SEP manager, some client communicating with another site. Command's failing...

I've got a couple of SEP issues.. split the points evenly it two peeps answer separate questions..

1. SEP Manager 12.1.2, the vast majority of my clients are communicating with another site.. how do I fix that?
a. I have two sites in which my site is the remote (or second site installed).  A list of groups divided up by OU.  All OU's are listed on both servers and Im thinking that since site a's server was installed first that's why my clients are talking to it.  I do have policies directing my clients to my local server as a GUP and SEP server.

2. The clients of mine that are not talking to the other site's server are showing the installation failed.  Except I have VNC'd into two of those machines and manually installed the latest version of the client and rebooted.  Refreshing my client list their status does not change.  So from the server I chose to force those clients to update content.  In the Command Status window that command is never completed.  I Googled and found one result that the 'fix' was the restart eh server.. did that and no change.