NTA Ramblings

Problem is the mission has been getting it back together for how many years now? Two or three different boards or more, can't keep count. And saving it from who, ourselves? As George has said numerous times, taxidermist just can't play well together.

 

John, you really are bi polar. I disagreed with several that have expressed that's what is wrong with you and I disagreed at first. I thought that you were just ignorant but now I realize you do have a mental disorder.
YOU are the one that brought up my personal life which exemplifies how classless you are. I don't need any sympathy from you and I'm certainly not looking for any. Question. What could I be calling an executive session for? YOU? John, don't flatter yourself. You are not that important and you definitely don't pose any threat to anything that is gong on, anywhere! Did Michelle wait until I returned from New Mexico? Maybe. I AM part of this Board. I do have input. Did I call the session? No. I did not. So, what the hell are you talking about or better yet what are you smoking? Nothing you have said makes any sense.....further proof why you failed miserably in your effort to lead. But don't feel bad, you had plenty of company!

 

This saga has started sad, then stupid, back to sad, now laughable. If the NTA show didn't have prize money at the show, attendance would be about zero I reckon.

 

the board was given a heads up about the meeting well within a 15 day notice, we just wasn't sure of exact day and time. just an FYI

 

Brian, for perhaps the FIRST time in NTA history we have a cohesive board. All working together for a common goal. I seriously don't think we have EVER had that before, where honesty and intelligence have come together at the same time, AND ABOVE ALL, RESPECT FOR EACH OTHER. But talk is cheap. By the end of October you will begin to see things that have been derailed, stalled, aborted, in the past come together in a positive way. How you receive it is up to you, but believe me we are working hard to fulfill all those broken promises and shortcomings that have plagued the NTA for years. Going back to as far back as I can remember there has always been turmoil within the NTA board. There is one suspended board member who still wants to fight, but believe me no-one else who is a current active board member is fighting. We are working as a cohesive unit and it's really nice for a change. There has not been one cross word amongst the current active board and things are getting done. That is how a WINNING TEAM works. The payoff will start to be seen very soon. If we didn't think the NTA was worth fighting for and working for we would have given up long ago. We are still here working. Don't give up on us. In the past there has ALWAYS been those who have tied the hands of those who know how and want to get things done. Not anymore. Those ropes have been severed and the right hands are at work now. You will see, as will everyone else, be they willing to except that or not. Haters are gonna hate and we can't do anything about that. But the organization will be solid very soon.

 

Brian, not when it was advertised for who knows how long that the NTA had way more prize money than it actually had to give away ! I feel sorry for any competitors that were mislead on this !!! Not very smart in my opinion but what do I know !!! Let's just mislead people !! :-[ :

 

Heath, you know I am not going to let that go. Fred and I had commitments for every dollar that was advertised. One MAJOR contributor pulled out. SCI. They pulled out due to budget cuts in that department. That removed 3K from the prize pool. One other commitment for 250.00 failed to come thru with his commitment. The NTA could have replaced that money very easily or worked towards getting other donators. BUT INSTEAD, some of you decided that it was better to work against those efforts than to work with them. It was part of the plan to make me and Fred look bad and you damn well know it. By the way, where is the TV that is owned by the NTA? I trust you will be sending that to HQ very soon.

Furthermore to work against our efforts, Chris Feldt managed to get 4 banners on the website in a period of several months. I managed to get ALL the banners up in a matter of days fulfilling our promises to the Prize Fund donators. Now don't tell me there were not those who weren't working against us. Some team some of you turned out to be.

 

Then it should have never been advertised that the NTA had "X" amount of dollars to give away !!! Plain and simple and smart business sense !!
Wow, how you 'FORGET". WHO was trying to make you look bad ? Do we need to go into details on who covered whos ass ??!! If I wanted to make you look bad, I had endless chances !!!! But hell, I guess we forget about that real quick, huh Tim ???
And you are full of shit about this so called plan to make you and Fred look bad !! I never heard of any such thing ! And I will leave it at that !!

 

Heath there is NO question that you and Jim and Jim's wife came to my aide on several occasions and I am more than grateful for that. Thank You Again. But why would you post what you posted when you know well and good what and who was behind the Prize Pool debacle?

You 3 were there to help me and again I appreciate that. But where were all the others besides Kurt, Todd and Michelle? Where was Mitch, Ellis, Creager, Fedlt or Janna? Yep working against me. Even going as far as trying to have me removed from the property by the police. We probably should drop it before I tell all.

 

Are you ****ing serious ?? !!
What team guys we were ? You are ****ing are nuts !!!
How was I working against anybody ?? I/we did more than we suppose to do, remember Tim ? !!
O.K. since you want to play, lets brake this down.
First of all, YOU were in charge of the seminars, which means getting all the seminar rooms ready, introducing the seminar instructors, making sure they have everything they need, making sure the seminar rooms were ready before the seminars and making sure they were cleaned up after every seminar. BUT you were "too busy ' out smoking a cigarette or two or whatever you were doing to take care of that duty !! Guess who covered your ass on that more than one occasion ??
Second, you were "in charge" of the auction. Nobody was willing to help you at the auction. But once again, guess who stepped up even though we as you say "were trying to make you look bad", nobody but Michelle, Jim and his wife and myself !!! Gee, doesnt look like we were trying to make you look bad. If so we missed a good chance here. By the way, where were all you "buddies" that are on the board now ? Boy, they really helped you out didn't they !!!!
Third and most importantly, the awards banquet !!! You didnt have a damn clue !! Who was there to save your ass once again !!!?? Oh, I guess it was the Ohio people once again !!!
Being "in charge" of the awards banquet, you didnt know what the hell was going on !! Hell, you didnt even know for sure what awards we were giving away because you never even opened the boxes to check !!!! Not a ****ing clue !!! Awards chairman you are not !!! You didnt even have as list of the suppliers who donated money so the NTA could thank them.
So Tim, please explain to me how we were against you and trying to make you look bad !! Believe me we had plenty of chance to make you look like shit !! But it sure looks like to me, we were the only ones willing to help !!! And you might ask why because we wanted to make sure the convention and the awards banquet went off without a hitch,unlike alot of people on that and this board.
Here is a quick question for you Tim. Its funny, after Jim I resigned because of all the b.s, YOU asked us to reconsidered because we did such a great job. Do you want to see your email to refresh your memory ? So what or who changed you mind since then ?? I'm sure you wont answer that question even though the NTA is "transparent now" but I pretty much know the answer but am curious to what you have to say.

 

I have no idea about the prize pool except that you were in charge of it and getting money for it. You were the one who made the statements we had "X" amount of dollars in the prize fund, which we didnt. Thus misleading competitors.
You may be right about those you named, I dont know. But YOU said "we" were against you as you were lumping Jim, Deb and I in with that group. Get your story straight or ask somebody what it should be, I am sure they will tell you !!

 

Heath as I have stated again here, YOU, JIM and his wife were VERY helpful and very much appreciated, and again I Thank YOu for that very very much. And yes, I wanted you to come back UNTIL yours and Jim's resignation letters EXPLICITLY made it VERY clear that you were done, good riddance and all that. REMEMBER?? In the end it was a unanimous decision to EXCEPT your resignations. Yes, you can withdraw a resignation, but it has to be done in a short time frame. 7 days I think. Yours was way past that time frame. We had no choice but to except your resignations. I am NOT trying to lump you. I separated you. You are the good guys in my opinion. Ok, I will own the Prize Pool if that's what you think, but somewhere along the way it would have been nice to have had some help. I pretty much put together the whole damn show but that doesn't mean that I could run the whole damn show. Especially not in the hostile environment I was placed in. Thank God you were there. Sincerely.

 

Additionally, EVERYONE that is STILL on the board DID in fact work their asses off. Kurt, Michelle, Dave, and Russell. The slackers are the ones that left with the exception of You , Jim, Jim's wife and Todd. And I did ask ALL of you to come back. Some were touring the sites. Some were taking afternoon naps, and some were campaigning. Those are the ones who were not there to help do anything. We had committees. I was not the only person on the committees you mentioned. But you would think so by the lack of effort some gave. I could not do everything for every committee that I was the chair of on site. There had to be help from somewhere. Again, Thank God you guys jumped in to help me.

 

Get your story straight or ask somebody what it should be, I am sure they will tell you !!

What the hell is that suppose to mean?

 

One of the things that you will see at the next convention is an even distribution of duties. This will ease the workload on the whole Board. Another issue is once we have a better grip on the financial side with new protocols in place we will be better informed as to the amounts available for the Prize Fund etc.
Heath, while I wasn't present at the last convention it is easy to see that situations surrounding the Prize Fund can happen. Monies are promised. These not yet available funds are advertised to be given away. Those funds are not collected from the donor. Then you have a problem. We will learn from this. We can't go back and change the past but rest assured it won't happen again in the future. At this point that's all we can promise.

 

$4500. for quick books.

Brian, at the time of the World Show the NTA had ZERO dollars for the prize fund. Zero!!!

 

A verbal commitment is not money in the bank.

When I ask one of the most highly regarded people in the taxidermy industry what we should do about the ZERO DOLLARS for the prize fund.
The person take it off the website asap.

The lie Tim, lays with the fact at that time THE NTA COULD NOT HAVE REPLACED THE MONEY IN THE PRIZE FUND!

TIM volunteered to do everything, in Jan. I told Mitch trusting one person with all that was going to be a problem. Again tim has to lie about slackers.

"""There is not a time limit listed to withdraw a resignation, in the book of bylaws. But I am sure the group in charge has changed that slacking part.I have no idea about the prize pool except that you were in charge of it and getting money for it. You were the one who made the statements we had "X" amount of dollars in the prize fund, which we didnt. Thus misleading competitors."""

When I ask Tim about this during the phone call at the WTC, he said he did not have printer ink. This was the second time he made this claim for samething. Most of this old slacker board paid for things out of their own pocket. One of the first things Tim wanted was for the board to paid for every dime they spend.

Another reason Tim threw a fit was his electricity was shut off for lack of payment, so Mitch removed Tim for the chairman of the committee. Then came Fred whining.
So now that Tim is being paid to be HQ, his electricity will not be shut off.

""" Where was Mitch, Ellis, Creager, Fedlt or Janna? Yep working against me. Even going as far as trying to have me removed from the property by the police. We probably should drop it before I tell all. """"

Tim, I made sure you were not removed. I made sure you were there legally. I was not working against you. My job was to make sure trouble did not happen because you are a convicted child molester. I had the NTA safety in mind. Feldt and Janna were at the reg. desk. I was also in the suppliers room running problems. Hell my wife even worked the desk while one of the current board members was bitching about working the desk.


Yea Tim tell all, tell all you dont know. You have a bunch of twisted arsh lies to tell and its coming, you better damn well be careful what lies you tell now!

Let me put it this way, You did not register with the Washington County Sheriffs office in 2014, and by Arkansas law you are required to. No exceptions.

 

This is really getting out of hand......

"My job was to make sure trouble did not happen because you are a convicted child molester".....

These 8 or 9 pages were kind of comical, and entertaining, but making comments like this is ^^^^^ is over the line, and total BS. How are these PERSONAL ATTACKS, and NAME CALLING advancing the cause of the NTA.....??? (and YES, I know Tim personally).

This entire thread has done nothing but MUDDY THE WATER........

7 Springs main event....NTA fundraiser....

 

Heath, after research I have found that everyone that deserved prize money received it. Any money left over or not awarded is carried over to the next year. Just wanted to make this post to clarify that everyone DID receive their prize money.

 

That has to be the best quote of this whole thread ;D :'(

Wow. I have known Heath for over 20 years and have NEVER seen him get mad. Especially in a public sense. I am usually the guy going off. I tried to keep out of this malarkey but since Harry and Tim keep dragging my name through dirt I feel I cannot.

Tim you neglect to explain that Heath and I BEGGED many times to let us take over 2 of the committees you chaired. Why wasn't THAT help accepted? In the end the problems we saw looming and were trying to avoid came true and you KNOW we were STILL trying to get the awards in order while people were starting to be seated at the banquet!

Yes you did a lot, but most of your problems were SELF INFLICTED. If you want help and friends willing to give that help it is a two way street. You continue to put faith in one who is not helpful to you and left you to hang plenty of times.

Just for the record. Heath and I sent our resignations in on 8/6/2015. On 8/8 - 8/9 the others followed suit leaving only Tim, Michelle, Russell, Kurt, Dave and Mark??(who I heard resign months before and who didn't come to the convention??) We'll leave Garvice out because the poor guy has walked backwards into a hornets nest.

On 8/21/2015 this email was sent.



James Tucker <[email protected]>
Aug 21 at 10:04 PM

To

Michelle Burkholder Tim Thacker Mark Morren Kurt Ainsworth Russell Knight Heath Cline Dave Blank



Michelle, Dave, Russell, Kurt, Tim, Mark,

Since sending our resignations to the National Taxidermists Association Heath and I have had some time for reflection as well as a chance to clear the air with some people and think we are all in a good frame of mind.

Heath and I are willing to rescind our resignations and finish our terms if you would have us return.

We do have one request. We would like to have the Awards Committee and the Judges Committee along with Competition Committee. It does not matter WHICH of US is the chair of each but we would like to be able to oversee these areas. We got a tremendous amount of FLACK from people about issues we had no control over because they thought that because we were the Competition Committee we had handled all these areas. Please do not look at this as a DEMAND over the heads of the Board. We do not feel that the Competition Committee can operate properly if we cannot be SURE of what is happening on these other committees. These 3 Committees operate hand in hand more than any other and it requires a large amount of coordination to make it work. We are used to this system.

This is not about removing Tim, to that end we would still want Tim on these committees as he is familiar with them and would be of great help. However by chairing the committees, being close friends and near each other geographically it only makes sense and promotes ease of operation for Heath and myself. This is about making the Competition, Judging and Awards Presentation go as smooth & professionally as possible and us keeping our sanity. We NARROWLY averted several BAD accidents at the show...NOT because people were goofing off but because we just could not be sure of ANYTHING, Tim felt the same. We do not want to re-live that experience.

If you do not care for us to come back that is fine as well and we wish you all good luck. No hard feelings.

We felt a joint email was in order at this time. If you do choose that we return we will each send you all a request to void our resignations.

Jim Tucker
Heath Cline

Remember on that date the board WAS : Michelle Burkholder Tim Thacker Mark Morren Kurt Ainsworth Russell Knight Dave Blank. 6 people.

I have confirmation of 4 of them welcoming us back either in texts, emails, etc.

However later that week we were told that we were UNANIMOUSLY voted DOWN and the Board was now Fred Vanderburgh, Harry Whitehead, Garvice Thomas, Michelle Burkholder , Tim Thacker Mark Morren, Kurt Ainsworth, Russell Knight, Dave Blank. Weird. 4 people who were happy to have us back suddenly voted us out? Like it said in my letter "If you do not care for us to come back that is fine as well and we wish you all good luck. No hard feelings." and we meant that but going from POSITIVE to 100% negative was disturbing to say the least especially since we worked hard at the convention and our areas ran decently.

Now you will get plenty of double talk about this but it's the truth. One of those 6 is especially disappointing to me. I wouldn't have even thought of returning if it were not for them. How did we suddenly become persona non grata?

It all boils down to this. We actually listened to what was being said at every meeting. We actually READ the by-laws. We read committee asigments and did our best to understand and implement these assignments. We questioned and asked for clarification on every vote. We thought throwing around $$ like it was confetti was wrong. We were there to try and make the NTA a good thing for the MEMBERS, not "return it to former Glory"(whatever that means ) that it never had.

Any one of you that wants to post any out and out lies be aware I WILL post any email I have to refute what you say and I have them all from people demanding all their bills be paid to run HQ to people threatening to sue because we didn't kick John Creager off the board 5 minutes after we even knew anything was accused. EVERY SINGLE NTA related conversation that happened while I was on the board is all nice and cozy in my files. Personal ones and Public ones from EVERYONE that had even the slightest to do with NTA business. I did so because I saw the day coming when this would happen. So make sure you don't start talking sideways.

You are right Harry. That did happen. Did anyone tell you that it was brought up at the meeting in Gatlinburg that maybe we should just NOT give it out?? It might have HAPPENED had not Heath, my Wife and I assigned those amounts on the trip down south. Any award money NOT given was the result of NO ENTRY eligible for that money. Should be a decent nest egg for the prize fund as a lot of possible Ca$h awards did not have any entries.

I love you Michelle but that sounds just like Nancy Pelosi. Everyone had a 15 Day notice of a meeting that had no date or time?? How is that possible?