This story was part of an earlier story about a $6,000 donation to the GOP being sabotaged by members of the Oklahoma GOP headquarters staff. We decided this was what is called a buried lead, an important story on its own so it needed its own article.
Click on this link and you will be able to listen to a phone call from Bob Dani where he asks that a $6,000 donation project be cancelled or pushed back. Why? Because Communications Director Leslie Nessmith wanted to sabotage the donation because she wasn't involved in setting it up. Read the original story for the disgusting details of a woman that puts her own political power before the good of the Republican Party.
On July
27th 1983 GOP officials announced the plans to spend
$300,000 to convert an office building at 4031 North Lincoln Blvd.
Into a library for former governor/U.S. Senator Dewey Bartlett.
Mr. Bartlett had passed away in 1979 and they wanted a memorial to
him and a place to host some memorabilia and to house the Republican
Party. So the Bartlett family set up a trust to purchase the building, remodel the building, and to hold the building in trust so that the Republican Party had a stable home.
The GOP at that time was located at 123 NW 23rd and in a few years the building was ready and the 4,700 square foot building became the Republican Party's home for the next 36 plus years.
All of that is in danger thanks to Oklahoma GOP Executive Director Bob Dani's plans to “strong arm” the Dewey Bartlett Foundation Trust into investing into an extensive remodel of the building. You can listen to this audio tape and hear Executive Director Bob Dani spell out the plan in his own words.
The GOP currently pays around $1000 per month in rent we are told by sources inside the GOP, with the money going into a trust account for paying insurance and property taxes and maybe enough built up to replace the roof or air conditioner if needed. Now market rates on a building that size with such a large parking lot would run $7000 to $8000 per month, maybe more that close to the Capitol. Even if the GOP could get by with a single office there is no way you are renting even a single office with a parking slot for $1000 per month anywhere close to the Capitol.
Bob Dani was upset that the grass mowing and landscaping wasn't included in the $1000 per month rent, or that the air conditioning needed repair, which I arranged the day after the volunteer coordinator let me know the system was only working in a quarter of the building. Which by the way I would up raising more than enough money for the repair and the donations coming in before the week was out.
Sure the building needs some sprucing up and maintenance. Tile is falling off the wall in the restrooms, the carpet needs cleaning which I had a donor willing to do but I was told that anything we do to the building takes bargaining chips away from Dani in his quest to force the Bartlett Trust to donate more. But the space is clean, safe, has plenty of parking, and we have been there for over 36 years for God's sake.
The gift that the Dewey Bartlett Foundation gave the GOP is simply amazing and generous. What amazing forethought, to ensure that the GOP always had a stable home. It would be insanity to even think about moving and the costs, well after putting up security deposits and advance rents and the costs of moving and changing things like checks and printed matter, well it would be several years before you covered these costs even if you found a $800 hole in the wall single office room in the area.
This is just another example of the insanity that is coming out of the GOP current headquarters staff. Who would even think that the State Committee would even think of allowing this to happen?
Meanwhile the GOP spends thousands of dollars per month on accounting services that are not audited, compliance services that have cost us tens of thousands of dollars in fines and penalties in the past two years according to good sources. And the idea of spending thousands of dollars on a computer software system that requires certified operators, with only one person in the state certified to run the software, that is complete insanity. You would be hostage to one person. When CNC machining first came into the cabinet shops many a shop was ruined by transferring all of the skill to build cabinets into one CAD designer. That man could name his wages because you couldn't replace him and he could shut your shop down if he didn't show up the next day. Many a shop failed the transition from craftsmen building the cabinets to a high tech shop.
This outrageous plan needs to be shut down. If Executive Director Bob Dani thinks the foundation needs to spend more money then he is better off helping them raise the funds or just stop killing off thousands of dollars in donations from people more than willing to fix up the building.
