This is a public service message for Section 10 from Ralph Splawski at 11866 Sagittarius East.
In my opinion and that of others in our community, we have a huge problem with the majority of our board of directors. By their actions, these people are demonstrating their disrespect for the residents of Pont Aquarius while trying to dominate the community in a way we have never seen before. My intention with this newsletter is to let my neighbors in section 10 know what is going on. While I try not to get personal, the deviousness of their actions makes that difficult. This message is long, but I ask your indulgence in reading it. Since the board specifically shuns communication about everything, this may be the only way to get facts distributed to the community. Perhaps others will follow suit in other sections throughout Pont Aquarius and we will create our own network to do the job that is actually the responsibility of the board. Maybe we will have a Point Aquarius blog someday.
How many of you read their resolution about closing the clubhouse? What a joke! It was poorly written and chock full of grammatical errors. I wonder where these people went to school. That document reflects the lack of respect the authors have for the residents. An arrogant attitude about content is just like saying, “Who cares whether the wording is accurate and the grammar correct, only the subservient people will be reading it anyway”. In the last few years there has not been a single written document for distribution by the board that did not contain errors. An English major friend of mine who was visiting told me there were 7 mistakes in a couple of short paragraphs about the entrance gate. Wow!
Besides the extremely poor form, the content of this document is the most troubling of all. No where does it allow for any input from the residents who are paying for this clubhouse project. As it states, all decisions will be made by the board with no option to edit their “must have” list as they call it. Who decided Point Aquarius needs a $450,000 clubhouse? Or, is it really $950,000 or $1,450,000 because of a typo in their document. All of us should expect a future correction saying, “We made a mistake, and the clubhouse really cost twice a million.” They mention a financing plan which would be needed if their palace is built, but they are silent on details. This fits in with their usual penchant for secrecy. If we can’t afford to fix the roads with our old budget, how can the association afford to build a new clubhouse without raising the assessments on top of the 40% increase this year? Where will it end?
How many residents really want our community to go deep into debt for a new fancy building at whatever the cost? Certainly, the board does. After all, they will be the primary users of this facility. Sooner or later, we will all have to pay. Shouldn’t we have an opportunity to express our opinion in this process? Isn’t a $200,000 building enough for our community needs? We already own the land so it’s only the cost of construction that must be considered. The board leadership has no desire to get any fair input from the residents about the clubhouse. They want to build what they want, not what is prudent for the community. Maybe their composition and grammar skills will improve if they sit in leather bound chairs around a solid wood table. Any group whose main accomplishment is keeping everything a secret is open to suspicion.
In 2004, I volunteered on two committees to help with the clubhouse project so I had direct knowledge of what was going on then. Two years later, nothing has changed and it may have become even worse. To make a long story short, I quickly resigned from these committees in disgust after I found out how unfairly the POA leadership was operating. It was a facade for the ideas of the board who wanted a rubber stamp from residents so they could claim neighborhood involvement. Idealistically, I assumed the community would decide on size, features and expense by way of an approval vote. No way!
One former board member confided that it wouldn’t matter what the residents voted for if an open election was held. The board changed the by-laws to allow them complete control. They can build whatever they want as our new clubhouse. They don’t have to get residential approval for anything regardless of the cost. Some of you may think a clubhouse is not needed at all, but you will never get a chance to exercise your opinion. That is, unless we unseated this band of power hungry zealots.
But, there are a few cracks starting to appear in their wall of protection. Their attacks on what we might have thought were our rights are not shared by the entire board. One board member has told me that there are six members aligned together who continually misrepresent things to the rest of the board and to the property owners. Oh great, we have a board that apparently lies to co-members. Another comment from the same board member was, “It is my contention that the board failed to carry out its’ judiciary responsibility by not maintaining the assets of the POA. Had the clubhouse been properly maintained in the past, we would not be in this situation today.” We can count sloppy maintenance of the clubhouse is another accomplishment this illustrious board.
It is clear that our rep, Al Morin, is part of this inner circle on the board and I strongly urge that he be asked to resign his position as representative of section 10. In my opinion, the entire inner circle of board members should also resign and be replaced by honest, dedicated people who will work for the betterment of Point Aquarius rather than to act in their own self interest. I don’t think any of us thought our elected officials would stoop to the depths of changing the by-laws to concentrate their power so they operate this community like a dictatorship. We all just assumed we would get straight forward, non-political effort designed to improve our community. Acting to divide the residents into groups to fight each other was not what any of us expected or wanted.
There is more evil going on than can be properly described in this small space. I heard one board officer say that the boat ramp by the clubhouse “must be closed.” I am suspicious of all financial transactions, but I don’t yet have proof of malfeasance. An audit would help, but the board won’t allow one. Our community is under siege by a group that has come to think that the money in the pot is actually theirs. They have changed the rules to keep themselves in office, have taken numerous actions to pit neighbors against neighbors while deflecting attention from their own self-serving misdeeds and have adopted a no communication posture with the entire community. It is time for a change.
The talk among residents is to pursue recall elections in some sections of Point Aquarius. Using their written documents as evidence, an incompetence lawsuit would be nice, but it is not illegal to be stupid. At the very least, I am proposing we ask Al Morin to resign as our representative of section 10. Attendees at a monthly meeting some time ago tell me he was asked to resign as well, but he refused. If he refuses again as will likely be the case, we need to pursue a recall to try to get our community back. Volunteers are needed to help with this action.
As a true believer in the democratic process, I’d like to know how the other section 10 residents feel about all this. Personally, I think treating every resident fairly along with a regular dialog with the community are minimums we should expect from our leadership. We haven’t received either one. Some of you are probably not aware of all the harmful in-fighting that has been created by these folks. I’d like to be able to trust our elected officials to work toward improving Point Aquarius. This trust has been violated and I cannot just sit back and ignore the harsh repercussions for our community without speaking out. I encourage your comments as well, pro or con, and ask that they be sent via email to ikswalps@gmail.com. A sound democratic process always has room for more than one opinion.
I have always challenged Mr. Morin or the board to a rebuttal of the facts as it should be in our democratic society. No one has ever answered. In fact, Mr. Morin rarely answers anything. If it is clear that the question or concern is not on a subject he favors or is from someone he doesn’t like, he just ignores it. I have lots of personal experience with his tactics. That’s not the kind of leadership that will make our neighborhood a better place to live. It seems pretty easy to me. Just let the community decide what it wants and communicate with everyone regularly. Money spent on postage to get the word out could be offset by reducing our bills now being spent on legal protection of the board of directors.
This is the first edition of this newsletter and it is being mailed simply because I don’t have email addresses. To save my costs on future publications, I would appreciate it if interested parties would send me their email address. On the other hand, you may not agree that we have a problem. Let me know that too, so I can remove your name from my list. I certainly don’t want to bother anybody who is not interested. If you have information you want to share with your neighbors in section 10, send me that also. Hopefully we can make positive changes in 2006 to improve our community.
Ralph Splawski
ikswalps@gmail.com
In my opinion and that of others in our community, we have a huge problem with the majority of our board of directors. By their actions, these people are demonstrating their disrespect for the residents of Pont Aquarius while trying to dominate the community in a way we have never seen before. My intention with this newsletter is to let my neighbors in section 10 know what is going on. While I try not to get personal, the deviousness of their actions makes that difficult. This message is long, but I ask your indulgence in reading it. Since the board specifically shuns communication about everything, this may be the only way to get facts distributed to the community. Perhaps others will follow suit in other sections throughout Pont Aquarius and we will create our own network to do the job that is actually the responsibility of the board. Maybe we will have a Point Aquarius blog someday.
How many of you read their resolution about closing the clubhouse? What a joke! It was poorly written and chock full of grammatical errors. I wonder where these people went to school. That document reflects the lack of respect the authors have for the residents. An arrogant attitude about content is just like saying, “Who cares whether the wording is accurate and the grammar correct, only the subservient people will be reading it anyway”. In the last few years there has not been a single written document for distribution by the board that did not contain errors. An English major friend of mine who was visiting told me there were 7 mistakes in a couple of short paragraphs about the entrance gate. Wow!
Besides the extremely poor form, the content of this document is the most troubling of all. No where does it allow for any input from the residents who are paying for this clubhouse project. As it states, all decisions will be made by the board with no option to edit their “must have” list as they call it. Who decided Point Aquarius needs a $450,000 clubhouse? Or, is it really $950,000 or $1,450,000 because of a typo in their document. All of us should expect a future correction saying, “We made a mistake, and the clubhouse really cost twice a million.” They mention a financing plan which would be needed if their palace is built, but they are silent on details. This fits in with their usual penchant for secrecy. If we can’t afford to fix the roads with our old budget, how can the association afford to build a new clubhouse without raising the assessments on top of the 40% increase this year? Where will it end?
How many residents really want our community to go deep into debt for a new fancy building at whatever the cost? Certainly, the board does. After all, they will be the primary users of this facility. Sooner or later, we will all have to pay. Shouldn’t we have an opportunity to express our opinion in this process? Isn’t a $200,000 building enough for our community needs? We already own the land so it’s only the cost of construction that must be considered. The board leadership has no desire to get any fair input from the residents about the clubhouse. They want to build what they want, not what is prudent for the community. Maybe their composition and grammar skills will improve if they sit in leather bound chairs around a solid wood table. Any group whose main accomplishment is keeping everything a secret is open to suspicion.
In 2004, I volunteered on two committees to help with the clubhouse project so I had direct knowledge of what was going on then. Two years later, nothing has changed and it may have become even worse. To make a long story short, I quickly resigned from these committees in disgust after I found out how unfairly the POA leadership was operating. It was a facade for the ideas of the board who wanted a rubber stamp from residents so they could claim neighborhood involvement. Idealistically, I assumed the community would decide on size, features and expense by way of an approval vote. No way!
One former board member confided that it wouldn’t matter what the residents voted for if an open election was held. The board changed the by-laws to allow them complete control. They can build whatever they want as our new clubhouse. They don’t have to get residential approval for anything regardless of the cost. Some of you may think a clubhouse is not needed at all, but you will never get a chance to exercise your opinion. That is, unless we unseated this band of power hungry zealots.
But, there are a few cracks starting to appear in their wall of protection. Their attacks on what we might have thought were our rights are not shared by the entire board. One board member has told me that there are six members aligned together who continually misrepresent things to the rest of the board and to the property owners. Oh great, we have a board that apparently lies to co-members. Another comment from the same board member was, “It is my contention that the board failed to carry out its’ judiciary responsibility by not maintaining the assets of the POA. Had the clubhouse been properly maintained in the past, we would not be in this situation today.” We can count sloppy maintenance of the clubhouse is another accomplishment this illustrious board.
It is clear that our rep, Al Morin, is part of this inner circle on the board and I strongly urge that he be asked to resign his position as representative of section 10. In my opinion, the entire inner circle of board members should also resign and be replaced by honest, dedicated people who will work for the betterment of Point Aquarius rather than to act in their own self interest. I don’t think any of us thought our elected officials would stoop to the depths of changing the by-laws to concentrate their power so they operate this community like a dictatorship. We all just assumed we would get straight forward, non-political effort designed to improve our community. Acting to divide the residents into groups to fight each other was not what any of us expected or wanted.
There is more evil going on than can be properly described in this small space. I heard one board officer say that the boat ramp by the clubhouse “must be closed.” I am suspicious of all financial transactions, but I don’t yet have proof of malfeasance. An audit would help, but the board won’t allow one. Our community is under siege by a group that has come to think that the money in the pot is actually theirs. They have changed the rules to keep themselves in office, have taken numerous actions to pit neighbors against neighbors while deflecting attention from their own self-serving misdeeds and have adopted a no communication posture with the entire community. It is time for a change.
The talk among residents is to pursue recall elections in some sections of Point Aquarius. Using their written documents as evidence, an incompetence lawsuit would be nice, but it is not illegal to be stupid. At the very least, I am proposing we ask Al Morin to resign as our representative of section 10. Attendees at a monthly meeting some time ago tell me he was asked to resign as well, but he refused. If he refuses again as will likely be the case, we need to pursue a recall to try to get our community back. Volunteers are needed to help with this action.
As a true believer in the democratic process, I’d like to know how the other section 10 residents feel about all this. Personally, I think treating every resident fairly along with a regular dialog with the community are minimums we should expect from our leadership. We haven’t received either one. Some of you are probably not aware of all the harmful in-fighting that has been created by these folks. I’d like to be able to trust our elected officials to work toward improving Point Aquarius. This trust has been violated and I cannot just sit back and ignore the harsh repercussions for our community without speaking out. I encourage your comments as well, pro or con, and ask that they be sent via email to ikswalps@gmail.com. A sound democratic process always has room for more than one opinion.
I have always challenged Mr. Morin or the board to a rebuttal of the facts as it should be in our democratic society. No one has ever answered. In fact, Mr. Morin rarely answers anything. If it is clear that the question or concern is not on a subject he favors or is from someone he doesn’t like, he just ignores it. I have lots of personal experience with his tactics. That’s not the kind of leadership that will make our neighborhood a better place to live. It seems pretty easy to me. Just let the community decide what it wants and communicate with everyone regularly. Money spent on postage to get the word out could be offset by reducing our bills now being spent on legal protection of the board of directors.
This is the first edition of this newsletter and it is being mailed simply because I don’t have email addresses. To save my costs on future publications, I would appreciate it if interested parties would send me their email address. On the other hand, you may not agree that we have a problem. Let me know that too, so I can remove your name from my list. I certainly don’t want to bother anybody who is not interested. If you have information you want to share with your neighbors in section 10, send me that also. Hopefully we can make positive changes in 2006 to improve our community.
Ralph Splawski
ikswalps@gmail.com
posted by Ralph Splawski at 12:05 PM
2 comments
