. . Dave & Sandy Decker

Dave and Sandy Decker were typical of volunteers to non-profit work. Newly married, veterans of previous marriages, they sought out activities they could do together. Dave was a Vietnam Vet, and because the POW/MIA issue had been in the news, they decided to help. They joined up with Minnesota Won’t Forget POW/MIA, Inc., in 1989 and were soon heavily involved in it.

Both were elected to the Board of Directors, and both became close friends of the Executive Director and his wife. Over the next few years, they would spend virtually every evening socializing with the Executive Director and his wife, usually at their home, and usually after working several hours at the organization office.

On weekends, Dave and Sandy would operate a merchandise booth for the organization, selling clothing, pins, and bracelets to the public at public events.

In 1990, they were given the job of forming and managing a parade marching unit, recruiting volunteers from the POW/MIA community. They did so with great success, and considerable time and effort.

Almost every weekend during the Summer, they loaded a bus with volunteers and POW/MIA flags and took off to a location in the state where a parade was being held as part of a local festival. The parades were usually a mile or more long, in the hot Summer sun -- and sometimes rain. The unit objective was to have more than 40 marchers carrying a POW/MIA flag, representing each missing Minnesota man. Typically, they would muster about 20 people, who would carry two flags each. They had no uniforms -- the flag made up their uniformity.

The unit gained enough notoriety that it was included in the Minneapolis Aquatenniel Parade - the State’s biggest and most famous parade of the year, with many professional floats and first-rate bands and marching units.

At the end of the season, Dave & Sandy organized a picnic for all of the volunteers -- the only reward they would see for giving up their weekends and wearing out their shoes.

The unit marched for three years, then began to have difficulty getting volunteers -- but what 1993 held for the unit will never be known, because the Deckers left the organization in the Spring of that year. They became involved in a dispute within the organization that ended in an attempt to remove the Executive Director -- and the Deckers were among those who were against him.

The dispute started over a petty issue, when some of the Directors complained that one of the Directors was using the organization copier to make large volumes of copies for another organization he belonged too. The copier was leased on a per/copy cost, and the rules were that payment had to be made for use of the copier, but the Director -- John Lowe -- made no payment.

Finally, when a group of five Directors was present at the organization office one evening, one of them -- a frail young man by the name of Dan Forby, decided to confront the Executive Director about it, as nothing was being done. Forby arranged a meeting and the five Directors went to the home of the Executive Director. Expecting that they would get a sympathetic and understanding ear, they were shocked when the Executive Director told them it was his organization and he would do as he pleased, and he didn’t intend to intervene.

After that, the festering argument over the copier also brought to the fore several other complaints. Two prominent Directors had resigned, and while there were bodies to fill the positions, it was frustrating to the others that there were so few experienced volunteers available for the organization. Occasionally, highly-qualified individuals, including two veteran airline pilots, had attended their meetings and expressed a desire to participate, but to the dismay of the other Directors, these people were never contacted. Others resigned after a short time.

The five were also concerned that the Executive Director had resisted making changes to his bookkeeping procedures. They had complained for over a year that his records were inadequate to break out the results of the organization’s merchandise sales; they couldn’t tell if the organization was making any money on the merchandise.

They had also complained for several years that having the Executive Director’s wife as Treasurer made it difficult to raise money, because of the appearance of impropriety. Finally, in the Summer of 1992, a temporary Treasurer was appointed, but he resigned within months. In December of that year, the first Treasurer was elected.

ALl of this took place when the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIAs had been holding hearings in Washington D.C.. The issue had been on the front pages of the newspapers and television, and the Senate Committee had recently completed its hearings. Everyone in the POW/MIA community was sitting on the edge of his chair awaiting the committee’s verdict, in the form of a final report.

Thus,the Directors were baffled when the Executive Director’s wife announced that people weren’t interested in the issue anymore and they might have to shut down the office. She disclosed that her husband also expected to be laid off from his job at a defense plant, and since there were few defense jobs available locally, she said they might have to move out of State to find work. Jobs were not plentiful at that time. At the same time, the Directors noticed that the Executive Director’s wife had begun placing labels on all of the property in the organization office, indicating if it was personal property or organization property. One of the items she labeled as personal was an expensive computer system donated to the organization by a VFW post in the City of Spring Lake Park.

The Treasurer decided to take a close look at the financial records, but was dismayed to learn that the Executive Director had taken them home, along with his personal items, and key data and records from the organization.

Finally, one day when Forby was in the office and answering the phones, he received a call from a moving company, responding to a request for an estimate on the cost of moving the office furnishings to an undisclosed location.

This alarmed the five, and they decided to act to protect the organization, as it was apparent to them that the Executive Director was shutting down the organization and taking its assets with him -- probably out of State. However, the five did not have enough votes to do anything about it. Two more Directors were on an extended Winter vacation and were not expected back for months.

They decided to approach one of the Directors who had recently resigned, to see if he would withdraw his resignation and return; When Forby contacted him asking for help resolving the dispute, and explained that the Executive Director was shutting down the organization, he agreed to help them. He was an MIA family member. He had devoted an extraordinary amount of time over four years to support and promote the organization, and he was not going to allow one man to destroy and disgrace the organization.

Subsequently, the six Directors met but decided not to take action until the two absent Directors returned, as it would demonstrate that there was overwhelming support for removing the Executive Director and his wife. The two absent Directors had often made statements indicating that they believed the Executive Director was dishonest, and felt something should be done to remove him.

The family member contacted the former Treasurer -- Ken DuFresne, and asked if he would take the reins of the organization if the Executive Director left -- though he did not give any indication of what was planned.

Possibly because of questions by DuFresne, the Executive Director got wind of the plans, and made appeals to two family members who had supported him over the years. Telling them that the Directors were telling lies about him in an effort to take over the organization, he demanded that they help him, especially by helping him get rid the family member on his Board of Directors. The family member was also a Director on the Board of the Family Members organization.

As a result, the other two family members demanded a meeting with the Minnesota Won’t Forget POW/MIA Directors, and they agreed. However, the family members asked for a written description of the Directors' concerns about the Executive Director. The Directors agreed, and met to draft a letter, which they all signed. The letter was then faxed to the family members, and to the executive Director -- who was shocked at the depth of the complaints, especially concerning his alleged plans to close the office. The Executive Director then refused to meet with the families. Finally, it was agreed that one family member, in addition to the other Directors for Minnesota Won’t Forget POW/MIA, Inc. would meet with the Executive Director. The other family member was George Bush -- a retired police detective, whose brother is missing from the Korean War.

At the meeting, the Executive Director denied everything. He denied that he had taken home items from the office, he denied that he planned to leave the state, he denied that he had planned to close the office. He said the labeling of the computer system was an error, and he denied that he had called a mover to ask for an estimate to move the office furnishings. He suggested that someone else may have called the mover to make him look bad; specifically, he suggested that one of the Directors -- the family member -- had called the mover, to make him look bad. To their dismay, Bush reported to the families that there had been no solid evidence to support the claims of the Directors.

To the Deckers, the Executive Director's statements were a slap in the face. The executive Director and his wife were not just fellow Directors. The Deckers had spent virtually every evening with them for three years. They had considered themselves to be best friends of the Executive Director; yet, there was no doubt in their minds that he was lying to them, and that meant only one thing. They had sought to resolve a dispute over use of the copy machine, and now the other Directors wanted to remove the Executive Director. Distraught over the shock of learning the real nature of someone they had felt close too, they decided they could not in good conscience continue. They submitted their resignations and left the organization.

They also left the other Directors short of votes to change anything when the other two Directors returned from vacation.

Two weeks later, the dissident family member contacted the Attorney General’s office for the purpose of getting financial information about the organization, because the Executive Director had taken all of the financial records from the office. He was met by Anne Hensley, an angry Attorney General investigator, who demanded to know why nobody had returned their letters and phone calls for 18 months.

H e was told that the Attorney General was about to levy a large fine against the organization for refusing to provide any financial information to the State for two years. The Attorney General had banned any fundraising by the organization in January of 1993 and the Attorney General had revoked the organization’s certification in March. The executive Director had disclosed nothing about these matters to the Board. When the Executive Director had been taking home personal items and critical records, the Attorney General had just banned any fundraising by the organization. He said nothing, but scheduled several major fundraisers. When, after refusing for several months, he agreed to turn over the organization checkbook to the new Treasurer, the Attorney General had just revoked the organization's certification. Each time, he said nothing about the Attorney General's actions. To the Directors, this was proof that what they had perceived was true beyond any doubt. There was no doubt in their minds that the Director had ignored the Attorney General because there was going to be no organization left.

The Treasurer was able to negotiate a deal with the Attorney General, to restore the certification and drop plans for a fine, in exchange for the financial information requested. The organization bookeeper had provided the necessary documents each year, but the Executive Diretcor had declined to turn them over to the State. Later, the Executive Diretor took credit for the deal, and said he had been working on the problem with the Attorney General all along. Most people in the veterans community believed him, because the Directors were not active in the Veterans community -- their story was never heard.

The Directors had kept quiet about the scandal, partly to protect the organization , and partly because they were not aware of all the facts, and didn’t fully understand what was happening. The Executive Director, on the other hand, had been busy conducting a damage control campaign among the other family members, and the veterans community in general. By this time, the community at large was convinced by the Executive Director that the dissident Directors were lying to take over the organization, and that is the story they believed. Some of the Directors were subjected to hate calls made from VFW bars.

The Deckers did not attend any of the organization meetings after that, but were kept abreast of events by the other Directors. When, a few months later, they learned that the Executive Director had taken a large amount of money from a fund-raiser and accused the Treasurer of stealing it, they attended the next meeting for the purpose of defending her, however, they were treated so badly by the other Directors, and the two family members who supported the Executive Director, that Sandy left in tears, and they never attended another meeting, and have refused to associate with the Executive Director since then. Later, the Executive Director would admit to State investigator Jodi Wahl that the money was not stolen, but few people would ever hear that.

There are many people like the Deckers, who seek to fill their lives by donating their time and talent to worthy causes. The Deckers worked hard, and were very successful, and must be given credit for helping to make their organization successful. They knew the difference between an organization and an individual, and they were loyal to the organization, and acted according to the responsibilities they were charged with when they were elected -- and they paid a price for that loyalty. Their efforts were devoted to helping the families get their answers concerning the fate of their loved ones, and for that, the families should be grateful.

.. RETURN