Contents
1. Annual Assessment Structure Review Committee
2. Nominating Committee Policy Revisions
3. Miscellaneous Items

The POA attorney attended the entire meeting, but there was no Executive Session.

As of this posting, no Splinters summary has been distributed to the community. It may come later, but the vast majority of the meeting was spent on the two items below.

Annual Assessment Structure Review Committee

Again, so that everybody is on the same page, the “annual assessment” is referred to by many people as our annual dues.

Last month, the Board created an advisory committee to evaluate the pros and cons of possibly changing the methodology of annual assessments. The committee presented its report at this meeting, and the Board sent out a summary of its decision in an email to the community. That email is printed in its entirety at the end of this post.

At the bottom of the email copied below are links to four papers; including the committee’s report and the reasons behind the Board’s decision. Also included is a “Minority Report” by Chris Wittmayer. He was a member of the advisory committee but resigned after the second meeting, and the paper presents his views as to why the committee came to the wrong conclusions.

Also, I suspect most of you received an email from the “Dues Project”; which Chris helped form to pursue the idea of changing the assessment structure. During the meeting, he did not disclose the names of any of the people that he claimed were supportive of his ideas. According to the Dues Project web site, which was available several days later, the only named people are Chris Wittmayer, Mary Ann Anderson, Jim Charton, Kelley Hunter, and her husband, Joe Hunt.

I recommend reading all four papers; especially the committee’s report. But please note one very important point about some information that is not obviously referenced.  The “Report from the POA Board” is six pages long.  The first three outline the rationale behind its decision.  But the next three respond to several of the comments that were made in the Minority Report.  If you read the Minority Report, you should also read the Board’s response.

Since all the information is readily available, I will not summarize it here.

(Editorial Comment: For the time being, I don’t want to address either of the two opposing positions. The primary reason for this is my sense of uncertainty as to exactly what is being proposed by this new committee.

Initially, the proposal was for our annual assessments to be based on assessed tax values. However, at this meeting, Chris Wittmayer appeared to be hedging his bets, so to speak. He hinted that he might be amenable to an alternative form of assessment model that, while not based strictly on tax values, would still assess some property owners more than others; just not as much as would be the case with the “tax value model”. He tossed out a number of alternatives, but with very little detail.

And, in fact, their web site, which was released several days later, showed no less than ten different alternatives.  But, again, they were outlined only in very sketchy terms.  It appears that they wish this to be a negotiation; with all the attendant strategies and ploys that accompany such an effort.

At this point, the only thing we know for certain is that this “group” wants some people to pay more than others. But we don’t yet know exactly how much more or the format they are willing to accept. Nor do we know how many are part of this group beyond these five people. Given that, I don’t think the ten vague alternatives are worth the effort of analysis and/or commentary at this time.)

Back to the meeting itself.

After presentations by the committee and Chris Wittmayer, the Board discussed the issue. Several directors offered good points, and most are outlined in the “Report from the POA Board”.

A motion was made to accept the committee’s recommendations; namely that, based on its findings, there was no compelling justification to modify the current annual assessment structure to one based on property values. The initial vote was five in favor with three directors not voting. Those three were Dave Burseik, Judi Anderson and Becka Huckabee. Bill Colton then asked all three why they did not vote.

Judi Anderson and Becka Huckabee said they were abstaining. Although there was some discussion, it was not entirely clear to me why they were abstaining. According to standard meeting procedures, one abstains only when they have a direct conflict of interest; and the discussion did not indicate the existence of one. Becka Huckabee did express her concern for those that would have difficulty paying the increased assessment; her example being the buyer that had “stretched” to purchase their $450,000 home. But, again, that is not a conflict of interest.

Dave Bursiek initially expressed concern for those owning lower value homes. But he seemed more concerned about homeowners that had purchased an adjacent vacant lot for protection; in other words, to stop anybody from building next to their house. He felt the increase in the annual assessment for those owning two lots in this manner would be a financial burden or somehow be unfair; and that perhaps there should be an adjustment made for them. However, after expressing this concern, he then decided to vote in favor of the motion to accept the committee’s recommendation.

Therefore, the final vote was six directors in favor and two abstentions.

(Editorial Comment: I was puzzled by Dave Bursiek’s concern for people owning two adjacent lots and decided to do some research at the county deed registry. I could not find any record of him owning a second lot. But I did discover that two of the “Dues Project” committee members, Mary Ann Anderson and Chris Wittmayer, both own vacant lots adjacent to their homes.)

Nominating Committee Policy Revisions

(In the interests of full disclosure, please note that, when asked by the chairperson, I agreed to serve on this sub-committee.)

I noted in last month’s summary that a sub-committee was to be formed to look at the nominating process and provide suggestions for improvement. That committee presented its report at this meeting, and the Board voted to adopt its recommendations; which can be found in a two page summary here:  Nominating Recommendations

Briefly, the three most significant points were as follows. First, it should provide more time for the community to assess candidates and, if desired, deal with write-in candidates. Second, it calls for the entire Board to be actively involved in the selection of all members of the Nominating Committee. Third, the weight of the committee’s membership is shifting from a majority of Board members to a majority of at-large members (see Editorial Comment below).  There are other changes, too, and those interested should read the two page summary linked above.

The Nominating Committee will continue to have the option, at its discretion, of nominating a number of candidates equal to the number of openings on the Board.

(Editorial Comment:  In the past, the Nominating Committee has consisted of three Board members and two at-large members from the community.  The Board agreed with the committee’s recommendation that it be changed to three at-large members and two Board members; with limitations as to how often one individual may serve in any given time period.  For this new structure to work, it will require more participation from community members.   So, if you are asked to serve on the committee, please do so.)

Misc. Items

• The replacement Mt. Carmel gate entrance sign is still in the works.

• The new “information signs” that were to replace the green posts just inside each gate are currently on hold.

• It appears that the “Governors Club Cares” liability issues have been adequately addressed and that it will be part of the POA committee structure. No mention has ever been made of the POA funding this activity.

 

November 20, 2015
POA Board Accepts Committee Recommendation that Dues Structure Will Not Change

At its meeting on November 17, the POA Board heard the results of an ad-hoc committee formed to examine the Governors Club annual dues structure in light of the Board’s recommendation to increase annual dues by 10% each of the next four years to fund future GC road resurfacing. After hearing both the committee’s findings and a minority opinion of one of the committee members, the Board decided by a vote of six to zero (with two members abstaining) to accept the dues committee’s conclusion that there was no compelling justification to modify the current dues structure to a property value based system.

The Board’s conclusion was based on the committee’s findings that:

• There is no evidence 2015 dues levels negatively affected medium and lower priced home sales. In fact, on some measures, lower and medium priced homes did relatively better

• The effect of dues increases needs to be closely monitored, as they will directionally reduce the competitiveness of GC versus surrounding communities.

• Community marketing efforts must be redoubled to continue addressing the property values issue. The dues structure is not a solution.

• The current dues method is fairer than a method based on property values. POA services are available to all owners equally and are not “consumed” according to their home’s tax value

• The Committee could identify no North Carolina home owners association (in over 1,600) that uses a tax-based allocation system, including those with diverse property values such as GC

Moving to a tax-based system introduces legal risks and associated costs to the GC POA

The following related information is posted on the POA website home page:

• Report from the POA Board; including its response to the Minority Report

• Final committee report

• Slides used by the ad-hoc committee at the November 17 Board meeting

• Minority Report by one of the committee members

(You can either visit the POA website or click on the blue links above to go to each of these four items.)