Site Updates

On the Meeting Minutes page, you can now find several new official Board Minutes for last year: i.e. June 6, August 1, September and October.

On the Newsletters page, you can now find the official HOA newsletter for last December.

January Board Meeting Report

Wednesday’s Board meeting was thankfully a pretty friendly affair. There were three directors present: president Marilyn Dupree, vice-president Sam Goldberg, and treasurer Glenn Lyons. (Absent were secretary Cathy McVey and member-at-large Marius Ardeleanu.) The management company was represented by property managers Sue and Katie Besek. In addition, there were about five owners in attendance. Items discussed at the Board meeting included:

• To comply with the new California Civil Code, the agendas for future Board meetings will be posted at the pools at least four days before each meeting.

• The Association’s reserves are going up again, though there still appears to be some confusion about bills that haven’t been paid yet and even some bills that are still being sent to A. McKibbin & Co – the previous management company. At any rate, at the end of last November, our Association had assets of about $259,000! The increased monthly dues and last year’s special assessment appear to have paid off.

• An official web site for Playmor Terrace may appear soon. Owner Sue Maloney pointed out that the Association really needs a better way of distributing information as this would prevent some of the issues that were raised during the controversies of the last elections. Owner Ezra Van Everbroeck said there are several relatively cheap web hosting options available for HOAs and he would point the Board at some of them.

• Two other initiatives that are planned to foster a better sense of community are a ‘Social Day’ for owners to meet each other (Glenn Lyons is preparing this) and a new newsletter with more concrete information about what is happening around the complex (owner Larry Harris volunteered to do this).

• Per a request from Larry Harris, the management company will be working on a master repair plan that describes when different parts of the complex will be renovated. E.g. repainting Playmor Terrace is something that is desirable but currently not in reach – it would cost upward of $200,000 and requires prior expense to make sure that all the wooden elements (including balconies and fences) are structurally sound.

• Ezra Van Everbroeck asked whether the recent RICO (racketeering) investigation into (among others) Peters & Freedman – the Association’s new legal firm – is a reason for concern. (For more background reading, check www.ahrcexposed.com and www.ahrcexposedexposed.com and prepare to be confused.) The Board hadn’t heard about the investigation, but the property managers have and will inform the Board about Peters & Freedman’s response.

• Owners Ruxandra Ardeleanu and Larry Harris suggested there were lessons to be learned from some procedural questions about the recent Recall election. (It appears that hiring a completely independent company to organize future elections may be the best way to avoid problems. It is not clear whether the current Board agrees this is necessary.)

• In the management report, Sue Besek mentioned that they are having a hard time getting a number of bids for the required repairs to balconies, decks and fences around the complex. Still, work should start soon in some places. There were also two slab leaks that needed to be fixed — please report any hot spots on the floors immediately to Stratus Management.

Tomorrow’s Board Meeting at 6pm

Rumor has it tomorrow’s monthly Board meeting will start at 6pm. Please contact the management company to get a definite answer.

Monthly Board Meeting Wednesday January 9

Unless there is a last-minute cancellation, this month’s Board meeting should take place next Wednesday, January 9. It will presumably start at 6:30pm and take place at the Doyle Recreation Center on Regents Road.

As mentioned in the previous posting, an amendment to the Civil Code took effect on January 1 that requires an Association to notify its owners of the agenda of a Board meeting at least four days in advance. (See section 1363.05, subdivisions (f) and (i) for details.) Items that are not on this agenda may not be discussed or taken action on at the Board meeting unless there is an emergency of some sort or the item was announced and later tabled at another Board meeting in the last 30 days. The net effect of this amendment to Civil Code is that next week’s Board meeting may be a short one.