PKI bookkeeper Joan Carter's "Final letter"

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Dear Breeders:

It is with an EXTREMELY heavy heart that I write this letter to you.

I still cannot believe what has happened I’m sure many of you will be thinking that “She must have seen it coming” or “She must be pretty stupid if she didn’t see it coming”. If only it were that simple.

I realize it would give you another person to be angry at. And by all means you have every right to be angry because as terribly sad as I am, I too am angry. I just hope this letter might help you to  understand who you should be angry at.

The easy conclusion that everyone will immediately jump to, will be that “t was a scheme after all and Arlan Galbraith is a crook and therefore by extension as his bookkeeper so must I be”. That is just not so! I will defend till the end of time what I have said to many of you in person and on the phone. Arlan Galbraith is a man of vision who had a very unique and brilliant plan that he was going along and executing brilliantly until the jealous fear mongers of the world decided to make him a target. I have every faith that had the David Waglers and the David Thorntons of the world found someone else to spew their poison on, that PKI would be going strong today and for many generations into the future. It is a very sad world we live in that will beat a man down for daring to have a dream and a vision. Arlan’s dream was to help the STRUGGLING North American family farmer and his vision was to make pigeon a very healthy alternative to chicken. Some of you will say I must be just an emotional woman who couldn’t see the reality of the situation even though I saw the numbers everyday. Yes I saw the numbers but I always believed we would get past all the negativity and that “right” would prevail. So if you want to be angry at me for trying to the very last hour to beat the fear mongers, you have a right to that anger, and if you must call me names then call me naïve for wanting the world that we live in to be better than it is. Most of you know the very high price I am paying for my naiveté. My sister and her husband (who were equal partners with my brother on the second contract) have lost their retirement fund, my brother will be years digging himself out of the debt he went into to put up and fill his second barn besides not having paid off the first flock. Then there is my son and his young family who have lost their dream of being able to raise their children (they just found out another one is on the way) on a farm. So I have lost much more than a job I loved. As much as I dread having to start all over in the working world at my age I wish that was the only consequence of my involvement with Arlan Galbraith.

I want you to know that despite all the extreme hardships this has brought upon my family I do not really regret knowing Arlan Galbraith. I feel I am richer in many ways for having known such a man. I worry greatly what this will do to this good man as he has lost everything and I can’t imagine having to start over again at his age.
So as each of you struggle to deal with whatever hardships this bankruptcy brings into your lives and deal with all the “I told you so”s you will have to listen to I hope you will try to remember and believe that none of this was done maliciously or with bad intent, by Arlan, myself or anyone else associated with this company. Whether you choose to believe it or not this was not ever a “scheme” (Ponzi, Pyramid or otherwise) and Arlan is not a crook, you have only to look at the plans for the processing plant to know that there was indeed a grander plan that we were only just getting a glimpse of. Also I want you to remember there are a lot of farm families out there who have benefited from their involvement with the pigeon business, a lot of people have been helped and it breaks my heart when I think of how many more could have been helped had Arlan been left alone.

In closing I just want to say that I will cherish many of the memories of the friendships I made and the wonderful people I met in my year and a half working for “The Pigeon King”. I am truly sorry for any part I played in the hardships some of you will now face!

Sincerely

Joan Carter