The POHOA Board quietly posted notice on the Frontsteps website about 10 days in advance of the meeting on 5/9/23, but didn’t send out an email, nor did they post the sandwich board until the day of the meeting. It is therefore no surprise that the only homeowner that participated in person was Director Jones’ wife, Gloria. I had requested remote access in advance of the meeting, and was a bit surprised that it was granted. While Zoom would have been preferable, at least I was able to call in to one of the Director’s cell phones and listen in. In order to keep the meeting efficient and on track, I submitted my comments in writing in advance. I was pleased that Director Tunna mentioned them more than once, and it appeared comments from others regarding the 5th attempt by Director Jones to push us into investing in gold coins from his coin shop.
While the first item was not actually on the agenda (a vote on investing 5-10% of the POHOA Assets into gold coins), it appeared to be a compromise to put the issue “on the record” after Director Jones failed to woo votes from Directors Flanary or Tunna the day before, Director Ballweber’s position wasn’t made clear because she did not vote on the matter. Director Jones motion failed in a 1-2 vote.
The next matter was a proposal by Director Flanary to invest a significant amount of our reserves in either a CD or Money Market Account. His proposal was fairly simple – to put a significant amount of our Reserves into either a Fidelity or Vanguard CD or Money Market account that should get at least 4.5% Interest. He added that most banks are not paying interest keeping up with the inflation rate.
Director Flanary cited Director Jones $100,000 estimate of available funds, which isn’t actually correct. As noted in the article about the gold coin proposal, we only had about $77k in Reserves at the end of 2022. So, while we are collecting Assessments generally at a faster pace than expenses, which temporarily inflate the Balance Sheet early in the year, even if we matched last year’s excess funds at around $7k, we are unlikely to approach $100k in available Reserves.
In the Motion voted upon by Directors, $30k would go to a CD and $30k would go to a Money Market Account. This would leave less than $20k in liquid Reserves, which could potentially be sufficient. Interestingly, the vote was 2-0, with Director Jones abstaining from this vote without a stated reason.
What is interesting about the liquidity question is that the next item on the agenda was about fence repairs, which became necessary after a wind storm did more damage. Director Jones said it was a “huge wind” that completely broke off the posts on an entire section, which then exposed some homeowners to the view of Overland (privacy issue). The price per post went up from $288 to $344.
However, Director Jones walked the South Fence with the contractor, Cerda. An additional 8 posts were found to be broken and that work was to be completed on May 19th.
While we continue to be surprised at the wind breaking these Cedar fences, the fact of the matter is that this has been a perennial problem over nearly the entire course of the existence of the HOA. These are not unusual, but rather regular and expected events. And, with the report that has come out about the Boulder Fire indicating that the way the fire spread so quickly was a combination of these regular winds which spread quickly into subdivisions destroying homes because these ubiquitous cedar fences are quite literally a fire hazard – particularly when they are attached to homes.
In a recent CPR Article, removal of cedar fencing was a strong priority for protecting neighborhoods from wildfires. And, considering we live across the road from a natural area (often covered in dry brown grasses), it is worth considering whether we should continue to keep putting money into fencing that is always getting knocked down when it also presents an existential threat due to increased fire danger.
The options for replacement are definitely an issue in terms of appearance and cost. But, we should probably consider this sooner than later, as the definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Maintaining a mile of cedar fencing with all the repairs may not be as expensive as fencing with different materials – metal, in particular. Yes, that too comes with maintenance expenses, but given the fire risk, it may tip the balance. The discussion should begin soon, as it likely comes with a hefty price tag that would come in the form of a Special Assessment.
After some discussion, where Director Tunna did mention my written comments about consideration of different materials, there appeared to be a unanimous consent decision to approve the emergency fence expenditures. Unanimous consent is where the Chair asks if there are any objections, and seeing none, the motion is approved without a role-call vote.
The next issue on the agenda was yet another repair item. Apparently, there’s a problem with the sidewalk connecting to Lin-Mar Acres. The proposal is putting drains under the sidewalk to deal with iced-over sidewalk. The Board discussed a need to know what the options are, but clearly this is also a problem with snow removal because the area doesn’t melt. Director Jones lamented that contractors don’t come because we don’t have a property management company, which wasn’t substantiated beyond his opinion.
Next up was the signing of a contract for mowing the backlots at $1450 per mowing. Director Tunna verified that we have enough money in the budget to do two mowings. Director Jones said he wanted to wait until the end of May to schedule (when the contractor has a 4-week lead time) because of a perception that this would reduce fire danger for the 4th of July.
But, then Directors Jones and Flanary discussed how there was little rain this year compared with last year – when the grass grew like “crazy” after rains in May. The problem with this perception was that on the night of the meeting, there was already a forecast for at least 2″of rain in the following days, and as we know now, we have had over 3.5″ of rain since the meeting. But, April was also much wetter in 2023, so the entire premise of waiting is challenged by a simple review of the almanac data that is available, and a cursory look at the upcoming forecast.
I wrote to the Board this week to ask if they have yet scheduled, and the Board has yet to respond that they have (after waiting 3 days to publish this article). For whatever reasons, Director Jones, who has declared, without a Board vote, that he is the sole contact for contractors as a duty of being Treasurer, somehow has control of this issue.
I raised the point that last year, by June 15, many homeowners were complaining that the landscaping, and in particular the back lots had “gone to hell”. I documented this with this article, and tried to raise the issue at Board Meetings. Instead, Director Jones blamed the contractor (it wasn’t his fault), and didn’t get our FIRST mowing done until August 1 when some grasses and weeds were over 5-6 feet tall!
When we already have 30-40% more precipitation in 2023 than in 2022 (YTD), and we know that we will have a problem by June 15 (based upon last year), why Director Jones has a stranglehold on simply calling and scheduling with the contractor raises the question about whether it would be better to have a Landscaping Committee handle this. In the end, the Board didn’t make a decision regarding mowing.
Next on the agenda was a proposal putting our digital records onto the Frontsteps website. Director Tunna offered to do the work. It was passed by unanimous consent.
Next Director Tunna made a motion to meet with the ACC to address outdated Landscaping Guidelines which will need to be changed due to HB23-178 among other things. The ACC remains a committee that meets secretly and does not keep records, and per the recently changed Policies in March of 2023, that committee will need to have open meetings with notices, meeting minutes, and perhaps even members that are actually appointed openly by the Board. As it stands, the ACC operates almost as an independent body with no actual oversight, but two Board Members (Directors Jones and Flanary) who apparently meet with them and are perhaps voting members.
As it stands, we think the ACC is comprised of Clay Jones, Walker Flannery, Bill Tuminello, Jeanne Babbit, and . . . well, we just don’t know because there are no official records of a Board action creating this committee. Hopefully Director Tunna will help us get our policies in order and make this committee less opaque and more transparent.
After that, the Board moved into Executive Session, but did not disclose the reason why as required by CCIOA. It is presumed that this is about impending litigation regarding the “dog incident”. No other updates were given.
Overall, the meeting was over in less than 30 minutes, mostly due to zero attendance or participation from homeowners.