BOD meeting on 8 September 2015

I attended the first hour of the BOD meeting tonight. I will share the notes that I took. Also, I have posted the meeting Agenda and two open letters that were handed out at the meeting (see below).

Jennifer (office worker) and BOD members (left to right) Wendi, Cynthia, Carol, Mark, Harold, David, and Tracy were in attendance. Not in the picture, but very much present, was a law enforcement officer in a very sharp-looking uniform. He was a striking presence, and it was easy to see why he was there. In attendance were approximately 40 unit owners. More than one were obviously upset and determined to be heard, whether they were in order or not. Only one audience member was truly disruptive, but it was easy to see how it could rapidly get out of hand. I believe that the officer in the room had a calming effect.

The very first order of business was to dismiss Tracy Thomas from the BOD. From what I could hear, she was in violation of a rule that states that a BOD member cannot be more than 90 days (?) delinquent in the payment of certain fees, and possibly fines. She responded by saying that she had, this very day, paid $12,000.00 to bring her account up to date. She also had some other explanations that I could not clearly hear or understand. In the end, she accepted the dismissal and joined the audience.

Before she left the BOD table, Tracy asked that the BOD accept petitions that had reportedly been signed by a number of TAJ unit owners. Apparently one petition is to have a recall vote to remove Wendi from the BOD, and another one is to have Wendi terminated as the TAJ property manager. At some point in the meeting, the President DID formally accept those petitions for review.

Agenda items #3 and 4 were about financial matters. Harold Scott reported that initiating a Forensic Audit was pending the completion of regular Yearly audits. The 2012 Yearly audit was only recently completed. Carol reported that the 2013 Yearly audit is complete except for some information (two numbers?) yet to be obtained.  It was stated that the Forensic audits would cost (a minimum of?) approximately $15,000.00.

The issue of audits roused spirited participation from concerned Unit Owners. It sounded like some audience members (unit owners) were concerned that the accounting was being done wrong (maybe even worse). It sounded like the BOD was trying to weigh the cost of the proposed audit(s) against the potential benefits.

Agenda item #7 was Lisbeth's proposal for a common sense procedure to send income and expense statements to unit owners at the completion of any project for which the unit owner was given a SPECIAL ASSESSMENT (SA) so that the unit owner could be aware of any possible credit in their favor due to over-payments of their SA. That credit could then be applied to the unit owners' monthly maintenance, was suggested.  The BOD apparently adopted that suggestion as a rule (from what I could make out).

Jennifer set the dates of November 6th, 13th, and 20th for Finance Committee meetings at which the yearly budget will be outlined.  She also reported the need for SA meetings for buildings 22, 23, 16 (as shown in the Agenda, below) and also buildings 1 & 3 (not listed on the Agenda).

The Agenda item of most interest to me was #6: "Priority Topic to Discuss and Set Date on Assessment of Two Million Dollar Loan to Repay Operating Funds $approx. $325k, Loan approved by Board of 2006-2006."  That item was tabled, as the President asked that more information be known before any further action be taken.

The second most interesting Agenda item was #17: "Selection of New BOD to fill Abandoned Seat and Re-voting of BOD Officer(s)."  Unfortunately, I left before this item was addressed. Can anyone report what happened?

Open Letter from Cynthia Potts, Publicly Distributed at BOD meeting on 8 September 2015

Letter to all concerned TAJ residents and homeowners;

I have been debating with myself for several months now on how to properly and legally respond to accusations being made by Tracy Thomas, Harold Scott, David Saldarriaga and several other members of our community against current board members and Wendi Hill in particular. I listened along with others when Tracy knocked on my door 18 months ago to cite indiscretions being done by the last board. I was not happy with some of what I saw and did get involved to learn more. After many months, that is all I heard was allegations with no concrete proof. I cannot in good conscious make a decision based on conjecture and speculation nor should anyone else. I ran for the board because I wanted to see change and have many if my own ideas I would like to contribute. Never did I think that the new board members would not want to move forward with the betterment of TAJ; instead all we ended up with is a board divided and several out to accomplish their own agendas.

Every month has been the same at the board meetings. Important agenda items are not being discussed because of the constant bickering. Every month, I am faced with explaining the same facts to the same people. There are no hidden agendas. The facts are still the facts; we are in good financial shape. The books are in proper order with all buildings credited for all monies collected, most due to Jennifer Burton going above and beyond to collect as much as possible to save other unit owners from having to pay for all of the bad debts on their buildings. This is not part of her normal job responsibilities. She does not have to do this. When you hear about the office not cooperating with Banks, realtors, Fannie Mae, etc., it is because she is standing firm to collect for you. This is not illegal; she is not breaking any laws. I have spoken at length to our legal team and they have been impressed with what she has managed to accomplish. Bills are paid on time; there are now reserve funds in all of our accounts so that we are able to make necessary repairs to the grounds and common area elements. This was not the case just a few short years ago. If Wendi Hill and Jennifer Burton were doing such a bad job, how do you explain the financial increase to this community? Yes, we can hire a property management company to come in and take over. I have been interviewing many companies for the last 4 months. After speaking with me, a few large companies said that this community is too large and facing issues that they do not want to handle, case in point the 40 year inspections.  Alliance Property Systems contacted me this weekend, sent to me through Harold and Tracy. The owner was very aggressive and said that his idea was to put us into receivership and then assess the entire community a large monthly payment and weed out the bad residents. Is this what the two of them have in mind? Does anyone know what going into receivership would do to our community? We are solvent and not even close to bankruptcy; receivers come in, clean out the accounts and take over. Not on my watch… We can hire a management company, but please consider this before we move forward with the decision to do so, a property management company will not know the history of TAJ and its’ residents. It will take a tremendous amount of time to give them all details to make informed decisions. They will also not go the extra step to collect monies as Jennifer has. They are hired and will stay with basics and will only collect 10%, which means less funds being collected for your buildings. Money is an important issue right now. Buildings must be assessed so that they can be repaired to come up to city code. We are out of time and cannot delay this any longer according to the city. As far as Nova Contractors, I am of the same mind as everyone else. I would love to see other General Contractors all working on construction projects. Again, I have met with many GC’s and engineers and most have said they will do the work but they all ask if the buildings are fully funded. No they are not. If there is any one building that would like to come forward and pay their full assessment, we will hire one of these GC’s and have them repair your building. This will be a good way to get further cost analysis done. All we have had to work with is the prior work from the bad GC’s we have had in here and Nova Construction cost. Anyone willing?

I would like to address the idea of hiring a Forensic Auditor. The board has never said no to a forensic audit. Since Harold Scott had the most to say about it, I put him in charge of contacting auditors, getting quotes and bringing back the names so that we can start interviewing them. Every month at the meetings he says he has the names and will send them to me but I never hear from him. I contacted a Forensic Specialist myself, John David CPA in Plantation and have spoken with him a couple of times. The audits start at $15K per year and that cost will increase as they dive into the paperwork as they will ask for more supporting paperwork. He asked for two years of audits to base his cost on which I provided to him. After reviewing the audits, he did say that they were very comprehensive 65 to 67 page audits and done very well.  He also reminded me that even if a small monetary indiscretion is found, the current board will be held responsible. I will go along with whatever the majority of the owners wish to do.

I hear total transparency complaints month after month. There are no hidden agendas on the board. Every project being worked on or that is in consideration are brought to the board for discussion and approval. If those yelling about total transparency take it so seriously, then why do they have a TAJ Residents watch that only those selected are able to see? This way, they can spout half-truths and lies and there is no one to support the falsehood to the statements.  Tracy takes copious notes at the meetings but does not comprehend what is transpiring. She emails letters to all with no support. Last one in case that I did receive: she claims an elderly resident is upset that she just wants grass put down in front of her unit and has asked several times and nothing has been done. I pulled the records and the request was made in October of 2014 and Leigh installed the sod within two weeks. Tracy claims that it was done incorrectly; well the only way to lay sod incorrectly is if you throw it down on top of pavement. Grass needs water and this area most likely turned brown due to the lack of rain we have had and the fact that the pump has been broken and thus the sprinklers not working. This is just one of many examples of Tracy telling half-truths and lies to try to discredit the office staff.

As for the many accusations that have been put out there; all based on conjecture, why has no one except a small handful of residents approached me and asked me to explain? Why have I not been invited to the residents’ blog so that I may have a fair chance to voice any issues or make comments? Tracy has done nothing but stir up hate and discontent since she bought here. She resides in Weston and has had an illegal unit owner in building 28 since she purchased. Everything she has been trying to do to bring change to the community has been either for her own benefit or for investors. She does not have the best interest of TAJ in mind. If she did, she would not make suggestions like asking everyone to contact Channel 10 to make complaints. If they did happen to do a personal interest story here and the condition of our buildings was displayed on TV, how long do you think our insurance company would keep our contract? Can we afford to risk going without insurance in the middle of hurricane season. We must use common sense in some things. Tracy went to the City to try to overturn the 40 year inspection on her building, not any others. She was asked to leave by city officials. They are well aware of her actions. Tracy would like to do nothing more than sell, make a profit and leave this community.

As for Harold Scott, he is lying to everyone. He has claimed that he was on the board during 2006 but could not meet his obligations due to his new business startup and not having the time. He has claimed many times that he did not vote for the $2 million dollar loan nor the purchases of the two TAJ owned units. I have the meeting minutes from 2006-2008 showing that not only was Harold on the board the entire two years but he did in fact vote for both of the referenced items as well as many more. The TAJ units were purchased for approx. $250K each and are now going to cost the community an over $200K loss. The board during his time served had many indiscretions, clearly documented in the minutes, such as commingling of funds, losses and missing funds. His audits were behind for two years because they could not straighten their books out. He keeps stressing how we have put the community in jeopardy of heavy fines because the audits are late. The audits have been behind since he was on the board by several years. The past board has been working since 2008 to get them caught up. The state is well aware of the delinquencies and is working with us and in constant contact with our legal team. We are currently on 2014 and which is expected to be completed quickly. As far as his allocations that the CPA firm is crooked; he is the one that chose this firm while serving on the board.  Harold loves to throw out accusations without supporting documents. I have supporting documents. Which one is to be trusted? Is it fear of exposure prompting this turmoil? 

I am offering to call a community open forum and ask that all residents and homeowners attend. Bring your questions to me. I will answer as straight forward as I can and if I do not have the answer at that time, I will get it for you. I do not know how else I can show you that we are operating in good faith.

Please help me save TAJ,

Thank you,

Cynthia Potts, 

President 

Townhouses at Jacaranda