Dannie’s Two Millstones

Sometime back we posted an article entitled Playing the “Victim” (aka “The Blame Game”). (Click here.)  And in it, we talked about SGG’s failing HVAC system and its failing school.  Well, here we are again: “déjà vu”!  Just recently, SGG’s HVAC woes came up again, after which Pistrina posted an article about it (click here).  And, as for the “school,” lately that’s been very much in the news as well.  Nary a week goes by when Dannie is not promoting it in his Bishop’s(?) Corner. 

That being said, we think that it’s particularly apropos right now that we revisit both of these items.  Recently, Dannie has been frantically promoting his “school” (to increase its embarrassingly anemic enrollment) in an effort to justify its existence.  So far, it has been both a huge financial drain on SGG’s resources (because of the principal’s “salary”) and a huge flop (because of the school’s sorry “academics”); and, as we noted earlier, Dannie has also been mentioning what has become a recurring nightmare: fixing (or replacing) SGG’s failing air-conditioners.

In our aforementioned article, this is what we had reported about SGG’s HVAC problems:

In his Bishop's Corner of May 2, 2015, Dannie mentioned that the church sanctuary’s HVAC unit had been hit by lightening (and was thus supposedly malfunctioning).  He then added, “Here the story becomes impossibly complicated, all caught up with big brother regulations and smoke detectors which never worked correctly in the first place, and companies gouging churches for great quantities of wasted money, backed up by the government oversight. Much patience and a cool head is required to navigate these waters.”

Apparently, “big brother” is unjustly imposing “regulations” on SGG and “gouging” them for “great quantities of wasted money, backed up by government oversight” [whatever that means!]. Apparently, too, the “smoke detectors that never worked correctly in the first place” are the fault of “big brother” as well.  Did it ever occur to Dannie that they didn't work properly because they were not installed properly?  How, we may ask, can “big brother” and his regulations be the cause of smoke detectors not “working correctly”?!  Stripped of Dannie’s confusing rhetoric and false logic, what it all means is that he is probably getting ready to soak the culties again for MONEY to meet these “unjust” expenses.  He has to portray himself as “victim” so that the culties can cough up the money for these “meanies” who are “responsible” for it all.

And this is some of what we had to say about the “school”:

The principal’s salary (and that of his family members who are on the payroll) represents a huge financial millstone around Dannie’s neck, and he wants desperately to be relieved of that burden – but he can’t (see Pistrina article).  And the sad thing (especially for the culties) is that it’s such an unnecessary burden, because the school has a total of twenty-five students in all, K through 12.   We wonder how the parishioners would feel if they knew that the lion’s share of their weekly donations was going to provide twenty-five kids a substandard education.

Firstly (as we had also pointed out in that article), the HVAC problems were as much the result of poor workmanship as they were of any “lightening strike” (or of “big brother”); and secondly, if the system was insured (which it should have been), the “lightening strike” damage should have been covered by said insurance.  (And, actually, with proper “surge protection” up front – which there also should have been -- the lightening damage would have never occurred in the first place.)  And, as for the “school,” Dannie cannot get rid of it – or, rather, get rid of it’s principal (for reasons that are a mystery to everyone but him and Dannie).  And so, the superfluous “principal” remains -- and the Gerties continue to foot the bill for having him around.   

But, so far, Dannie has “gotten away” with this.  And whenever Dannie wants any “extra” money from his Gerties, he simply dreams up some “crisis” (along with appropriate “villains,” such as “big brother”), and then taps his Gerties for the expenses – which usually end up being used not for whatever the “crisis” was, but for funding another one of his boondoggles to some exotic location.  Well, this year it’s no different: in spite of all the HVAC expenses that SGG has staring it in its face, Dannie and Tony managed to go on another “getaway”:  In SGG’s August 27, 2017 ’Corner, written this time by “Lurch” (Charlie McGuire), it was reported that Dannie and Tony both were “away on a much needed vacation (I figure it has been at least two years since their last one).”

Well, if one doesn’t count boondoggle “apostolates” to sunny Latin America as vacations, we suppose Lurch is right.  (This one was billed as a bona fide vacation, not as an “apostolate.”)  However, to help justify this vacation, Dannie later mentioned that it was to Chimayo -- “America’s Lourdes,” as he calls it (to make it look like an "apostolate").  But if one looks at the map, Chimayo is a stone’s throw from Santa Fe (Dannie’s favorite vacation spot).  But why, we may ask, did Dannie and Tony go to Santa Fe again – and at a time when SGG is strapped for cash to fix its failing HVAC systems?² 

Shouldn’t they be conserving their cash, in case another one of their AC units bites the dust – or for other “unforeseen expenses”?  (SGG’s physical facility, for instance -- from its parking lot to its leaky roof to its critter infestations -- is in sorry shape.  It’s only a matter of time before “something else” happens.)  And, again, what about the ongoing cost of that other millstone around their necks: the “school” – especially with attendance in a downward death spiral¹?  Lately, Dannie’s promotion of the “school” has been nothing short of frantic.  As Pistrina reported in a recent article, Dannie has even concocted a pretentious “teacher’s prayer” (click here for article) to drum up support for this ongoing failure.  But it’s all to no avail: attendance continues to dwindle.

So, it seems that Dannie’s old problems – SGG’s crumbling infrastructure and its “school” -- are still there – and not likely to go away.  The former will continue to (prematurely) decay -- because it was never built right to begin with.  And as for SGG’s so-called “school,” it will continue to be a liability; and, as we’ve already noted, Dannie can (apparently) do nothing about it:  he must incomprehensively tolerate the “principal” -- a financial burden that the Gerties must continue to bear (and which must be a source of continuing frustration for them).  That being so, it is only a matter of time before they will start asking why – and demanding answers.

And when they do, they’ll inevitably stop swallowing this malarkey about Dannie and Tony being “victims” (and blaming everyone else for their troubles), and find out that Dannie and Tony are not victims but victimizers, and that it is they, the parishioners, who are the real victims – that Dannie and Tony are the two millstones around their necks.  And when that happens, Dannie and Tony will, at long last, have no place to hide – and will finally reap what they have sown.

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¹Attendance at the “school” was twenty-five in 2015 (see SGG’s April 26, 2015 bulletin), and nineteen in school year 2016.  (See SGG’s School: Still a Bad Bargain.)  What’s it going to be in 2017?

² And speaking of HVAC systems, why – in lieu of going to Santa Fe -- couldn’t Dannie and Tony (as they’ve always exhorted their parishioners to do) have “offered it up” and foregone their trip to buy heating and AC equipment for the church’s vestibule, where SGG’s mothers and their small infants are still shivering in winter and sweating in summer?