I sent the following e-mail to the Board on November 21 as a reminder of the questions that I asked at the Annual Meeting. I have subsequently resent this twice.
All,
1. Who pays the fee for the use of credit cards in paying for the annual assessment?
2. Who maintains the spoil site?
3. I would like someone to prepare for me a comparison of the year to date expenditures and budgeted amounts for the following committees:
Jude Davis
To date, I have not had any reply from Edmund regarding these questions. I did receive the following from Adam Anderson concerning the maintenance of the spoil site. I asked a Board member if this reply was the official position of the Board, or just a personal view. He replied that, as far as he knew, this was a personal communication from Adam. Does Adam speak for all of the members of the Water Amenities Committee? Where is his base of support?
Jude,
I really don't understand your persistence in asking this question. The expense of maintaining the spoil site would be no different than the expense of dredging. The way the regime idea has been presented is the WPA would pay X amount of money to the canal regime and it would be up to US to spend that money as we desire. The balance of ANY expense including spoil site maintenance would fall on the canal regime.You seem unhappy with the split or balance in the proportion of money contributed to the regime from off-canal lots vs on-canal, but I really fail to see how someone living off-canal would really care if the spoil site is maintained. Its unfair to project that cost on the rest of the plantation when its people like you and I that benefit from it.Let's assume we could do a maintenance dredge including engineering cost, in a year or two for $400,000. Without any WPA help, that would be about $5000 per lot. Over time, if the WPA kicks in the proposed percentages, that number would be considerably less. Are you really going to tell me that's not a plan you could support? It's logical, simple, fair, and most of all allows us to control our own destiny concerning dredging. As you witnessed Saturday, the community's acceptance on individual assessments is not very positive. Unless someone challenges the assessment from 2009 in court and has the wherewithal to see it through, we will never know if it's valid or not. What any of us think is completely irrelevant. I would prefer to stay out of court, which would take years and tens of thousands of dollars, and instead try to resolve this ourselves.
I think you make a valid point that the spoil site could use some annual maintenance and it is something I intend to look into. I don't know if this is something a group of volunteers could go out and do a few times a year or if we need a contractor to come in and do it. I will get with John McBride and the rest of the water amenities committee and get you an answer asap.
Adam Anderson
I replied:
Adam,
Thank you for a response to my question about the spoil site. I persisted in asking the question BECAUSE no one had an answer for me. (I have asked this question many times).
The WPA recently spent over $7,000 to maintain WPA property behind someone’s house. Who, besides the individual property owner, cared! Why should someone on Swamp Fox care what the circle on King George looks like, or Duck Pond Road? The responsibility for maintaining WPA property is the WPA’s regardless of where it is located. Deliberately failing to maintain WPA property is negligence on the part of the Board.
I do not know what happened Saturday. On Friday, an e-mail was sent from a canal resident to Carol Zieske who then forwarded it to her group. This e-mail decried ANY money from ANYONE being spent on maintaining the canals and was totally against a sub-association. The animosity and disharmony that you hope to avoid is still active and present here. The people who caused the stink over the first dredging seem to be prepared to fight a sub-association. It is interesting as to the number of people on your cohesive Board whose names appeared on the list of recipients.
Perhaps you could explain to me your complete reversal on individual assessments and your support of a sub-association. Sub-associations have been looked into at least three times that I know of—including a serious push in the 80’s by Dick Meyers group who petitioned the Board to allow the canal lot owners to form their own association. The Board, on the advice of counsel, said no due to the legal logistics. Adam, I believe that you know that you can’t force someone to join the association and therefore can’t assess them any fees. Who pays for those canal lot residents who don’t join? Do you assess the members more? If I understand correctly, it was Bob Garrison who decreed that individual assessments were out and pushed the sub -association. Meanwhile, nothing is happening, no plan is in place, and no money is being put aside. Were you at the meeting—heavily attended by the cc—where both Janine Cline and Bob Garrison said that by paying off the loan in 2013, the annual assessment for 2014 would go back down to $450! Where does that leave your plan for $40-$50/ household from the WPA for canal maintenance? The permit clock is ticking--or was that the plan.
The minutes from the 2011 Annual Meeting state that individual assessments are legal! These minutes were approved without correction. You are completely incorrect about having to wait until someone challenges the individual assessment in court to determine if it is legal or not. Until such time AS IT IS CHALLENGED IN COURT, individual assessments are legal. It was Carol Zieske and her group—including Bob Garrison and Jason Barrier—who fought the individual assessment. No one on the canals did. It was Carol et al who said that individual assessments were part of the By-laws but only for small amounts of money. No where in the By-laws does it give an amount. The sub-association works only if you get 100% participation. It is not viable and you are spinning your wheels and wasting time.
I have received several e-mails from Adam where he makes it clear that the opinions he expresses are his alone. Really?! I thought that as a Board member he should be solicitous of the opinions of the membership. The survey SHOULD have come out BEFORE Adam decided that a sub-association was the way to go. The survey itself was a joke—no deadline for returns, just a yes/no question, no place to sign, etc. I urge all canal lot owners to return their survey immediately! Is Adam operating without the support of the canal lot owners, or is Bob Garrison’s sub-association idea the way to go?
No one complains about spending WPA money to maintain WPA property UNTIL that property involves the canals. Once again, I must caution the Board about negligence and discrimination. Has anyone run the idea of negligence and its pitfalls by the attorney?
Our By-laws give the Board tremendous power. They can do anything they want until such time as they are challenged in court. To my knowledge, the individual assessments of 2009 have not been adjudicated and until they are found to be illegal in a court of law, they are LEGAL.
No one has answered me regarding the credit card fee. Frankly, it should be in the contract. The amounts spent on various committees are important. Each chair needs to know, and should be keeping track, of the amount spent versus the amount budgeted.
As I look at the October financials, I immediately had several questions:
Who is our resident manager? We are paying over $18,000 annually for one as well as an additional $25,000 for a management company?
Why was $10,000 budgeted for irrigation repair?
What are safety inspections?
Why did we budget $2200 for annual evaluations?
Our past due amounts are over $100,000 yet we spent over $89,000 on forgiveness of debt. Does someone have a clue?
It is a shame that these questions, like most of my other questions will find their way into the dead question box. This box is supported by apathy—on the part of the Board and the membership.
