# WorldMark owners band together to get an owner on the board.  Email from today:



## rickandcindy23 (Sep 19, 2016)

Dear WorldMark Owners,

My name is Myle Hammond. I am an independent WorldMark Owner just like you and I am also a candidate for the Board of Directors. I need your vote and I would like to tell you why. Together with a group of other concerned Owners we have privately raised the $5,100 that is required in order to send this election email directly to all of the membership. This is drastically different than the many communications that you normally receive that are paid for by your Owner’s dues or the Wyndham Corporation, so my hope is that you will read this email in its entirety.                

Under its current composition, the WorldMark Board of Directors, which is responsible for oversight of the Club’s Management Company, is controlled by current and past employees of the Wyndham Corporation, which serves as both the Developer and the Management Company, a natural conflict of interests. 

Anyone that has received proxy requests in the form of a contest giveaway or election campaign emails over the past several months realizes that the Wyndham Corporation has and always will have the ability to directly communicate its message to Owners. However, the Board and the election communication process are the only mechanism by which Owners and those not affiliated with Wyndham have the ability to communicate to the entire Club. Unfortunately the Board with its current composition primarily serves as a proxy for the Wyndham Corporation, leaving only the election campaign process as the means by which involved Owners can communicate to the broader membership of the Club.

For the past several years I have read election statements from Wyndham and the Board that conveyed the message that electing anyone other than the incumbents would result in an increase in dues and the end of the Club as we know it. However, as someone that has been a WorldMark Owner for going on 20 years, I have come to believe that we as Owners are too often presented with a false choice. I believe that it is the responsibility of the Board to ensure that Owners are receiving the best value for the money they are spending. However, I do not believe that Owners can be provided with true value unless there is a dialogue that allows for Owners to effectively express the degree to which they value how the Club expends valuable resources.

Transparency is the key to accountability, and if elected to the Board my priorities will be to maximize the value that we as owners realize from the investment that we have made into the Club, to develop more effective means to account for Owner preferences as the Club continues to grow, and to ensure that Owners feel as though the Board’s decisions represent the interests of the individual Owners that have purchased into the Club, rather than the Management Company for which it is supposed to provide oversight. But I cannot accomplish any of these goals without your votes.

The Wyndham Corporation holds a substantial block of votes that they will invariably apply towards changing the Bylaws as well as re-electing their affiliated members. This together with those undeclared proxies that are given to the Board has resulted in the election of a Wyndham controlled Board year after year. My hope is that this year will be different, but making that difference will require action by individual Owners like you. Owners have the ability to cast all of your votes for one candidate, and I am humbly asking for the support of all of your votes this year so that the voting power of Independent Owners like you is not split in vain amongst the three non-affiliated members that are running for the Board.  If you have already granted your proxy to the WorldMark Board without designating your candidate then that only makes your participation in this year’s election all the more important. It is not too late for you to cast your vote.

Furthermore, as a concerned Owner I am encouraging Owners to vote NO on the proposed replacement of the Bylaws. The Restated Bylaws have been prepared by attorneys hired by the Wyndham controlled Board, and as such reflects a perspective and language that is most beneficial to Wyndham the corporation. Cost savings has been articulated as the justification for the need to replace the existing Bylaws so that the Board can obligate the Club via multi-year contracts. However, a side by side reading of the proposed and existing Bylaws will show that the Board already has the authority to engage in multi-year contracts for a number of routine, goods and services categories that have been specified, so long as Wyndham does not have a 10% or more interest in the provider for the contract. 

For those goods and services contracts that fall outside of the specified categories, the Board during any given year has the ability to present a cost saving multi-year contract to Owners for approval at the annual meeting, but they have regularly elected not to do so. The Club already has the authority to execute multi-year contracts for areas that seem reasonable for most Owners, but if the authority for multi-year contracts needs to be extended to include certain new specified categories of service then that is what should be requested, and without the removal of provisions that were intended to provide transparency for Owners.

Our Club is important to me, but I also know that it is important to the many Owners that I’ve had the pleasure of meeting throughout the years. Please help to ensure that its Board of Directors is accountable to all of us as Owners. Please take a moment of your time to vote.

Since the Board began soliciting proxies even before candidates were announced, you may have assigned your proxy without designating your vote. If so, please be sure and submit your ballot marking both of your votes for Myle Hammond and NO on the proposed bylaw changes. If you would like more information from the perspective of individual WorldMark Owners you may connect with us at WorldMark Election Connection on Facebook.

There are four ways for you to vote in this year’s Board election. You may vote from a computer online via the WorldMark website.  You may vote by phone by calling (866) 567-7889 Monday-Friday, 5 a.m.-5 p.m. PT and Saturday, 6 a.m.-10 a.m. PT. You may vote by mail by sending in the completed proxy and ballot that you should have received, or you may vote in person at the annual Owner’s meeting to be held on Thursday, October 20th in Bellevue, Washington. Thank you for your support.

Respectfully submitted,
Myle E. Hammond
(USMC, Retired)

This email is being sent per section 4.2 of the WorldMark, The Club Communications Policy. The content of this email expresses the views and opinions of the sender only. The statements in this email are not made on behalf of WorldMark, The Club, its Board of Directors, or its representatives. The Club, its Board of Directors and its representatives do not endorse and cannot verify or be held responsible for the accuracy of the information contained in the message.


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## Slinger (Sep 19, 2016)

That's a uphill battle but good luck to Mr. Hammond!


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