So, in 2024 I let them know I could no longer support their efforts, nor could they use my name, since they had broken the tenants upon which Vote Smart was founded. Their efforts may still have value to you, and to the extent they do, I hope you continue your support, but I simply cannot.

  Let me be clear, these new leaders are not bad people, just inexperienced and upset because of my intense objections to the reversal in direction they took Vote Smart on the day of my retirement. To me, it is like good kids that got the keys to a candy store, all knowing how to eat the candy but none how to make it. The fault, in truth, is mine. It was my judgement, my decision, my mistake to retire and turn the reins over to this new leadership.

  Despite this painful news, I hope all is well with you. Adelaide and I live in Tucson now and regardless of these events and my dream’s failure, are healthy and happy.  I believe in better years ahead and pray someone will take up the cudgel and demand an unquestioned source of information to which any citizen, right wing or left can turn in absolute confidence for the facts.

   

  My very best wishes,

  Richard Kimball

  Email: daffieduck2016@gmail.com  Cell: 520-784-4877 
  Address: Kimball, 575 Via Guadalupe, Tucson, AZ 85716