Surfside HOA, Ocean Park, Washington
What happened to the committee that was modifying the covenants and operations manual?
November of 2016, I was a board member, and I was chosen by the President of the Board, Jim Flood, to be the chairman and trustee of the committee and told to work on reviewing suggestions of how to change the covenants and operations manual of the HOA. The job of this committee was to recommend changes that will be presented to the HOA members at the annual meeting. The Surfside members would be allowed to comment on them, but will not be allowed to vote on them. The Board will then vote on them at their leisure.
The committee met over a period of months and almost always agreed 100% on the changes before they were presented to the board. The suggestions were:
- To allow RVs to remain on their own properties all year, under the same conditions as the rest of Pacific County
- To create a new covenant specifying that Surfside HOA would not attempt to enforce County Ordinances that were not specifically in the Covenants. Comments in the Covenants stating that properties must follow the County Ordinances are warnings indicating that our inspections and approvals do not cover all County Ordinances.
- To require the Surfside Board to follow the “Sunshine Laws”, AKA the Washington Open Public Meetings Act (“Act”) RCW 42.30.
- To establish a “public” electronic means of communication with which the board and committee members could communicate publicly and openly outside of the physical meetings. Secondly to allow a “section” of the electronic means of communication to allow communication from the HOA members as a whole on the issues discussed.
Our committee was in the process of discussing other suggested changes, such as solutions to the unnecessary tree topping, without blocking views, but never got to present that as a committee to the board. As soon as the committee started to suggest changes to the covenants and operations manual, the board started to disintegrate the committee. The board eliminated the committee and thus did not allowing the committee’s suggestions to be heard by the Surfside members at the Annual Meeting.
Not only did the board table ALL the suggestions presented, but they completely changed the long standing charter of the committee so that they could control even the suggestions that are presented to the members.
The board members who voted to disintegrate the committee and block the Surfside members from hearing and commenting on the suggested changes were Jim Flood, Jim Clancy, Chris Hanson, Kirby Smith and Thomas Rogers.
How did this all come about?
As the chairman, my job, according to the committee charter as written in our operations manual, was to select up to 4 people to service as members of the committee. I talked to many people in an attempt to find people who were willing to serve and that would represent the different interests in the community yet be reasonable people, open to compromise, with the ability to see things from all the land-owners point of view.
People have asked if I ever turned away people from being a voting member who wanted to volunteer. Yes, I did. The committee charter only allowed 5 people including me. That only allowed me to bring 4 people into the committee. My goal was to get one from each interest group. I turned away people who volunteered after we had a full committee, and two people who volunteered when the regular members could not make the meeting because they did not represent the same group as the people that were not able to attend.
There were also several Board Members that wanted to be Committee Members, Kirby Smith, Chris Hanson, and Thomas Rogers. I talked to each of them and pointed out that it was part of our written HOA Board Goals this year to encourage and include the community more in the decision making process. I told them that I felt it was more important to get community members involved in the committee than to have board members involved. Thomas Roger and Chris Hanson agreed and graciously stepped aside to let non-board members participate. Kirby Smith was significantly more resistant but then did agree.
I chose one person, Toby Harris, from G Street that has a view of the ocean but could be blocked by trees and also has to cut his trees to protect the views of the people of J Place. For ease of discussion, I call the people he represents the G Streeters. He also lives on a lake and so has interests in the care of the lake. He is also has been a business owner for many years thus has had experience with laws and regulations, and understanding how they are normally interpreted and enforced.
I chose the second person, William Sartorius, who was an RVer. For ease of discussion I call the people he represents the RVers. He also lives on one of the streets between J Place and G Street. For ease of conversation, I call the people that live in that area The Valley People. He works for the government helping foster children, deals regularly with the court system, thus also understands laws and regulations and how they are normally interpreted and enforced.
I chose one person from J Place, Tom Brazier, who is a retired attorney. For ease of discussion I call the people he represents the J Placers. When I first approached him he told me if I tried to take away the views of the J Placers, he would sue me. And frankly, I completely understand his reaction and position. Once Tom and I talked a bit, he realized that I was trying to put together a fair committee that represented the entire community, and have an equal voice for all. He realized that the goal was to make things better for each property owner, and do things in a fair and equal way. I have personally heard Tom tell this to others.
I chose one person, Nancy Andersen, from the east side, meaning people who do not live on J Place but all the streets east of J Place. For ease of discussion I call the people she represents the East Siders. She has worked for the government, wrote much documentation, and is familiar with the way regulations and policies are written.
We started out with much disagreement but very quickly, the members of the committee realized that the proposals I had collected from the community were very good compromises and benefited many in the community without damaging others.
We tweaked a bit here and there, adjusted the wordings, etc., but basically the committee seemed to be agreeing in general with the suggestions, without a lot of large adjustments.
After handing in our first 4 proposed changes, in the form of motions, the board, led by a motion from Kirby Smith, decided to completely change the existing charter of the committee. They added Kirby Smith as a co-chair, changed the membership of the committee to UNLIMITED members, and made a bizarre rule that anyone who shows up for the meeting can vote. Yikes, what kind of a format for a committee is that?
This of course takes away equal representation, blocks out representation for people who can’t physically attend the meeting, and gives people who have the free time to attend meetings all the say. 80% of our community lives significant distance from Surfside and most of the RVers have no place of their own to stay here as they have to remove their RVs from their lots in the winter.
Just for the record, every person that raised their hand at one of these meetings was given the opportunity to speak. I had personally invited Chris Hanson, Thomas Rogers and Kirby Smith to attend the meetings and participate, even though they would not be voting members. I believe that I have Kirby Smith more time to talk than any other person present at any of the meetings. Some of the committee members asked me to give less speaking time to the floor because they felt the comments were repetitive and were slowing the progress of the committee. I don’t believe a committee could have been run more fairly that it was being run. I believe the other members of the committee would tell you the same.
The board then voted to eliminate the committee. The Surfside members never got to see the suggested changes.
What happened to the Technology Committee?
A while after the Policy & Procedures Committee was eliminated, Deb Blagg proposed a technology committee be created to examine ways to use technology to better inform and engage the membership, improve efficiency of the Board and the office, and promote transparency. The committee was formed as an Ad Hoc committee and much work was done by Deb Blagg and Pat Tollefson. They found an excellent software solution that would cost $1000 per year. Upon the suggestion, the Board eliminated the committee. The Surfside members never got to hear the suggested solution.
Patrick Johansen