Friends of Southwest Museum Coalition Issues Rejoinder to Leader’s ‘Skanks’ Comment

The Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition has issued a rejoinder to an objection by the Mount Washington Association that one of the coalition’s leaders used a derogatory term to describe the association’s members.

In a letter posted on the Arroyo Seco Neighborhood Council Yahoo mailing list Tuesday, the Southwest Museum Coalition said that its steering committee was “surprised” to receive a July 17 letter from the MWA and that “the matter of concern that was outlined” in the missive “was resolved at the private meeting of the steering committee” on July 11.

But Southwest Museum Coalition member Gabriel Buelna, who attended the coalition’s July 11 meeting in Highland Park, told Highland Park-Mount Washington Patch that the matter was far from resolved.

Not only was the coalition’s July 11 meeting not a private affair, but Dan Wright, one of the coalition’s leaders, had not adequately apologized for saying in the meeting that MWA members are “skanks,” Buelna said. 

Click here to read the background about Wright’s comment in our story from this past Monday.

“You can’t create a coalition and then say that it’s private,” Buelna argued. “That’s not a coalition.” The coalition’s meetings, held at 8:30 p.m. every Thursday at the El Huarache Azteca restaurant on York, have always been public in the sense that coalition members are free to come and go, Buelna explained.

Besides, even if the meeting were private, “you can’t disparage someone from the coalition and then say that people are bound by the confidentiality of the private meeting,” Buelna said, adding that contrary to the coalition’s rejoinder, Wright was positioned as the coalition’s co-chair at the July 11 meeting.

Above all, Buelna added, Wright’s apology, pretty much word for word, went as follows: “If anyone here was offended by my comment, then I apologize if you were offended by my comment.”

Said Buelna: “That’s not an apology. He didn’t say, I used a bad word, or My comment was inappropriate.”

Wright told Highland Park-Mount Washington Patch on Monday that he hadn’t had the time to peruse the MWA letter written by Buelna’s wife Pilar, who is MWA president. Patch is waiting to hear back from Wright to clarify his position.

According to Buelna, the immediate provocation for Wright to call MWA members “skanks” at the July 11 meeting was related to a conversation that someone recently had with John Nese, the owner of Galco’s Soda Pop on York Boulevard. The community member evidently told Nese that “the Southwest Museum will not get everything it wants from the Autry in a settlement,” Buelna said, adding: “I asked [at the meeting] what is the background to that [conversation]?”

According to Buelna, Wright responded by saying that he knows that whoever spoke to Nese is from the Mount Washington Association and that “all of them are skanks.”

Buelna said he walked out of the meeting, not least because his wife Pilar is the president of the MWA. (The word “skank” is particularly offensive to women.)

Buelna, who said he developed the strategic planning and public relations plan for saving the Southwest Museum, also asked Wright certain questions that, he said, greatly angered the coalition leader, who has long been part of the organization’s legal battles to keep the museum’s artifacts in the community.

According to Buelna, he expressed his concern over the coalition’s strategy for saving the Southwest Museum in the days before the June 30 deadline for the Autry National Center, which merged with the museum in 2003, to remove all the museum’s artifacts and house them elsewhere.

In particular, said Buelna, he asked Wright about who in the coalition had the right to see the confidential documents of the Southwest Museum before its merger with the Autry. 

Buelna also told the meeting that in an attempt to get access to the confidential minutes of the Southwest Museum meetings before the 2003 merger, he had contacted Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, the law firm that represented the Southwest Museum prior to the merger.

“Dan got very angry with me for calling the law firm,” Buelna said. “I said, Dan, we all have the right to research the process” whereby the museum was merged with the Autry. 

(Buelna told Patch that the law firm refused to allow him to review the minutes of meetings of the Southwest Museum prior to the 2003 merger without permission from their client, that is, whoever hired the law firm to work for the museum at the time. "I asked who their client is [but] they wouldn't say," Buelna said, adding: "I asked, could I review the Board resolution and the persons who were in quorum duing the time period? They said no." The lawyer from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher who represented the museum was Gregory L. Surnan, who is no longer with the law firm, Buelna said.)

The bottom line, said Buelna, is that “you can’t have someone who’s leading the coalition and its [legal] cases against the City of Los Angeles express this level of anger while representing the community’s interests.”

Buelna’s wife Pilar, the MWA president who is also a member of the Southwest Museum Coalition, told Highland Park-Mount Washington Patch that 

“Dan has been doing this kind of thing historically and it’s got to stop.”

She added: “We’re in the 21st century and there’s no tolerance for anyone calling people such names, particularly of an organization whose president is a woman.”

For all that, “we’re happy to move forward and will be joining the coalition fundraiser on Sunday,” Pilar said referring to Galco’s Summer Soda Tasting event on July 28.

Here is the July 23 rejoinder from the Friends of the Mount Washington Coalition in response to the Mount Washington Association’s objection to Wright’s “skanks” comment:

Response to Board of Directors of the Mt. Washington Association

Wed Jul 24, 2013 11:29 pm (PDT) Posted by: "Arroyo Seco NC" asncalert

July 23, 2013
Board of Directors of the Mt. Washington Association 
c/o Pilar Buelna, President

The steering committee of the Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition (Friends) was surprised to receive your letter of July 17th. The matter of concern that was outlined was resolved at the private meeting of the steering committee on July 11 that Gabriel Buelna attended and participated in. Therefore, we would be happy to clarify the facts and questions that your letter has raised:

Position of the Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition:

Our Coalition has always been about advocating for one specific issue € ¦’¶ the return of the accredited Southwest Museum and Casa de Adobe as fully functional museums in their respective historic locations in Northeast Los Angeles. We believe the MWA letter mis-states this long-held, widely-known and supported position. Our sole purpose is focused on a resolution to bring a museum function that utilizes the vast Southwest Museum Collection for residents, visitors and schoolchildren now and for future generations. 
We do not believe the MWA views, at least as expressed in the July 17th letter, are consistent with Friends position. 

Clarification on the Role of Friends Leadership/Dan Wright:

The Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition holds public meetings for all Coalition members and organizations who support our position. Our last public meeting was held on July 10th at the Highland Park Ebell Club. 

Your letter references a private discussion at a July 3rd steering committee meeting where Gabriel Buelna was in attendance. On July 11, the leadership of the Friends, with Mr. Buelna again in attendance, spent considerable time discussing the actual context of a mis-placed word, an apology by Mr. Wright, and an agreement for the steering committee to work together in a productive, civil and reasonable manner going forward. We felt that the matter was satisfactorily resolved and that Mr. Buelna would have certainly communicated this to the MWA board. 

Second, MWA has asked for clarity on the role of Mr. Wright. He is not the co-chair. The Coalition, at our public meetings, long-ago asked Ann Walnum and Nicole Possert to volunteer as co-chairs. Mr. Wright is not the "attorney for the Coalition" as we do not have one. Mr. Wright has served on the leadership of the Friends for many many years as a tireless committed volunteer. 

Next Steps:

We agree that there is broad support and commonality to "Save the Southwest Museum." The Friends will continue to do the advocacy work to find a way to maintain and preserve the first museum in Los Angeles and the Casa de Adobe as fully functional museums for Los Angeles. 

Respectfully submitted,
Ann Walnum and Nicole Possert, Co-chairs
Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition