The three oldest directors want to retire, but they want to appoint their successors before they go. Sol Chooljian has exercised a veto power over every director appointment for at least 25 years and wants to do so again. This is a direct in-your-face challenge to shareholders who think we should be able to elect directors responsive and accountable to us, not Mr. Chooljian.
The practice of appointing successor directors may have made sense in the past when it seemed nobody wanted these unpaid jobs. However, this year there are four shareholders who do want the job. Three of them responded to our interview requests: Ron Rieger, Steven Muro, and Dave Stephenson. They are all well qualified. Shareholders have received letters, emails, and texts from Muro and Stephenson explaining their joint platform and requesting our votes. We are not aware of any campaign activities by Rieger. Jim Lingl is on the proxy at his request, but did not respond to our interview request, and we have not seen any campaigning by him.
Why would we reject all those choices and wait for Mr. Chooljian to appoint three replacements he has not named and may owe more to him than to us shareholders? Why would we want him hanging around exercising his influence in the future, when his leadership in the recent past has been so disastrous?
Crestview Watch is not endorsing any director candidate, but we do urge, as a high priority, that Mr. Chooljian be voted out. We are confident that the two junior incumbents and any three elected by the shareholders can reset our company on a sound path—but only if Mr. Chooljian is off the board.