Theft Charge Not ABATE’s Big Problem
I spoke to people from the Denver Police Fraud Unit and the Denver District Court Wednesday and got a few things clarified regarding the charge against former ABATE of Colorado State Coordinator Terry Howard. She definitely has been charged, but only on one count of theft. I had been told previously, and reported with caveats, that there were charges of forgery and theft. (I have updated that post with this new, solid information.)
My ABATE D-10 patch.
While this case is crucially important for Terry Howard, not at all meaning to be dismissive toward her, it is really small potatoes for ABATE. ABATE has a much bigger issue, which is this crushing debt that threatens to wipe out the organization. I’ll be following the case but I’m going to be spending a lot more time trying to get answers to the questions regarding how ABATE ever got here in the first place.
I want to spell out the questions I’m going to be pursuing, both to let you know where I’m headed and also to organize my own thoughts on what I want to do. I’ll include a little history along the way.
There was a time not long ago when ABATE was flush. Revenues from the rider training program were in excess of $1 million a year, providing the group the cash to put the state coordinator on salary along with the rider training program manager (already being paid, I believe) and two folks to work in the office. Ben Hochberg was the rider training head and it was largely through his efforts that the program was doing so well.
Personalities were conflicting in the office, however. One thing led to another and Ben got fired. One thing I want to understand is how–and if–Ben’s departure ties in with the decline in the program and the revenue it brought in. Was there already a major decline in proceeds when Ben left? Or did the program nosedive after he left? I do know there were some issues before Ben left that he tried to warn the board about but I’m not clear if they were financial.
So Ben left and then what happened? I do know the state MOST program (Motorcycle Operator Safety Training) went through some changes, and I’ve talked about them here. Was that change in MOST all by itself the cause of ABATE’s financial crash? Or was firing Ben a decision that really should have been avoided at all costs? Or what other factors came into play?
Either way, it is my understanding–and I want to know a lot more about this–that ABATE launched an advertising campaign to the tune of about $45,000 and apparently was not very successful. I’m an active member. I go to meetings. I have never heard about this ad campaign. I want to know what it was for, what it entailed, what the results were, and who made the decision to do it, and why.
And then this expense apparently led to a need to take out a loan just to meet expenses. And ABATE apparently didn’t have the credit standing to qualify for a bank loan so Terry personally signed or co-signed for it. How did we fall so far so quickly? Why was this loan even necessary?
And after that came another loan, I guess intended to cover the first one. Who made that decision? What discussion went into that? And this is the one that is killing ABATE. I saw an article about exactly this kind of loan-sharking in the Nov. 17-23, 2014, issue of Bloomberg Businessweek magazine. Discussing this field of finance, the magazine says, “It’s a high-risk market, and interest rates can exceed 500 percent a year.”
And they quote someone who lost her company because of falling for this loan come-on: “It’s the worst possible decision you can ever make, because they own you. It’s crack for a business. You can’t get off it.”
I repeat: how did we ever get to this point? I want details and I want names. Not to blame and point fingers, but if the same people who made these decisions are calling the shots today then I’m going to have some serious issues about trust. And I know I’m not the only one. I was all prepared to write a check to do my part to help bail the organization out but when I started learning about all this I put down my check book. I’m going to need answers before I reach for that check book again.
Biker Quote for Today
I know there’s money in motocross. I put it there!
Tags: ABATE of Colorado, Terry Howard
December 26th, 2014 at 1:20 pm
[…] not, in large part, Bruce’s fault. A lot of the questions I asked had to do with events that took place before Bruce stepped in as the new state coordinator. […]