Association Times | Communication - The Key to a Successful Board and a Happy Community 0810

It really is true that if we communicate with each other and keep things open, then there will be a lot less conflict. There will be less of a rumor mill--less holding things close to the chest to deceive others. If we are all paying for our services here in Hideaway, why would we want to hide anything from the others who pay the same????? Shy? Makes no sense--lets just be open and honest work for the common good and not try to get others topay for our stuff...

communication. that is the key. Here is an article int he associaiton Times that explains this...

Association Times | Communication - The Key to a Successful Board and a Happy Community 0810

If you are committed to developing and maintaining communication in your association, you will have happy, more content residents and you will see less conflict and apathy. You will have created harmony in the community.

Strong communication skills are not recommended but required for board members. To be effective, you have to deal with conflicts or challenges without expressing anger or loss of control. It is your responsibility, as a board member, to make sure that each owner understands key information.
An example of good communication with your owners is: The west parking lot in your community needs to be resurfaced. You must relay all the information that an owner would need. Give the owners details; anticipate all questions they might ask and leave no question unanswered.

Roy Walker Is still with us.

I want to say how grateful I am that Roy is still with us. I recevied a frantic phone call from someone who was sure the accident victim was him. Then I received another from someone who siad it wasn't--then it was...finally I found the obituary and it was not our Roy Walker in Hideaway Valley but another man from Mt. Pleasant. http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=124080100947017&ref=mf  My condolences to that man's family.

You know, we are told to be kind and never leave people with angry words between you--becasue one never knows when you won't see them again. Roy and I have had our differences but we were friends once. Just before this last election, Roy held a get together to share his ideas with folks. I went becasue I wanted to know what he might do differently if he were reelected. Roy made his presentation and at one point he got a little loud so I left.

But to my surprise, Roy followed and asked me to come back in. He wanted to share a few more things with me. He asked if I had seen his flyer on the HVPOA board--I laughed and said "yeah"--I asked if he saw where some one had scribbled that I was a "b***h" and he laughed, "Yes and I tore that down," Roy exclaimed.

"That's funny,"  I replied, "becasue someone had torn your notice down I put it back up!"

And there you have it. Even though we disagreed on many issues and confronted each other with HVPOA business and bullcrap, very loudly at times,  we still believe in each other's right to be wrong and right to have a different opinion. We don't see eye to eye today, Roy is my neighbor, was my friend, and I'm glad he is still with us.

Shelly

Half Step from Crazy: The Power of the HOA

You think we have trouble with the trash part of the HOA amenities--check out the trash chubaca on this woman's blog!!

Half Step from Crazy: The Power of the HOA

I hardly think trash cans in the driveway was worthy of a typewritten letter and the cost of postage. However, I have since moved them to the side of the house where they normally reside.

I am tempted, though, to take up my sisters' offers to help. One said said she'd pimp out my trash cans with rhinestones and boas and glitter, and the other said she'd sew a set of trash can cozies to cover them up.

Or maybe I'll just cover them up with hair extensions, like this person did.

Associations should be on the warpath

 Here is an article reprinted from the above organization, news brief that comes in email--I suggest that if you are concerned about homeowner associations that you sign up for their list and become a member of their site--although from California, many laws are the same and this is the BEST homeowner rights organization in  the country.
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You think the association  together with its debt collector  can't take your house because you fell behind a couple months on assessments?

Wrong.

How about the homeowner association that got the owner's house last year for $5500 bucks?  The bulk of this figure isn't assessments: it's collection costs racked up by the debt collector.

Take a look at the documents posted on the CCHAL website: the payment plan the debt collector forced on the homeowner and then the documents recorded at the county recorder showing that the HOMEOWNER ASSOCIATION got the house for $5500 at the trustee sale.  The HOA now has title to the property.

Here's the CCHAL link: http://www.calhomelaw.org/PDF/HOA%20foreclosure.pdf

First of all: the so-called payment plan breaks existing law.  It says that, when the homeowner makes a payment, the debt collector will use it to pay himself  not to pay down the assessments owed.    After that, payments go to legal fees; after that management fees.  After THAT, the assessments get paid.

EXISTING law (Civil Code 1367(a) is very protective of BOTH the homeowner and the association.  EXISTING law says ASSESSMENTS ARE TO BE PAID DOWN FIRST  AND IN FULL. Collection costs are to be paid last.

After all, the whole idea of hiring the debt collector is to get the association its assessments  RIGHT?

So -- when exactly does the ASSOCIATION get paid?  The payment plan says assessments are paid LAST.

Associations should be on the warpath over these payment plans  and why AREN'T they? Is that why the association has the winning bid at the auction?  So it can take title to the property and then flip the home?  Or what…? And how did the HOA come up with $5500?  Did it pull it out of reserves or out of somebody's pocket?

Debt collectors and the association industry are in a FRENZY over AB 2502/Brownley.  Why?  Because it hits them in their wallets.

Somebody -- we can't imagine who -- has a nice scam going: forcing the homeowner into an unaffordable payment plan while holding the home hostage.  Then foreclosing on the home with the association buying it at a fire sale price.

The debt collectors and the association industry are calling AB 2502 the worst bill of the century.

We call it one of the best bills of the century: one that protects both homeowners AND associations.  The associations should be in total support of AB 2502. But they aren't.

Yesterday we were at the Capitol talking to members of the Housing Committee where the bill is to be heard next week.

CCHAL NewsBrief
April 21, 2010

So who is paying $1116 in assessments for their lots?

This post is soley the opinion of Shelly Marshall and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Member to Member team.

Hello fellow lot owners,

Well, a lot of you, like myself have received a letter today from Mr. Roy Walker. Look at the label on your letter--it contains your lot number up in the corner. This is the same label that was on the "anonymous" hate letter sent to everyone a few months back. Does that surprise anyone?

Mr. Walker is also running for the board after quitting, yet again, just a few months ago. We all know he quit a number of times before in fits of rage. But Nov 9th was the first time he put his "tantrum" in writing. Now he has resigner’s remorse and sour grapes and is spreading misinformation so he can get back on the board.

I don’t want him on the board because of his past actions. He throws fits in meetings, paces, screams at members and makes it next to impossible to conduct business. I also don’t want Roy on the board because he is not careful with our money. Roy paid himself for milage out of association money just to run errands. This was for driving to the post office, to the book keeper, county clerk, and Sams Club. Most of the time he failed to get board approval for reimbursing himself. Unfortunately, Mr. Walker often failed to get board approval for many things he did in the name of the association. That was part of the problem with his inability to work as a team member. Fortunately our current board is a team and thankfully, they don't find it necessary to pay themselves to drive to the post office, go to Manti for records, or go shopping at Sam's Club in Provo. They combine association business with things they have to do anyway. Not to take anything away from Roy when he served, but all of our board members put in many many miles and countless hours to serve you, yet only one reimbursed himself for mileage, to the tune of $1,701.00!

Walker misquotes figures and that hurts all of us. For instance with the 2009 budget, he wrote that 260 members were behind on their dues! Wow--that would be horrible except that it isn't true. I did the math and the result was the opposite of what Roy claimed. From the very same aging report, I calculated that 285 lot owners were current and 22 owed less than $100! That was 307 members current for all practical purposes. Only 137 were behind and of that only 27 were way behind (over 1000). If any association member wants to know what that aging report really says, please contact me and we can go over them together and you can decide for yourself if 2/3rds of you are in arrears.

He makes other wild claims that pit neighbor against neighbor. Why would he write in his letter to you that "it is common knowledge that only about 33-50% of the owners pay assessments?" How odd to tell such fibs. Why? Maybe to justify the $350 to $300 dues he had you pay when he was a trustee? Remember the budget you received in January of 2009? The board then wanted $300 in dues--but anyone who examined the numbers quickly realized that with the carry over from excess funds, Members only needed to pay $90 to fund what he said Hideaway needed. So did Walker do the honorable thing as president and lower the dues? NO. He inflated every single number to justify the $300 and created a new bloated budget!!!!
If members were not paying their fair share, as both Roy and Bryan claim, how could Hideaway collect $138,489.92 for fiscal year 2008 to 2009? Lets do the math.

We have 444 paying lots--if only 50% pay, as their letter stated, divide that years income ($138,489.92) by 222 (50%) That means that all those who did pay had to pay $623 for each lot! If only one third paid, then each lot owner would have paid $1116 per lot! Since I don't remember paying $1116 on my lots, I suggest that he is mistaken about the percentages of members who don't pay.

I wish members, candidates, owners, and interested parties would stop telling Hideaway members their neighbors are stiffing them! Stop trying to get them angry at each other. There is only one person they should be angry at now and that is Roy.
I am angry at Roy for spreading misinformation.

I am angry at Roy for quitting repeatedly, leaving the association high and dry and now having resigners remorse and blaming everyone but himself.

I am angry at Roy for spending many thousands of our dollars on attorneys and very often without board approval.

I am angry that he once was in charge of the CPO and now pretends he was manipulated.

I am angry that he continually repeats untruths that have been proven to him over and over to be untrue but he holds on like a pit bull despite all the facts--such as refusing to acknowledge Utah code about a lack of quorum he created in our association.

I am angry that Roy tries to discredit a reputable company (C&G Disposal).

I am angry that he tosses out unsubstantiated figures to make it appear as if Hideaway could soon go bankrupt when nothing could be further from the truth.

I am angry that he slants things saying this site doesn't present all positions when he knows perfectly well that every thing he or Rita or any other board members have ever sent to the site have been published as is..

I am angry that we are no longer friends and that things that use to make him proud, he now denies.

Most of all I am sad--that he ran for the board and that he tried to run over the board once he got there—I am sad that I lost respect for my old friend. I don't know what happened to him--but the guy who sent you that letter is not the man that was my friend and I am sad for the loss--

Roadside Trash

Yesterday after I had to run an errand, I decided to pick up a few pieces of garbage and cans on the side of the road. Then I walked further and picked up more, and more and more. I walked for about 30 min and cleaned up about 300ft of the entrance road.

My asthma got the better of me and I needed to quit because I was stirring up dust as I was picking up the cans. By the time I got home and emptied my Jeep, I had enough cans to fill a 44 gallon bag halfway and my garbage can halfway with trash.

This to me is disgusting. People are pigs. Not only that the fact that 98% of what I was picking up were beer cans/bottles and hard liquor bottles is very scary. How are we as a community going to feel the first time some drunk driver hits a child? We live here we have kids playing outside now that the weather is better. We all want to enjoy the beauty we are surrounded by.

I feel it may greatly benefit our community to post a sign near the entrance about cleaning up after ourselves and taking the garbage out, or maybe we should consider asking the county to provide a dumpster by the entrance, just a thought.

The Peterson's and our family are doing a clean up project tonight, in an earnest effort to make this place a nicer place to live. Permission to post this to the site.

I hope that we all can pick up after ourselves, remember we need to think about the safety of others, and the overall effect that this has on the wildlife and land around us. If you can bring it in with you, then take it out with you!!!!

Thanks Melissa Zobell

Anger Management at Board meetings

"Me thinks he doth protest too much"--such a telling saying from Shakespeare. apparently many other boards have had added troubles in these unsure economic times. In this article they speak to the increasing rudeness seen at many board meetings BUT what is nice about the full article is that this author offers solutions! Take a minute to read how he suggests handling the unruly member at the board meetings.

Anger Management: "A former president who recently had been voted off the board began pacing angrily between the board table and the assembled unit owners. He got so upset he was literally frothing, Hirsch de Haan says, so she responded by “circling the wagons.”

“I gathered all the board members around the table, and we talked very quietly,” she explains. The man continued to rant and rave. After a few minutes, one of the unit owners piped up and said, “Hey buddy, would you sit down and shut up? We want to hear what’s going on.” The former board member responded by leaving, slamming the door on his way out. “The audience burst into spontaneous applause,”"

and

But above all, says Hirsch de Haan, board members must not allow themselves to be drawn into an angry confrontation—no matter how tempting. If you refuse to react to someone's bad behavior, it’s much easier to defuse a tense situation. “If somebody’s yelling and you speak quietly, it tends to calm them down,” she says.

Whatever you do, make sure business carries on as usual. “What you don’t want to do is adjourn the meeting,” says Hirsch de Haan. By doing so, “you have rewarded their bad behavior. They’ve won—and they'll do it again. Plus, you don't get your business done, and that's what you're there for to begin with.”