Cindy Kwitchoff's (Editor of the Dispatch & Website) summary of the March 6 PHCA meeting. Views expressed are solely my own:
- Are you familiar with Jill's House, a respite care facility for intellectually disabled children next to McLean Bible Church? Their parents have to take care of these children their entire lives. But what happens when the children get old and their parents pass away and there is no family left to take care of them? The proposed house on Cherri Drive is for six of these ELDERLY intellectually disabled adults, of which there is such a long list of people like this who need a home that there would be no reason to change the type of residents who live here.
- The PHCA Board, who volunteer their own time and effort to serve the Pimmit Hills community (and have worked harder than any other board in the past 20 years), were each served with legal papers the night before by a lawyer hired by the Frace-Heller family who accused the board of "changing" the voting procedure. PHCA never changed anything. For years the dues have been $20 per house, regardless of the number of people living in the house. Why, then, would a single, divorced or widowed person who paid $20 get ONE vote while a husband, wife and 20-year old child get THREE votes for the same dues price? The "Family Membership" level on this website was only created so each family member could have their own login information and thus post comments on the blogs or community forum. Do you share your Facebook login with all members of your family? There is no official "Family Membership" level in PHCA itself, it's just a function of this particular website. PHCA never changed the voting procedure and voting has never been an issue, but faced with a bizarre legal threat, it was decided simply to not take the position vote. PHCA position votes are not binding to the county or state, which will do what they want anyway.
- Because of the many inflammatory and scare-mongering emails and flyers the Frace-Heller family sent out (which PCHA had NOTHING to do with), most residents came to the meeting very upset and ready to vote No to the proposed home. There were nearly 200 people in attendance, up from the 20 or so who normally care enough to show up for meetings. After listening to District Supervisor John Foust, members of the Fairfax-Falls Church Community Services Board, and a resident in Fairfax City who lives next door to a group home provide the actual facts and truth that countered the accusations of the Frace-Heller family, many had changed their minds.
- The best comment of the night came from a person who had come adamantly opposing the home, but by the end of the night, she reminded everyone in regards to alleged "threats to our property values" that we live in Pimmit Hills, former home to the Pagans gang, not McLean, and have more threats to our property values by the many dilapidated 'Green Acres" homes in our community with junk cars on the lawns. She ended by saying when she leaves Pimmit Hills, she'd like to donate her property to build a group home for elderly intellectually disabled adults.
- The sad comment was from a Pimmit Hills teenager in the audience who came to see how her community worked. After listening to some of the rather mean comments against the home and its residents, she stood up and said she was ashamed of this community and that it was not the Pimmit Hills community she knew. I second that opinion.
- Because of the continual harassment of PHCA Board members for the past two months by Glenn Heller cumulating in his legal threat, the volunteer Board said they would be leaving at the end of their term in May. No volunteer who is trying to serve the community should be burdened by a situation like this or legal threats. The PHCA Treasurer resigned that night because the mean-spirited things he is disappointed to see in this community.
On another note, the Member Directory on this website (only available to members who log in) states that this information is not to be copied and violators will be removed. Unfortunately, on 23 February 2012, Glenn Heller joined PHCA, copied all the members email addresses and has been sending multiple unsolicited emails to members. I have now hid members phone numbers and email addresses and apologize that this information was stolen. To stop his emails, you may want to add his address to your spam or blacklist.
It's a very sad time for the Association on its 61st anniversary.
