Locke

This Has To Stop

June 15, 2008 By LakeHolidayNews 3 Comments

Whatever one may think of John Martel, he consistently manages to come up with great one-liners. Mind you, they’re not going to be heard on the big movie screen anytime soon. They’re just pithy observations on the problems at Lake Holiday. We took the title of this post from his remarks on the issue of ordering tote bags for new owners for the Welcoming Committee.

Too many bags were ordered at a price double what they should have cost because the wrong person ordered the bags.

Wayne Poyer described the mix-up:

A batch of bags was ordered which, based on the rate of people coming into the community, it’s going to last about 40 years.

As Martel said: “this has to stop, this has to stop.” We’ll go out on a limb and guess that the Welcoming Committee only welcomes new homeowners and not new membership lot owners with one of the too many totes ordered at an exorbitant cost.

The budget review was made a little more difficult when it was discovered that one of Mike Kilmer’s staff incorrectly coded an expense item as an income item. Robin Pedlar thought Kilmer’s firm was “overpaid.” According to Martel, the distribution of work between the LHCC office and Kilmer’s firm has created problems. His view:

It’s hard to sort out who’s doing what to whom.

Kilmer’s firm is paid $4250 per month (an annual rate of over $50,000), and the board was reviewing other cutbacks to balance the budget at the May 15th budget meeting. Despite that, Pat Shields didn’t think that meeting was the appropriate time to address the value of Kilmer’s services.

In the video of overpaying for too many tote bags, Robin Pedlar worried:

If this is indicative of how phony all the numbers could be, it scares me.

She was not alone in her concern about sloppy accounting. Wayne Poyer asked somewhat rhetorically:

How bad is our accounting?

Let’s look at one area, the relationship between delinquencies and receivables. In our videos 2008 1Q Delinquencies and How Bad Is Our Accounting, Treasurer John Martel gave the numbers on delinquencies: 114 homes (including trash assessments), 70 water/sewer lots, and 242 membership lots. Based on LHCC’s published assessment rates, this is a monthly delinquency of $30,748.08. Yet the difference between LHCC’s reported accounts receivable in March and April of 2008 is only $9,299.73. If the delinquency rate is actually that high, why didn’t accounts receivable go up by a larger amount? If it’s not that high, why is the board over-stating the delinquency rate and budgeting based on this over-statement? As Poyer himself remarked, the delinquency report “just doesn’t pass the nonsense test.”

Budget-related videos from this meeting also include a discussion of getting foreclosing banks to pay their dues and a brief review of Kilmer’s role (which includes a little spat between a frustrated Martel and Suzy Marcus). A few unrelated topics were addressed after the budget review: creating the nominating committee; handling road violations, in which directors acknowledged that the roving patrol is not authorized to stop alleged violators; and relisting lots for sale with Oakcrest.

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If you find it odd that in all this budget talk, the name of Steve Locke doesn’t come up much, we do as well. Steve’s resume says he’s a certified financial planner and a former member of the Financial Management Task Force. He had little to say about changes to the budget, a topic that is very relevant to his background and experience. What is the point of serving on the board if you don’t have much to say on the topic most directly related to your background or work experience? Congratulations, Steve. You’re our Silent Sitter for the May budget meeting.

With all of the excitement about accounting and budgets (a subject that caused Robin Pedlar to comment a little past the half-way point of the budget meeting that “we’ve got to move faster or I’m going home”), we realized that we neglected to announce our Silent Sitter winner for the April 28th meeting. The most important topic covered at the April 28th meeting was a proposal to refinance the clubhouse balloon note. In a meeting where directors openly acknowledged they breached their fiduciary responsibility, Suzy Marcus sat in almost total silence. She neither objected to the characterization expressed by several board members that the board (of which she was a member) had in fact breached its fiduciary responsibility or raised any concern about the cost to fix that mistake. Important issues require the input of all board members. Congratulations, Suzy. You’re our Silent Sitter for the April meeting.

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Quick Takes on the April 28th Board Meeting

May 4, 2008 By LakeHolidayNews 1 Comment

The April 28th was long – over 3 1/2 hours, not counting an executive session. We’ve included all but about 15 minutes of that meeting, spread over 26 video clips.

Review of a new front gate contract took about 5 1/2 minutes, but review of a $1500 reimbursement for additional lifeguard open water rescue training took over 30 minutes. The latter issue apparently stemmed from roving patrol/lifeguard supervisor Zeb Brevard, rather than the board, authorizing an expenditure made by the parent of one of the lifeguards.

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Just because review of the front gate contract took 5 1/2 minutes doesn’t mean there was serious review. The board rubber-stamped GM Ray Sohl’s recommendation of keeping the contract with Haines at a cost of $15 per hour rather than accept a much lower cost proposal from Spartan at a cost of $13.33 per hour. The potential savings from Spartan’s proposal? About $15,000. The board couldn’t spend a lot of time on this $130,000 contract because it had to have enough time to discuss a contract with the lifeguards requiring them to reimburse the $100 training cost if they failed to work the entire season. At one point, presumably just to shorten a ridiculously long (or was it just ridiculous?) discussion, an audience member volunteered that he would reimburse the $100 training cost if that event occurred.

For the monthly staples, Martel gave the Treasurer’s Report and GM Ray Sohl gave the Management Report. Martel also put forward a motion to fully expense rather than capitalize all of LHCC’s depreciable assets. No director asked whether that was GAAP-compliant. For that matter, no director asked what GAAP is.

Dave Buermeyer gathered up some projections from Miller & Smith and some boxes of old documents. He rolled them into his Vision 10, a plan for the next 10 years at Lake Holiday. It drew applause from the board, which is the only group that will pay any attention whatsoever. Buermeyer also brought back more modifications to a policy to fill board vacancies. Secretary Ken Murphy secured approval for a new Rules Tracking System. At least they’ll look pretty. Early topic of the video: picking the right font. We’ll state the obvious: when a simple community association has to have a rules tracking system, it has too many rules. The board also approved a motion to hire a new collection agency, Debt Recovery Bureau, to try to collect old LHEUC debts on a contingency basis. According to Ray Sohl, these debts are outside the 3 year statute of limitations, and 1 firm has already tried a similar approach and given up after about 2 months.

On a positive note, director Steve Locke brought up negative communications relating to architectural compliance during the Committee & Task Force Reports. He was critical of his own experience and said the board needed to find a “much more neighborly way of going about things.” He thought “a little conversation would have gone a long way.” Perhaps his wife Deborah is working with him to try to develop a “kindler, gentler” side rather than the pseudo-tough guy tactics he displayed in our Keep It Over Here Punk video. Imagine: one LHCC director thinks “a little conversation” with an adversary could go “a long way.” Believable? Enduring? Let’s wait and see.

In earlier meetings, the board concluded that LHCC lacked the money to install guard rails, a safety issue, but evidently the money is there for the GM to solicit proposals to improve the acoustics at the clubhouse. Safety, no. Better acoustics for board members to hear themselves talk, yes.

The biggest topic of the night: re-financing the clubhouse loan. GM Ray Sohl started the discussion by stating that the “Board of directors has expressed an interest in re-collateralizing the existing clubhouse loan.” Oddly, there’s no expression of such interest during open meetings. Since the board voted on a motion to direct the GM to get bids on changes to the clubhouse acoustics, why is there no approved motion to direct the GM to investigate refinancing the clubhouse? This is just more evidence of the backroom discussions that Wayne Poyer denied the existence of when questioned by Bill Masters at the February Round Table.

In a sometimes heated debate, the board decided what to do about the fact that it pledged common assets without first obtaining 67% approval of the membership. To those who say the board never violates LHCC’s governing documents, this is just 1 example. The board acknowledged it didn’t follow LHCC’s governing documents on one of the largest transactions in Lake Holiday’s history. Jo-anne Barnard expressed the view that had she been given a chance to vote to incur a big mortgage to remodel the clubhouse, she would have chosen not to do so.

According to some board members, to fix things would require:

pledging over 90 LHCC-owned lots
paying $18,000 in closing costs
paying an extra $1400 per month for 5 years
putting a bank hold on $150,000-$200,000 of LHCC deposits for 5 years

The hold would prevent LHCC from using the money. The board’s fix relies on an artificial distinction between “common area” and “common property.” Mortgaging the clubhouse without member approval was wrong because the clubhouse is “common area,” but mortgaging 91 lots without member approval is acceptable because these lots, according to the board, are something entirely different – “common property.” The extended debate is covered in a total of 9 parts, the first 8 of which include the discussion and the last of which includes the final vote.

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Several directors expressed the view that the fix was expensive at a time when money is tight and the damage from violating LHCC’s governing documents can’t be undone. The decision: put the issue to retroactively approve pledging common assets to a member vote (which will almost certainly fail, as Poyer himself acknowledged), and if it fails, to enter into the refinancing, probably in early 2009. Martel asked that the record reflect that this decision to refinance is a breach of directors’ fiduciary responsibility, and when Poyer objected to the minutes reflecting Martel’s comments, he withdrew them. Not to worry, John Martel. The record of your inability or unwillingness to stick to your position is amply reflected on YouTube.

We extend our continued thanks to Bill Masters for his unflinching efforts to let property owners monitor the conduct of LHCC’s board. Despite the board’s talk of openness, they blocked Masters’ videographer from the boardroom on the grounds that he wasn’t an LHCC member. Property owners should be deeply troubled by a board that blocks openness and at the same time denies it is doing such blocking.

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Silent Sitters Face The YouTube Era

March 12, 2008 By LakeHolidayNews 2 Comments

One of the hot issues at the February 25th board meeting was videotaping board meetings. In fact, the issue made it on to the agenda for that meeting. However, when the board reviewed changes to that agenda, the videotaping topic wasn’t changed or dropped. It was just silently skipped during the meeting.

If the board wasn’t prepared to discuss videotaping, homeowner John Platt certainly was. Platt gave a nearly 10 minute presentation on the perils of videotaping that ranged from behavioral control to breaching personal security and identity theft. We can sum up Platt’s message in 2 words: stop videotaping.

Videotaping open meetings fosters good governance. Governance at Lake Holiday extends to committees and task forces, which are the principal advisors to the board. Together, the board, committees, and task forces make decisions that affect about 2700 lots and approximately $210 million of property value (based on February 2008 Frederick County tax valuations). The board, along with committee and task force members, opted to take on the responsibility of governing their community. That authority comes – and should come – with scrutiny.

Videotaping also helps to address something that LHCC Treasurer John Martel acknowledged:

We also have a lot of baggage that we have to overcome.

Homeowner Bill Masters records the meetings. Both Wayne Poyer and GM Ray Sohl have publicly acknowledged that Masters has a right to make these recordings. In fact, at the December 27th meeting, LHCC’s directors briefly discussed recording board meetings on their own.

Getting videos on the web quickly takes some work. To further his goal of fostering open governance, Masters gives the raw video tapes to us to take the most relevant or interesting portions of these meetings and get them on the web as quickly as possible. In many instances, we have video clips of important discussions available on YouTube before LHCC releases a written synopsis of what took place at a meeting. Anyone, including LHCC itself, is free to embed the codes to display any of these videos on a website. The videos are provided at no cost.

Some LHCC directors complain that we edit videos or provide clips that are not representative of what took place. That’s trying to bundle an obviously true statement with a crazy one, hoping that people can’t tell the difference between the two. A typical board meeting takes place over several hours, and the clips we make are no more than 10 minutes long. We don’t set or control this limit; it’s set by third-party video sharing services. It’s self-evident that we edit them. That much is true. In every case where we make an edit, we insert a clearly visible transition effect. If you don’t see a clearly visible transition effect, the video you see is an unmodified video stream.

The claim that something is unrepresentative or taken out of context is the crazy part. Lake Holiday’s board meetings are divided into tabs, as the agenda for the 2/25 meeting demonstrates. These tabs are discrete topics that often have little to do with one another. For example, on the 2/25 agenda, Tab 14 involves a roughly 3 minute discussion about selling a 1991 Ford pickup for $150. The very next tab is a roughly 26 minute discussion of a policy to fill board vacancies. One does not need the context of the old truck sale to understand a policy on filling board vacancies.

The videos we present are clips from a larger meeting. Given that the videos are made available at no charge, technological and practical considerations make it impossible to deliver a 3 hour watch-on-demand meeting video in rural Virginia. YouTube, backed by the multi-billion dollar resources of Google, doesn’t do it. Hollywood movie studios don’t do it. Those that attribute sinister motives to Masters or us for failing to deliver community association videos in their entirety for free display their technical ignorance. Maybe their motives are on display as well.

Dividing meetings into clips allows a viewer to watch what he wants, when he wants. We are not extracting unrepresentative comments from the video when there were opposite or contradictory comments readily available. When we quote John Martel as saying that “we also have a lot of baggage that we have to overcome,” he did not contradict this assertion before or after making that remark. In fact, after Pat Shields expressed an opposing point of view, Martel repeated his position more firmly and succinctly: “Lake Holiday has baggage.”

There are a lot of benefits to providing videos on the web. The majority of Lake Holiday owners do not live at Lake Holiday, so internet-hosted videos enable more owners to observe how their community is governed. Very few owners actually attend meetings, and those that do typically do not stay for the entire meeting. We’ve uploaded more than 100 videos to YouTube, and these videos have been watched over 4000 times. That’s roughly the equivalent of 40 people attending 45 minutes or more of every board meeting for a year. Since board meetings frequently draw no attendees outside open forum, videos create community involvement.

Many of our videos are informative, such as our series on the dam or the maintenance building (Dam Pt 1, Dam Pt 2, Dam Pt 3, Maint Bldg Pt 1, Maint Bldg Pt 2, and Maint Bldg Pt 3) available by clicking the nearby thumbnail or visiting our Videos page). Most videos show LHCC’s directors conducting routine business, such as reviewing the Treasurer’s Report or the GM’s Management Report. Unfortunately, too many videos show the board engaging in what we believe is inappropriate behavior or making a bad decision. A dramatic example of this is the Keep It Over Here Punk video, featuring the antics of director Steve Locke and Bob Fraser. In all cases, owners get to watch their board in action and form their own opinions. If board members find that their conduct appears unflattering when watched on video, the proper course is not to try to pull the plug on videotaping; the proper course is to change that conduct.

As a result of watching board videos, we’ve observed too many board members sitting in silence and then unanimously rubber-stamping a motion or resolution. Typically, we’ve given our Silent Sitter award to a director that we thought was especially passive. During the February meeting, directors Noel O’Brien and Robin Pedlar said very little. However, Noel O’Brien made a strong statement in favor of installing guard rails on West Masters Drive without delay. In light of the recent serious accident on that road, O’Brien is on the right track. Pedlar also voted against the recently adopted policy on filing board vacancies, an unnecessarily cumbersome procedure. These are positive steps, but we think they need to do more. Perhaps some directors are realizing that passivity is not such a good thing after all. Sorry, Robin and Noel. No award for you this month.

We’ve never given an officer our Silent Sitter award. In award terms, LHCC’s officers get off easy, since several have regular responsibilities at monthly meetings that force them to speak up. Sometimes, in the course of that speaking up, officers say things that hurt Lake Holiday. At the February 25th meeting Wayne Poyer complimented John Platt on his “excellent presentation” focused on putting an end to videotaping. Poyer offered this praise despite Poyer’s numerous acknowledgements of Masters’ right to make those recordings. We certainly support Poyer’s allowing Platt the time to make his point. But fueling Platt’s views, especially since they are contrary to opinions that Poyer has expressed, only increases political divisions at Lake Holiday. Poyer should have firmly conveyed that open governance, however uncomfortable it may be at times, is a good thing, and that it is supported by the LHCC board.

For keeping silent on this point, Wayne Poyer is our Silent Sitter for the February 25th board meeting. Congratulations, Wayne! You’re a Silent Sitter!

Making videos of public meetings is an issue that has been closely analyzed outside of Lake Holiday. In March of 2007, the New Jersey Supreme Court decided a case that raised issues similar to those in the discussion of videotaping at Lake Holiday. In the NJ Supreme Court case, Robert Wayne Tarus, a 15 year resident of the Borough of Pine Hill, was blocked from videotaping public meetings. Tarus was a frequent critic of the Borough Council. The court decision referred to remarks the mayor made to a local paper about Tarus: “If he was a decent resident, we would have no problem.”

The court also discussed the Borough’s concerns about how Tarus would use or edit the videos he made:

Finally, during oral argument before this Court, defense counsel for the Borough explained that a primary concern expressed by Council members was that ‘this political opponent . . . was going to take tapes and take them back to his basement and edit them around and turn us all into monsters.’ Thus, by their own admissions, when they blocked plaintiff from videotaping the meetings, the Mayor and Council acted on an impetus that found its genesis, to some degree, in animus against the plaintiff. In that context, we find those actions to be arbitrary and unreasonable.

The concerns that the Borough expressed against Tarus are nearly identical to those that LHCC board members have expressed about Masters’ recording the meetings and our editing the videotapes.

Tarus won his case, and the NJ Supreme Court ruled:

The law has embraced the undeniable fact that modern electronic devices are silent observers of history. These legal foundations support a finding that there is a common law right to videotape.

The NJ case also addressed the concerns expressed by John Platt that videotaping has a negative impact on other meeting attendees:

Video cameras and recorders have become a commonplace item in our every day life. They are a common security device and confront us at the bank, in stores and even in apartment houses. Exposure to video recording of all of us is a normal occurrence on the streets and in public gatherings such as athletic contests and sporting events where participants and spectators are under constant television surveillance. Such exposure is actively sought by all those running for public office in order to place their image and their ideas before the voters. … Today, hand-held video cameras are everywhere — attached to our computers, a common feature in consumer still-shot cameras, and even built into recent generations of mobile telephones. The broad and pervasive use of video cameras at public events evidences a societal acceptance of their use in public fora. … So too, we are not persuaded by fears that the use of video cameras in non-judicial settings will generate intimidation and harassment. … Trepidation over the effect of video cameras in public meetings is overstated. The prevalence of video cameras in society and the open nature of public meetings militate against such hyperbolic concerns. Although some citizens may be fearful of video cameras, we find that consideration insufficient to deny the right to videotape. … The legal foundations described above, with roots wide and deep, offer a glimpse into our evolved understanding of the right of public access and support our finding that there is a common law right to videotape.

Writing for a unanimous NJ Supreme Court, Chief Justice Zazzali referred to the ideas of Jeremy Bentham, Patrick Henry, and James Madison, offering these powerful words:

In short, our civic forefathers have long recognized that spores of corruption cannot survive the light of public scrutiny. … Openness is a hallmark of democracy — a sacred maxim of our government — and video is but a modern instrument in that evolving pursuit. … Arbitrary rules that curb the openness of a public meeting are barricades against effective democracy. The use of modern technology to record and review the activities of public bodies should marshal pride in our open system of government, not muster suspicion against citizens who conduct the recording.

Perhaps Poyer was less than firm in sending that message because openness and hallmarks of democracy do not really enjoy the support of LHCC’s board. Perhaps the disappearing agenda item on videotaping will resurface, and LHCC will seek to block such recording by a policy resolution. We hope not. Whatever happens, watch it play out on YouTube.

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Twenty Certified Letters Later…

January 6, 2008 By LakeHolidayNews Leave a Comment

…can the President of LHCC just pick up the phone, call a homeowner, and say “Oops, we goofed. We’re truly sorry”? Apparently not.

That answer was hidden away in a tab of LHCC’s board book called “For Your Interest.” LHCC directors now bury letters and emails from property owners to the board in this tab instead of reading and discussing them during the open meeting. That’s one way of blocking criticism from making its way to video and onto the internet.

Fortunately for Lake Holiday property owners, this “don’t discuss criticism” technique flopped at the December 27th board meeting.

The first example of this involves homeowner Robert Middleton, whose property was hit with a lien of $1800 for alleged violations of Lake Holiday’s sign prohibitions. A hit of $1800 – ouch! As the board discussed in our Compliance Reporting video (it’s in our video gallery on our Videos page), if Middleton violated any sign prohibition, he didn’t do it on his own property. In that video, GM Ray Sohl said that the signs should have simply been taken down instead of placing liens on Middleton’s property. It’s possible that Middleton himself watched the video and used it to support an argument that the liens should be removed, which is something that the board did not acknowledge at the November meeting. At the December 27th board meeting, shown in the following video, the board finally decided that Middleton is “no longer liable for $1800.” It’s good that LHCC reversed course on this issue.

The board discussed how to communicate this good news to Middleton, who apparently refused to accept several recently-mailed certified letters from LHCC. Ray Sohl described that LHCC has sent 20 certified letters to Middleton over this alleged violation, which apparently turned out to be no violation at all. Perhaps Middleton grew tired of seeing his own money spent to send him certified letters to communicate the message “We are 100% right, you are 100% wrong, so we’ve put an additional lien on your property.” An unsurprising outcome.

Some directors were reluctant to communicate with Middleton directly. In the video the best option developed by LHCC President Wayne Poyer was to put a message in a plain, unmarked envelope addressed by hand. That only seems strange to someone who does not understand that the board prefers to sneak their good news to Middleton to avoid having to acknowledge their error. Director Pat Shields even recommended no further effort to reach out to Middleton, ignoring that LHCC decided to remove the lien. Shields tried to focus attention on Middleton as the culprit, rather than LHCC itself: “He’s played the rules since this whole thing started.”

We have a simple suggestion for LHCC: have a senior official pick up the phone and call the man. Try starting the conversation off with: “Ooops, we goofed. We’ve removed the liens. We’re truly sorry.” Stop trying to shift the focus to Middleton’s alleged wrongdoing and away from the fact that LHCC improperly filed liens. We’re sure a straightforward, sincere apology will go a long way toward addressing any bad feelings Middleton may have.

Ray Sohl supported further efforts to reach out to Middleton for a good reason:

…you want to encourage participation of all members. The more participation you have, the more responsible community you have.

The secretive “For Your Interest” tab also revealed the second example of the unwillingness of LHCC’s leaders to admit a mistake. In our post It’s Not Our Problem Anymore we criticized LHCC’s efforts to wash its hands of helping property owners deal with utility problems. Apparently, LHCC has reversed course on this issue. LHCC Secretary Ken Murphy, a former LHEUC board member, has initiated efforts to communicate with Aqua Virginia and the SCC about utility complaints from Lake Holiday homeowners. Judging from the discussion in the video, complaints continue to roll in. We don’t see entirely smooth sailing, based on Murphy’s comment that he has “yet to identify the person at Aqua who will listen to me.” A little more than 1 year ago, LHCC closed on the sale of LHEUC’s assets for more than $1 million, and Aqua Virginia continues to serve Lake Holiday. Given those facts, one would hope that the board identified some responsible people at Aqua Virginia who would listen. One would also hope the board kept the contact information of those people. Nevertheless, we applaud this long-overdue correction.

Burying these 2 fixes in a section of the board book that is not intended for open discussion shows just how hard it is for LHCC’s leaders to admit they made a mistake. When faced with having to admit its error in putting a lien on Middleton’s property, the board preferred to communicate via cold and impersonal certified letters rather than a simpler and cheaper phone call. The personal phone call is both simpler and more appropriate in this situation.

Lake Holiday property owners are justifiably concerned about utility problems, and the board has tried to distance themselves from these concerns. If the board abandoned that effort and plans to play an active role in resolving these problems, that’s a good thing. The proper response to both our post and the complaints raised by others would have been to publicly acknowledge the mistake and openly commit to a new course.

Stubbornly refusing to admit a mistake sends an “I’m unreasonable” message to the world.

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2007 Year In Review

January 1, 2008 By LakeHolidayNews Leave a Comment

Update: In response to feedback, we’ve adjusted the audio track and added a break of a few seconds about halfway through the video.

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To Build a Class Act Type Thing, You Must Vote Your Conscience

December 5, 2007 By LakeHolidayNews Leave a Comment

Robin Pedlar Arguing Against The RV Storage Proposal...

One of the issues taken up at the November 26th board meeting was Ray Sohl’s appeal of the Architectural Committee’s rejection of his plan to locate boat and RV storage.

Director Robin Pedlar, a member of the Architectural Committee, summarized one of the reasons for that committee’s rejection: “It’s pretty ugly.” Why let a reasonable objection like that stand in the way of what the Board and the GM want to do, when the Board can simply overrule the committee?

Thus, we have the appeal of the Architectural Committee’s decision that’s shown on the following video clip.

In previous posts, we criticized several LHCC directors for their utter lack of meaningful contribution to the discussion taking place in the boardroom. We were pleased to see that at this meeting just about all directors present participated in the discussion at one time or another. Perhaps they didn’t want to win our Silent Sitter award. The absence of Suzy Marcus may have added to the pressure on some board members to contribute. With one of the best candidates absent, it was just about anyone’s award to win.

Director Rick Bleck, who did not meet the 1 year ownership requirement for nomination set forth in LHCC’s bylaws and was invisible on the campaign trail but was elected anyway, came out of his shell and offered these insightful comments:

I guess I’m going to show some ignorance and obviously not knowing the history of it and that’s why I’ve been learning a lot at these meetings and stuff. Is this the only common area that the association owns? To me it’s a real eyesore. You’ve got rusted out campers up there and you’ve got boats in disarray. … I don’t know how long the association’s been around and/or committees but…. I own property down in Orlando. The front of…when you enter the property, it’s got trees, palm trees, and flowers, and you come up here and it’s like holy smokes, who lives back in there? I know there’s some nice houses, nice lake back there, and all of a sudden you come in around the corner. You’ve got these beat up trailers and campers. I don’t know if you have any kind of regulations like if the camper is 10 years old you’ve got to get rid of it if it’s rusted out. I really hope there is a common area maybe in the back of, somewhere in the back where you’re not looking at this stuff. The other thing is I’m just surprised you’d allow this. I mean I’ve got my boats in my yard. That’s where I keep my boats. So, anyway, I’m not really sure about the issue here. But anyway, I was thinking, we need a…actually, the office should be a building with bricks and stuff, and you’ve got this old beat up house. I’m just kind of amazed that all these places I’ve ever had or lived in associations, it was really a class act type thing. This kind of parlays into maybe I’ll start getting active in this now. To entertain something like this, but again, my ignorance. We may not have any other land here and this may be the only solution. I hope someday that…I headed back to this one area, I’m going, I can’t believe that we’d ever entertain this.

When Rick Bleck described the treasured Lake Holiday office as an “old beat up house,” we wondered if we looked more closely, perhaps we might be able to see smoke rising from the other directors’ heads. Apparently, no one bothered to copy Rick on the memo that if you can’t mindlessly focus on positive, un-critical comments, you will be ostracized. We dreamed of a very brief return of Chris Allison. We can imagine his response to Rick Bleck would have created a memorable video moment.

We applaud Rick Bleck’s candor and his willingness to address things that perhaps other directors would like to cover up. Lake Holiday should and can be a class act, and Rick Bleck indicates he’s willing to tackle areas in which it falls short. For his straightforward, on-the-record statement that few of his fellow board members have the courage to make, we could just about eliminate Rick Bleck from consideration for our Silent Sitter award. Just about. But not entirely. And not so fast.

Rick Bleck discredits his own comments by remarking that he is showing “ignorance” and that the present proposal may be the only solution. You can’t persuade others if you can’t convince yourself. Board members need to come to meetings prepared. That means reviewing the topics in their board books and investigating other solutions before the meeting. If every board member does not diligently undertake these steps, the ability of the board to reach intelligent decisions at a meeting is lost. Rubber-stamping the decisions already made by other members is a problem fueled by the Silent Sitters.

Bleck raised a number of serious objections to the plan for boat and RV storage, and just before the vote director Steve Locke advised him that this plan is only temporary. However, Rick Bleck never got responses to his objections or answers to the questions about which he professed ignorance. He never pressed Locke or other directors on what the permanent solution would be, when it would be implemented, and what it would cost.

Rick Bleck Winning His 2nd Silent Sitter Award...

Compare Rick Bleck’s contribution to that of director Robin Pedlar. Our quote above represents nearly Rick’s entire contribution over 2 meetings. In addition to her comments shown on the video, Robin Pedlar weighed in on another topic at the meeting, John Martel’s proposal for board workshops to foster open communication between property owners and the board. We have a mixed view of 2 points she raised in that discussion. Robin thought that it would be helpful to have neighbors get together for coffee and talk about what they like about Lake Holiday, something that smacks of nothing more than a social gathering. But she also was one of few directors who expressed a willingness to listen to whatever complaints members had in an unstructured setting, something we support and that seemed to frighten other directors like Ken Murphy.

The standard for our Silent Sitter award is not purely the lowest number of comments made. We draw a more meaningful distinction than simply counting words. During the discussion on locating boat and RV storage, Robin Pedlar said she and her committee thought it was “pretty ugly.” Evidently, she voted her conscience, because she was the only director that voted against this plan. Rick Bleck, while strongly criticizing the plan, came to the meeting unprepared to discuss alternatives and didn’t press anyone else at the meeting for specifics. When the vote was taken, Rick Bleck voted in favor of a plan that he could not believe would ever be entertained. Steve Locke’s comments would not satisfy a person with serious objections. They would, however, satisfy a Silent Sitter.

For voting in favor of overturning the decision of the Architectural Committee, Rick Bleck is our Silent Sitter for the November meeting.

The question for December: will Rick Bleck three-peat? We hope he’s better prepared, more forceful and less equivocal, and votes according to his concerns, even if that means standing alone.

We support building a class act. To have any hope of doing so, each and every LHCC director must vote his conscience.

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Ushered Out of the Office To a Salary Increase and Bonus

December 3, 2007 By LakeHolidayNews Leave a Comment

Ken Murphy Waiting For Ray Sohl To Take The Folder...

Paying attention to body language is critical to understanding people. Folding one’s arms across the chest, especially when combined with leaning or turning away and avoiding eye contact, is thought by many to show rejection of the person or the person’s message. Think of it as one big push off.

LHCC’s board reviewed the compliance report prepared by GM Ray Sohl at the regular November board meeting.

Watch Ray Sohl’s body language when LHCC President Wayne Poyer attempted to hand him a folder of items he’d like addressed. Ray Sohl made no effort to reach for it, leaving Ken Murphy to take it from Poyer and try to pass it to Ray Sohl. Count the seconds while Ken Murphy holds the folder in space, waiting for it to be accepted by its intended recipient. The actual time may only be a few seconds, but if you are in Ken Murphy’s position, not knowing when if ever you’ll be relieved of the folder, those few seconds feel like an eternity.

Treasurer John Martel expressed strong dissatisfaction with Ray Sohl’s report:

To me…To me…I guess…I guess…I’ve worked for some very demanding people, I guess, and maybe you didn’t. Because if I had given them a report like this, they would have absolutely ushered me out of their office. They would have…They…There’s no summary. There’s no…There’s no kind of summary here for management. It’s a database with thousands of entries, and my boss never would have let me get away with giving him a database.

Martel was not alone in his assessment of Ray Sohl’s work. Wayne Poyer remarked that “it begs belief that this is so incomplete.” Jo-anne Barnard expressed surprise that the report showed no significant results.

We have no information about Ray Sohl’s body language or the position of his arms at the October 22, 2007 board meeting. At that meeting the board ratified Ray Sohl’s “annual salary increase and bonus” and confirmed publicly, for the first time that we are aware of, that upon completion of 6 years of service, Ray Sohl would be “given title to the lot at 626 Lakeview free and clear of any encumbrances.”

John Martel, now in part occupying the position of his own former boss, remarked at the November meeting that Wayne Poyer was an easy boss.

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Defendant Steve Locke Will Stop At Nothing…

August 28, 2007 By LakeHolidayNews 1 Comment

At the June 25th board meeting, LHCC directors debated defending against the Masters lawsuit. Directors evaluated whether they should use Rees Broome, a Vienna-based law firm that LHCC Treasurer John Martel compared to an “ambulance chaser” with “extravagant” rates or the lower-priced Segan Mason & Mason. (For more on John Martel’s evaluation of Rees Broome, watch Use Rees Broome Pts 1 & 2 on our Videos page.) The board also considered whether LHCC should defend the 5 directors individually named in the Masters suit: Dave Buermeyer, Suzy Marcus, Ken Murphy, Noel O’Brien, and Steve Locke.

On this last point, defendant Dave Buermeyer suggested that the individual defendants recuse themselves or abstain from voting on whether LHCC should defend the 5 directors. After all, it would be very self-serving for these 5 directors to vote in favor of a motion to get LHCC to pay for their defense. But that created a little problem. Earlier in the meeting, with everyone – including Steve Locke – in the room, LHCC President Wayne Poyer announced that director Chris Allison was “called away unexpectedly.” At no time during the 3 hour meeting did Chris Allison appear and, in light of Wayne Poyer’s comment, there was no reason to believe that Chris Allison was nearby.

LHCC has 11 directors. With 1 absent, that left 10 directors. If the 5 director defendants recused themselves from voting on that motion, that would leave only 5 directors able to vote. However, 6 directors are required for a quorum, or the minimum number that can transact business. The 5 non-defendant directors actually present at the meeting would not be able to approve a motion to pay for the defense of the 5 defendants.

To get what he wants – a motion passed for LHCC to pay for his legal representation, director Steve Locke suggests:

I can go outside and in 30 seconds get Chris Allison’s signature on a piece of paper. I’ve been trained. I’ve watched and observed how to do that. Yeah.

Since Chris Allison was “called away unexpectedly,” he is not in the immediate vicinity. Obtaining his legitimate signature in 30 seconds is an absolute impossibility, particularly if Chris Allison were allowed any time to review what he is asked to sign. It’s pretty clear what Steve Locke is suggesting to the board. Steve Locke will do whatever it takes, even if it means coming up with the signature of a director who is not even present, to pass a board resolution authorizing LHCC to pay for his legal counsel.

Instead of a negative reaction to Steve Locke’s repugnant suggestion, he gets a warm reaction. Pat Shields can be heard on the video interjecting in a complimentary way: “You had training.” When Steve Locke says that he has “watched and observed how to do that,” one senses that this is business as usual. This conduct reminds us of defendant Noel O’Brien’s suggestion that LHCC fabricate costs for non-existent employees as a response to Masters’ information requests. Fabricating things must be, as Pat Shields and Steve Locke remark, part of the Lake Holiday training. Ray Sohl, the current GM, sat through this entire episode and said nothing. We can imagine that former GM Dave Ingegneri witnessed equally troubling episodes, yet said nothing.

When Bill Masters heads to court on Thursday against Steve Locke and the other defendants, these are the kind of people he will be up against: soul-less people who will stop at nothing to get their way.

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LHCC Board Votes Down Humanitarian Assistance Policy

March 4, 2007 By LakeHolidayNews Leave a Comment

The Boyd family’s cherished cat Colby has gone and remains missing since mid-February. Finding Colby safe and sound is the paramount objective. If you’ve seen or have any information to help Colby get back home, please call or email us, and we’ll quickly put you in touch with the Boyds.

Colby’s unfortunate disappearance brought to the fore the issue of signs at Lake Holiday. The Boyd family had run afoul of Lake Holiday’s prohibitions on signage in their efforts to locate Colby. They took the initiative to encourage the Board to show more reasonableness in administering Lake Holiday by developing a more humanitarian outlook. However, at the February 26th board meeting, the LHCC Board voted down the humanitarian assistance policy championed by Sharon Boyd.

Facts Trounce Hate Speak

October 12, 2006 By LakeHolidayNews 1 Comment

Shame on Sue Fuerst. Her childish letter repeatedly refers to my brother Bill as “Sneazy”, a dwarf in a fairy tale. Bill is short and suffers from a rare bone disease. Her outright hate speak is among the most despicable behavior I have ever witnessed. Chris Allison and the LHCC board apparently support mocking the handicapped. Who’s next on their attack list? Recently, the supporters of the Board have stooped to spreading the false rumor that we have “sold out” and abandoned our reform efforts. This is not true. And by now you have the latest lie-filled panic attack from the Chris Allison supporters. Their strategy: If you can’t win based on the facts, attack someone’s handicap and resort to spreading lies.