VOTE FIRST, PLAN LATER: SELECTED'S BALLOT OPENS BEFORE THE OPPOSITION'S ALTERNATIVE ARRIVES

The question hanging over the Selected-NFDA merger vote is no longer whether members oppose it. It is whether the alternative to it will exist before most of the voting happens.

On a Sept. 14 program published by On Deathcare, host Tony Russo described a statement from Selected's leadership: anyone considering voting no on the sale to the NFDA "should have a well-researched plan that they're willing to present." Russo then pointed at one of his own panelists: Nathanael Billow, the sixth-generation Ohio funeral director organizing the opposition. Billow's response, as Russo told it, was "okay, I've got one and I'm going to present it to you." More material, Russo said, would be out "probably in the next two or three weeks."

Per the program's Sept. 14 publication, that is Sept. 28 to Oct. 5.

The electronic ballot opens Sept. 24 and closes Oct. 8, per the written update Selected's communications firm sent Obitley on Sept. 11. Under the earliest estimate, the plan arrives four days after voting begins. Under the latest, it comes three days before voting ends.

The math that makes the calendar matter

Obitley reported Sept. 9, from an on-record interview with Selected CEO Rob Paterkiewicz, that the ballot is a vote to dissolve the association under D.C. nonprofit law and needs only a simple majority of the firms that vote, not the two-thirds figure that had run in trade coverage since Aug. 20, including Obitley's own three articles. Selected confirmed the ballot logistics in writing on Sept. 11: the accounting firm Legacy Professionals LLP will tally and certify the results, with one vote per North American member firm.

A simple majority and a 15-day window make timing decisive. Any result between 50 and 66.6 percent in favor passes. Members who vote early do it without seeing the plan that Billow says he is bringing.

On the program, Billow said he expects the vote "to be just so one-sided," adding, "I mean, it has to be." His concern was the members who have not followed the fight. "I still think there's many members that we need to talk to and get the message out to," he said.

What the seven critics said

The program, recorded Sept. 11 and published Sept. 14, put seven opponents on one broadcast for the first time: Billow; Paul C. St. Pierre, a past president of Selected; Glenn Taylor, another past president; Eric Trimble, a past officer and former member of the nominating committee; John C. Greco, whose firm has been a Selected member for 55 years; Boyd Mothe, a fifth-generation New Orleans funeral director; and Chris Branson, an Indiana funeral director.

Their accounts added new specifics to the record.

The 80 minutes. At the Louisville annual meeting, Billow said, members "were given 80 minutes to talk through the biggest decision in the history of a 110-year-old association." He called the meeting's handling "nuts" and "absolutely insane," and said communication among members had been forced into "backdoor channels, one-on-one, calling friends."

Floor motions are "purely ceremonial." When members at Louisville passed resolutions from the floor, Billow said, "an attorney was hiding out online and piped in to say that the board has no obligation to listen to the members and that any motion we pass is non-binding. So it's purely ceremonial." Under that reading, the ballot is the only vote that counts.

Past presidents learned of the deal an hour before the public. Taylor, a past president of Selected and of OGR, said he was told on a call that the deal was about to go public. "And I said, when? And they said, in an hour." Trimble gave a similar account: "like Glenn, I heard about it an hour, half an hour before they went public." Greco's firm learned of the deal another way: he said he found out about the proposed merger on the Internet.

Nobody can describe the merged organization. Branson said he asked Paterkiewicz directly what the merged entity would look like if the merger goes through. "No, not yet," was the answer, he said. Next he asked Christine Pepper, the NFDA's chief executive officer, who he said had been brought into the process. "She also doesn't," he said. "Not one person involved in Selected Independent Funeral Homes would sell their funeral home and not know what the future holds for them or their organization. And that's what they're asking us to do."

The threshold apology. Billow recounted the Louisville moment when a member pressed leadership on whether the vote bar was 67 percent or 51 percent, and the answer had to be teased out. "They declared that it was only 51 percent, and they said, we're deeply sorry. We apologize. We've had bad legal help, and it's been pretty difficult since our attorney left us in the spring." Taylor went further on the legal advice itself: "The opinion was rendered by attorneys from both sides that wanted the deal to happen."

The memorandum members cannot see. Trimble said the board has seen the memorandum of intent underlying the deal, but members have not. "They said two attorneys, our attorney and NFDA's attorney, both told them they couldn't share it with the members."

The alternatives that were already on paper

The timing collision has a second fact attached: written alternatives already exist, according to St. Pierre. He said on the program that two association management companies, which he called Company A and Company B, had submitted written proposals to Selected. "Association Management Company A gave us a written proposal," he said, "and Association Management Company B." He also said that since the Louisville meeting, "I even had a state association come to me and say, hey, you know, I wish we had an opportunity to give a proposal to run, because we could do it with the current board of directors that Selected has."

St. Pierre disputed the premise that Selected has no options left. "We are not financially insolvent," he said. "They said five years from now, they think we're going to be in the red."

Selected's board has said it spent 18 months exploring alternatives before choosing the NFDA deal. Before the Sept. 14 program, the written AMC proposals and the state association interest had not been made public.

St. Pierre also raised the composition of the board itself. Several applicants with long histories in the association were passed over for seats, he said, in favor of members "a year or two in Selected," and he asked whether newer directors were picked "to help make this go through." Russo interjected at that point: "There's not an election. There's an appointment to the board."

What members can still do

The vote runs 15 days, and floor motions are non-binding. What members say before Sept. 24 is the only input that can still change the record.

Members can ask the board, in writing, to publish three things before ballots open: the memorandum of intent or a summary of its terms, the written association management company proposals St. Pierre described, and an organization chart of the merged entity naming who holds each role. Branson's account, that neither Paterkiewicz nor Pepper could describe the merged organization, makes the third question concrete.

Members can also ask Legacy Professionals LLP, as the certifying firm, whether it will report how many firms voted along with the tally. A simple majority of the firms that vote decides the outcome, so turnout is half the math.

And the alternative plan itself: Obitley emailed Billow and St. Pierre on Sept. 3, before the Louisville town hall, and again on Sept. 15 with specific questions about the plan's timing and contents. Neither had replied by the Sept. 8 deadline given for the first request. The new deadline is Monday, Sept. 21, three days before ballots open.

Sources: On Deathcare, "Transparency, Governance, and the Future of Selected," Tony Russo, published Sept. 14, 2026, recorded Sept. 11, ondeathcare.substack.com/p/selected-nfda-merger-debate (quotes cited to program timestamps 2:51, 8:27, 9:37, 11:51, 19:27, 20:59, 23:50, 25:28, 32:56, 34:34); Obitley telephone interview with Rob Paterkiewicz, CEO and executive director, Selected Independent Funeral Homes, Sept. 9, 2026; email from Mike Shefky, TRG Marketing, to Obitley, Sept. 11, 2026; Connecting Directors interview with Nathanael Billow and Paul St. Pierre, Aug. 20, 2026; Obitley, "selected-ceo-simple-majority-revelation" (Sept. 9, 2026), "selected-nfda-townhall-day" (Sept. 3, 2026), "selected-nfda-louisville-vote-preview" (Aug. 29, 2026), "selected-members-oppose-nfda-takeover" (Aug. 24, 2026); Obitley press requests to Billow and St. Pierre, Sept. 3 and Sept. 15, 2026.