Secret Internal Memo Reveals PRSA’s “Hostile Work Place”
Secret PRSA memos and meetings admitting to "unbecoming" and "inappropriate behaviors" may drive the last nail in PRSA's credibility coffin.
As we close out September “Ethics Month” in the PR industry (#PRethics), the industry’s sights should be turned yet again to assess the latest ethics travesties from the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA).
Among the government open records collected recently from PRSA National Board members’ government employers, the latest one to catch my eye included a December 9, 2021, memorandum by then-PRSA National Chair-Elect Felicia Blow, directed to PRSA’s then-CEO, Linda Thomas Brooks.
In the annals documenting PRSA’s own misconduct, this memo was a doozey.
As a timeline reminder, by December 9, 2021, Ms. Thomas Brooks had only been on the job at PRSA for 11 months, having just joined the staff in January 2021.
But already, accusations of a “hostile work place” apparently had been registered by Ms. Thomas Brooks to Dr. Blow, according to Dr. Blow’s explosive memo.
Dr. Blow cc’ed her memo to PRSA’s Human Resources Committee, composed of other PRSA National Board members:
In only those 11 months, PRSA leadership apparently was in a major meltdown, which it certainly didn’t want the membership to see, hear, or in any way know.
After all, throughout 2021, then-PRSA National Chair Michelle Olson and Ms. Thomas Brooks had undertaken their PRSA road show / “listening tour” to PRSA chapters nationwide, painting a (false) picture of “Everything’s coming up roses at PRSA!” and touting PRSA’s new “DEI Strategic Plan” and its phony “Voices 4 Everyone” / #V4E campaign to tout PRSA’s DEI window-dressing and “civility” posturing.
But take one look at Dr. Blow’s memo (placed by Dr. Blow on a self-styled PRSA generic letterhead), and you can read for yourself the degree of not only inner-leadership vitriol at hand but also flat-out allegations of apparent gross misconduct by PRSA leaders themselves — whether on the staff or National Board volunteer sides.
“Inappropriate behaviors unbecoming of Board / PRSA leadership…” and “…numerous activities that are unbecoming of PRSA leadership” (?!?!) were cited in writing by Dr. Blow to Ms. Thomas Brooks, among the apparent mutual accusations and circular firing squads.
This memorandum was followed up about eight months later with a dispatch from PRSA’s then soon-to-be-National Chair-Elect, Joseph Abreu, who shared via his Lee County, Florida, Clerk of the Court & Comptroller government e-mail a “Legal Expense Report.”
Brace yourself for “Doozey #2”:
I’m guessing none of these legal-expense revelations ever made it into Mr. Abreu’s own “town halls” with local chapters and districts, once he was elevated to PRSA National Chair himself in 2024… I’m sure as a reward for keeping mum about PRSA’s “hostile work place,” among other facts:
Later, according to PRSA’s 2022 IRS 990 filing (which PRSA didn’t even file until Oct. 30, 2023, mind you), PRSA ultimately hemorrhaged $142,881 in member dollars that year to its third-party legal counsel at Venable, LLP, due to all the matters listed above and goodness knows what else. (A PRSA chapter was placed under “Congressional Investigation”?! What the heck?!)
The prior year (2021), PRSA incurred $151,574 in legal expense with Venable.
And as for that little line in the above “analysis” that “If legal expenses exceed $100,000 in 2023, it is recommended that another analysis be conducted and an RFP be considered,” well…
PRSA’s IRS 990 for 2023 revealed $156,460 in “Legal” expense for that year, well over the amount that should have triggered an RFP:
But did PRSA follow through with a legal services RFP, as was urged by PRSA’s Finance Committee in its expenses assessment?
That question remains unanswered at the moment.
What we do know is that PRSA instead disbanded its HR Committee, under apparent recommendation from… you guessed it!… Legal Counsel at Venable (the below reference by Dr. Blow in her July 30, 2022 e-mail to Mr. Abreu and others to “Andrew” was Andrew Steinberg of Venable, LLP, who many Assembly delegates over past years will recall sitting up on high from the PRSA dais, helping stage-manage commentary by more than one PRSA Chair to the voting delegation):
Ms. Thomas Brooks left her CEO post in December 2024, and PRSA’s longtime CFO Philip Bonaventura also hit the road under questionable circumstances in June 2025… just a number of months ago.
Since then, PRSA has remained deafeningly silent on its 2024 financial results, which may have spurred the separate CEO and CFO departures.
We’ve seen no evidence that PRSA has revealed its 2024 audited financials (I welcome anyone with evidence of disclosure to step forward, with said evidence — I’ll be happy to publish it).
As a reminder, it’s October 2025 already. PRSA’s voting delegate Assembly takes place very soon. These voting delegates are the members in charge of holding PRSA’s National Board accountable. You know… like, how “democracy” works?
But will they? Or, are they too scared of PRSA’s retaliation?
PRSA’s long-term, multi-year patterns of omissions of financial data are legally noncompliant, as New York law requires compliant financial reporting at the annual meeting of voting delegates:
It appears that PRSA’s voting delegates are being forced to go into this year’s governance conclave, yet again, blind to any legally compliant financial reporting, by all appearances here.
Instead, I’m sure delegates will be regaled endlessly by 2025 Chair Ray Day from the Assembly podium about how great PRSA’s “Doubling down on DEI!” strategy is going for this toxic national organization.
Meanwhile, an all-male panel will be prepping to lecture the PRSA International Conference attendees – composed some 80% by females – about how to “wield” “civility” as a not “being nice” “power skill”:
Can’t make this up!
I guess PRSA’s Past National Chair loyalists like Tony D’Angelo and Mike Cherenson would also claim to be deaf, dumb, and blind to the infamous, inflammatory Blow memo of 2021 – the very year both of these specific men, among others, ganged up on me to kick me out of PRSA membership, all because I was asking questions not to their liking… such as:
“Where did millions of dollars of our member resources go?” and
“What gives, with this mysterious ‘Diversity Action Alliance’ that PRSA / PRSA Foundation set up with money PRSA doesn’t have?”
PRSA’s brand credibility has gone the way of the Greater New York Sewage System for so many years now… so much so, that rank-and-file PRSA members apparently can no longer even smell the stench and react accordingly.
If they could, then why aren’t they asking more questions and demanding more answers publicly of their member association leadership, who have fouled things up this badly, amid secrecy and “secret meetings” that even Mike Cherenson was complaining about in 2021… only days after the expulsion of my membership that Cherenson (and D’Angelo) himself secretively participated in:
Suffice to say, it’s not been a “Happy Ethics Month” for PRSA this September — nor has it been, for years and years.
It’s also looking like PRSA’s International Conference (PRSAICON) Month in October won’t fare much better.
Mary Beth West, APR, FPRCA, has been a whistleblower of PRSA misconduct since 2016, with a focus on urging PRSA National leadership to reform its unethical and legally noncompliant business practices, for the sake of the PR industry at large. You can read more about her chronicles of PRSA’s financial misreporting and discrepancies, ethics code breaches, DEI hypocrisies, and other misconduct on her blog.