Former City Councilwoman Susan Conniry, in a response to a Peter Jordan comment (Conniry noted in an email that she mistakenly clicked “anonymous” and meant to sign her name) on a golf course story at thenorthcoastnews.com, says she is the one that raised the issue of the golf course failing its lease requirements of regular financial reporting to the city. According to Conniry: “The issues raised with the auditor were focused on the city of Ocean Shores and not on Curt Zander, lessee of the Ocean Shores Golf Course. As an Ocean Shores council member from 2018-2021, adhering to my fiduciary responsibilities to the taxpayers, I questioned the late Mayor Dingler in regards to the lease agreement with the Ocean Shores Golf Course. One of the issues I raised was the fact that Mr. Zander had not provided financial information that was required under the terms of the lease agreement. Her response to my email sent in November of 2018 was as follows: ‘We do not receive such reports and have not required them ever that I know of. Since we have no ability to change the rate without a renegotiation, they are unnecessary.'”
Continuing her comment, Conniry said Dingler’s response did not stop her:
“The only recourse I had was to bring it to the state auditor’s attention during the annual audit. Though the auditor did not find it an issue at that time, after a contentious election campaign during which I lost my bid for re-election, perhaps in part to my questioning of the golf course lease, several citizens contacted the auditor hotline and also asked them to, once again review the issue. This time, at the conclusion of the 2022 audit, the team issued recommendations and a management letter that the city responded to. My understanding is that our new mayor took action by informing Mr. Zander of the requirement to provide the information as required under the lease agreement and to report to council.”
The North Beach News 
Everyone has known for months that SC was the one that called out the golf course. She is also the winner of “who has the most public records requests” of the city of Ocean Shores over the years. Her actions are likely the reason of her recent council seat loss. I sincerely hope she can enjoy her retirement, and start enjoying life more. She deserves peace in her life.
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Kind of sad that an elected official has to do public records requests, isn’t it?
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I think that perhaps Ms. Conniry either mis-took my statements about a lopsided beating being handed Mr Zander or maybe I just worded it poorly. My comments were intended to reflect the large number (in my opinion) of negative to nasty comments directed at Mr Zander in this and other media while few comments were directed at the other side of the contract who were at least equally responsible for any lack of compliance to contractual obligations. There are many alleged instances where the former mayor refused to convey information to both certain councilmembers or the public; too many to not have some truth. I myself had occasion to hit that wall several times until I just gave up; not being an elected official trying to guard the publics’ money it was not that important and I have never filed a records request. In fact, that management technique has given the taxpayers a lot of expense in complying with public records requests, including but not limited to a employee hired specifically for that purpose; or so said the budget request at the time. Yes, it is especially sad when councilmembers are forced to resort to public record requests to get needed information but there we were. Hopefully O.S. will learn to be more open and transparent in the near future; after all how many state secrets can there really be here? Finally, in listening to the golf course report and Mr Nobles gallant praise of the contribution Mr Zander has made in his stewardship(to which I agree) I noticed one thing Mr Noble forgot and I would like to remind us of that; he forgot to properly thank him for the time, money and effort he expended in his effort to get him elected.
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