ACHOA Board Meeting 24 Feb 2015 Summary Perspective – Unofficial

25 February 2015

Subject: ACHOA Board Meeting 24 Feb 2015 Summary Perspective
By: R. W. Duncan

During the opening remarks, Sam Fox said that there is currently NO plan to acquire the golf courses or club house. He further stated that there currently is no plan for a Joint Venture. With that statement, the meeting began with Homeowner comments. Each speaker seemed to have a slightly different focus on why the Board should back-off from the Golf Acquisition proposal and those words seemed to re-enforce Sam’s announcement. Certainly there was a clear discussion of amending the Articles of Incorporation which will become part of the ‘official’ record. One speaker brought up the ‘fact’ that there is an unintended consequence of the Boards actions. That consequence was that the High End realtors in Washoe County are concerned enough that they are now disclosing the controversy to prospective buyers. This is putting off some buyers and definitely affecting sales prices in a negative way.

The next item was a presentation/discussion by Rich Kenney on the ACCC (ArrowCreek Club Committee) activities. Rich was very candid and stated that the ACCC had opened up the trade space to include options that previously had been rejected. The ACCC also recognized that a mere majority vote (50%+1) was required to change the CC&Rs and By-laws but a two-thirds majority was required to change the Articles of Incorporation (66.7%). This presentation basically says the Board is merely not pushing for a quick resolution as The Club has now gone ‘private.’ One item that struck me in what was presented is the idea that the golf course ‘may’ only provide a 5% boost in property values to those living on a portion of the course. Previous statements, not by Rick, were on the order of 25%. So, a study has been commissioned to determine if there’s any material benefit to living on a course in Reno. When asked if the property value study would include an analysis of the impact of rising HOA fees and uncapped special assessments, Sam Fox said: “Yes” and stated the study will include pros and cons. Additionally, the study would include a comparison between Golf Club communities where the only views property owners have are of a golf course, different from the mountain and valley views enjoyed by ArrowCreek, Rich said: “Yes.”

(From others’ notes) It is anticipated that a detailed business plan for the purchase of the Golf Club will be delayed until Fall. The ACCC is looking into the option of just purchasing the land: Jeff Anderson, operations manager, is investigating what the financial impact would be of the “brown” and “green” options. Other options being explored are operating a 18/27/or 36 hole golf club. The ACCC is pursuing a 5 year performance analysis and are awaiting FOA first year results because 3-4 month of golf club operations is insufficient to make a decision and would reflect the impact of attractive marketing/promotional fees and not be prognostic for the long term.

It was also stated that the property tax impact, on HOA members if we buy the golf club property, would be about $40 annually for every HOA member, this is seen as an item on your property tax bill from Washoe County, at the current property tax rate.

Minutes of previous meetings were then approved with some minor edits. Followed by Mr. Liebman. A ‘planned’ slide presentation was not available, so he struggled to ‘read’ from notes the financial data through last November. The only startling thing here was that we appear to have ended 2014 -340K. The reserves are still meeting state standards but we spent more than we took in, to be made up over the next three years via the $80 a month we pay to reserves.

As amplified by another neighbor’s notes: The ACHOA did “in a sense” run “negative” in regards the multi-year plan in 2014. However I attended the last board meeting in 2014 where this was explained (after everyone left following the heated golf discussions) and it was very clear that the only reason we appear “negative” was because the board very wisely decided to do much more road work in 2014 to “save money in the long run,” so work earmarked for 2015 and perhaps a bit of 2016 were “moved forward” to 2014 using the reserve. [This same philosophy is being employed in 2015 to take advantage of potentially lower material costs – RWD] Overall, for the next 6 or so years, as presented by the finance committee at the end of 2014 (with slides), our overall budget and reserve are “quite solid” and adequate for continued good funding of needed HOA and AC community projects and services. I believe a temporary small increase in reserve funding will be required in year 2018 or so, but don’t hold me to that, I don’t have the charts and numbers.

Then there were staff reports. Since an issue was raised about the disaster/ evacuation plan for the development, this triggered some heated conversation with Rick Reyome, it was pointed out that it is posted on the Associa website.(Subsequent to the meeting I’ve reviewed it and it’s woefully out of date and does not capture the ‘shelter in place’ concept as our first line of defense, per the message from the meeting.)

Skipping forward to the Communications Committee report given by Norm Reeder and then John McGhee. They are pursuing two studies with UNR to review the property value vs. golf course and a ‘demographic’ survey of the community to determine what we might be interested in. From the standpoint of putting together a contingency plan for the golf property, the value study should tell us whether there should be an ACHOA interest in the property or not, so that’s probably a good study to do and have for reference. The demographic survey, though, is an animal of a different nature. If it was truly defining the characteristics of the residents of ArrowCreek, it would be worthwhile. However, it appears headed in a direction to facilitate a sales pitch from Arnold Palmer Golf in the future. The committee is also still on track to try and provide presentations to the community on the advantages of owning a golf course (why, given Sam Fox’s announcement, completely puzzles me).

Then we got to the web presentation by John McGhee. Basically John is proposing to merely upgrade the Associa website to a bit more current technology. The site does not include features already in arrowcreek411.wordpress.com. He quoted a very low dollar amount to get the site operational, and a number of people in the audience and members of the ACHOA Board questioned the cost and staffing skills required. The Board tabled any action until all costs and skills are identified to staff the site. One outcome of this discussion was Norm Reeder was asked to find out what the level of computer competency is across the community based on (using) the demographic study.

Finally, I presented The Board an additional complaint alleging violation of NRS 116.3108. The violation is failure to post meeting minutes within 30 days following the meeting. The violation is punishable by issuing a 30 day termination notice to the management company. This punishment was not recommended. Instead the Board, who has the oversight responsibility for the contractor, was asked to publish a revised ACHOA procedure to ensure compliance with the law. They acknowledged it and said they had already remedied the violation. We’ll see.

So, that’s the meeting that was on that Tuesday evening.