You gotta love Newbury

Speaking of controversy and disputes, one of my buds in Newbury sent me an alert about the continuing saga of the Yellow School Center for the Arts.

At 2 p.m. tomorrow there will be a court hearing for the latest episode, in which two former board members of the YSCA are suing the chairman of the board for $1500. It would seem from what I'm told (by my friend, who is admittedly partial) that the money was raised for YSCA but somehow ended up with the two former board members, until the chairman, Richard Johnson, asked for it back.

Now the former board members say it's theirs. From what I can tell from a story from the Dec. 13 edition of the Boston Globe, when the Yellow School lost its buildings last fall by somewhat questionable actions by the Newbury selectmen, one of the former board members now suing, Linda Allen, started a new arts organization.

Allen (with the other woman who is suing YSCA, Heidi Fram) soon started a new arts organization, the Byfield Community Arts Center, which now operates out of the two buildings.

It seems quite a tangled web, in which Allen was at least implicated in financial 'shenanigans' that resulted in the indictment for larceny of the former YSCA treasurer, David Takesian.

The YSCA, while no longer operating as an arts center, has not disbanded.

There is also this story, from the Daily News, also in December. Not unsurprising, it mentions nothing about Allen being implicated in the larceny since chairman of the Newbury selectman Vincent Russo is a supporter of Allen and the DN is a staunch supporter of Russo.