Park district isn’t holding up its ballet contract | Letter to the Editor

Published 8:00 am Thursday, November 10, 2011

Vashon Island Community Ballet is a non-profit organization. We are the same board that organized and supported Vashon Junior Civic Ballet. We are the same parents and volunteers who fundraised by selling flowers and concessions during shows and washing cars. We painted the props and backdrops, baked the refreshments, wrapped the roses, shook the snow machine and pinned the costumes. We are the support system for these shows and for these dancers. We pay the artistic director a stipend for each show. Betsy Frazee voluntarily resigned from our board and stated she would never work with us. We moved forward for the benefit of the kids and the program and hired a new artistic director.

We changed our name at the recommendation of Vashon Park District staff and signed a contract that clearly stated VPD would hold our funds and distribute them per our request. Park district commissioners believe they can interpret the law in a way that allows VPD to ignore our contract, take those funds and create a new entity with them. We believe VPD is in breach of contract.

Before the end of our contract, we requested arbitration with VPD. They did not respond. The commissioners have ignored our requests to meet with them. VPD has put this board of volunteers through an emotional roller coaster and has refused to acknowledge us as a separate legal entity. Their attempt to placate our former artistic director has caused damage to our reputation and harm to our program. We do not want to fight with VPD or Betsy Frazee. We only want to continue to provide a top-notch free ballet program to the youth dancers on Vashon. We are a hard-working volunteer board who has no personal agenda here except to put on a spectacular show for these kids.

— Kathy Snyder, Kamela Trujillo, Michael O’Donnell, Susan Parsons and Katie Whitney