"House Of Deception"

Three weeks ago I served in the House of Delegates (HOD) during the annual Fla. Dental Convention (FDC), something I did from 1994-2017. I briefly came out of retirement at the request of several members in my S. Fla. district.  What I witnessed and what happened to my delegation was appalling and unacceptable, something I never dreamed could happen at this usually noble event. I've always been proud of my HOD service and the caliber of my fellow delegates was a major reason I stayed on for so many years. Sadly, most of those great mentors are gone and I no longer recognize this now dysfunctional body.

 We had our SF candidate for FDA Secretary, the first step to eventually become the FDA President. This has been the FDA's tradition for decades, to recognize the will of each district and respect their choice, the only exception being 2017, when a challenger emerged from the Atlantic Coast delegation and announced his intention to run from the floor well in advance,  before HOD convened, no surprises. What happened during this HOD was a stealth nomination, unannounced by anyone and done in cahoots with the leaders from the other districts. The fix was in, they knew they were going to do this for at least one year out and their plot was carried out in the first HOD session. For those who doubt me, ask yourselves how a retired trustee who hasn’t been to HOD for years just happened to be there, standing by the right microphone for the stealth nomination and how a carefully prepared speech was written in advance and ready for the insurgent to deliver, had this truly been a spontaneous occurrence?

 The slate of candidates that included our chosen nominee had been voted on by the Board of Trustees (BOT), which included the insurgent challenger, herself a trustee. This challenger had even sworn the oath to continue as a trustee only 2 months prior. The last second nomination was done by one of our own former delegates and trustee, once held in the highest esteem by all. This person also ran unsuccessfully  for FDA Sec. in 2008 but had the class not to do what she enabled a stealth insurgent to do this past HOD session. That deference and respect for the will of her fellow district members went down the tubes this June. There's a reason this was done in perfidy, which I'll cover.  Our chosen candidate was 2018 Dentist of the Year, Lucy Hobbs Award winner and ADA Vice-President 3 years ago. Her challenger has achieved none of these distinctions despite more years in organized dentistry, and was not reelected to the ADA's Council on Annual Meetings, despite not being term limited out. So, given that qualifications were clearly not the reason, why did the plotters have such animosity for our chosen candidate? The answer is pettiness, envy and resentment that she refused to kowtow to their egotistical whims and even ran successfully for ADA V.P., despite their admonitions no to run because she'd lose badly and take our then ADA presidential candidate down with her. Well, she won decisively and that presidential candidate lost on his own, as did the previous two anointed by this leadership from the other districts.  That, my friends, is the one thing these ringleaders will never forgive or forget.

 I visited the other caucuses to make the case for what was really going on behind the scenes and found few sympathetic faces. It was clear to me these delegates had been poisoned for quite some time and believed their deceptive leaders.  To further cloud the issue and justify this ploy, the insurgent and only supporter (from our district) told the other delegations our district had prevented her from running in advance, not informed her of upcoming nominating committee meetings, etc. This is all patently false and we have the emails and notifications to prove it. The insurgent did not even attend our 2018 Annual Business Meeting, where she could have run from the floor, because knew she had no support in our district and would have lost decisively. Besides, even if it were true that she’d been treated unfairly, why would the wronged party stay silent after the fact and wait to cook up this sham at the very last moment, knowing it would be difficult to for us to refute it? That last question answers itself.

 I understand that anyone reading this would be set off and ask me why do I burden the rest of the FDA with our inter district infighting? Well, that infighting was dealt with in our own district and only made productive by enablers in the other districts who made sure their members didn't hear the truth and were too quick to carry out a hit job on a leader who's done nothing but take time away from family and practice and work tirelessly to serve all of us. This recent hit job was the final coup de grace that followed voting out this rising star and former ADA V.P. from the ADA Delegation for the second time this past January. It's clear this has been a personal vendetta from the get go. Think how ridiculous and vindictive this makes FL look to the rest of the nation! I'm in no way implying every single delegate outside of SF district was complicit in this cabal but clearly far too many were gotten to. This sends a very dour message, especially to our younger members who are considering going up the ladder. That message is if we, the junta, don't like you, we don't care about your qualifications, we can take you out and we don't really care what your members want. This happened two years ago in Atlantic Coast delegation and has left a divided district where several delegates resigned in frustration. I have no doubt that's what the plotters want, to get rid of opposition, but I'm here to serve notice to them. Our delegation isn't gonna cut and run and we refuse to be intimidated. This ugly trend is no longer a single isolated incident, don't be too surprised if it happens to other districts. This also mirrors what we’ve seen in DC for two and a half years, one side of the political aisle refusing to accept the results of an election, and is equally damaging to our FDA. In closing, it gives me no joy to report all of this to you and I'm only doing it so you can see what your elected representatives have been up to and the damage they've caused. It has to stop or we will lose our association to attrition when no young dentists want to serve.

Carlos A. Sanchez, DDS