A meeting of the Board of Directors of the Williamsburg Settlement Maintenance Association, Inc. was held on Tuesday, January 19, 2016 at 5:30 p.m. at the Williamsburg Settlement clubhouse, 1602 Hoyt, Katy, Texas 77449.
ATTENDANCE
Board Members present were Floyd Ball, Walt Smith, Gail Owen, Michael Wood, Dave Ellis, Martin Spears and Larry Crain. Also in attendance was Dolores Sue representing Planned Community Management, Inc. (PCMI) and Officer Felchak.
Also invited guest Urbano Amzaldua representing CenterPoint Energy.
With a quorum being established, the meeting was called to order at 5:30 p.m.
MINUTES
The minutes of the November 17, 2015 Board Meeting were reviewed. A motion to accept the minutes as written was made by Walt Smith seconded by Martin Spears and unanimously approved.
HOMEOWNER CONCERNS
There were five (5) homeowners present. Floyd Ball welcomed the attendees.
One resident who attended the meeting lives in a home on North Rebecca Burwell where his fence and that of his neighbor is deteriorating due to poor drainage of the Association owned ground on the car park side of the clubhouse. He distributed some photos illustrating the problem. As this issue was on the agenda as a New Business item discussion was deferred until that portion of the meeting.
Another resident thanked the Board for the good stewardship of the subdivision money. She stated that even though assessments have not been raised in quite a few years the Board has still managed to make major improvements with the replacement of most of the perimeter fence and a lot of work at the recreation area. This included replacing the wrought iron fence around the pool, installing new awnings over the baby pool and on the pool deck and replacing the deteriorated awning between the tennis courts. Repairs were also made to the support columns on the clubhouse canopy and the cabana. The clubhouse exterior and cabana/storage shed have also been repainted and the landscaping on the pool and car park side of the clubhouse has been replaced. She just wanted the Board to know how much she appreciates them and their great work for our community.
At this time Dave Ellis introduced the CenterPoint representative Mr. Urbano Amzaldua who had been invited to the meeting to report CenterPoint’s progress on addressing the intermittent electrical interruptions that have been occurring in our subdivision.
Mr. Amzaldua began by asking if the homeowners present had noticed any improvement since he was last here in November. Since that date some work has been done on the capacitor banks the switching of which may have been contributing to the problem, although he believes that most issues are arising due to foliage coming into contact with overhead power lines. Mr. Amzaldua said that he had walked the entire length of our overhead lines looking for problems and has made arrangements for CenterPoint crews to cut back tree branches throughout our neighborhood. This task should be completed within two to three weeks. Floyd Ball asked that when this is done that all branches which are cut down be hauled away. In response to Mr. Amzalduas’s question, a resident stated that she has experienced a few short duration power interruptions recently. She reported these to Dave Ellis who forwarded the information to Mr. Amzaldua who subsequently investigated. He checked several meters in the subdivision and could find a record of just one momentary outage in December and two which occurred on one day in January. One resident, who is a master electrician, did take issue with the statement made at the November meeting that momentary interruptions, being under voltages as opposed to voltage spikes, wouldn’t cause equipment damage. He has experienced some recent severe power dips which he believes may have caused damage to some of his equipment which he has had to replace, although he couldn’t definitively prove the correlation between the damage and the power dips.
Once again the question was raised of whether the momentary outages are a result of the new buildings in the area. Mr. Amzaldua stated definitively that the new construction is not the cause of our problems.
Mr. Amzaldua explained that CenterPoint will continue to monitor the situation and he passed out his business cards to the homeowners present inviting them to call him with dates and times of momentary outages so that he can research each one. Dave Ellis volunteered to help in this process by asking residents who experience power problems to send him an email with as much information as possible about the event, including their street address and the time the anomaly was observed. He will then forward this information to Mr. Amzaldua who will continue to address these issues.
The Board thanked Mr. Amzaldua for attending the meeting and for his efforts to help alleviate the problems we are experiencing.
PATROL SERVICE REPORT
The Board reviewed the patrol service report. The Board thanked Officer Felchak for attending the meeting.
FINANCIAL REVIEW
Dave Ellis presented the financials. As of December 31, 2015 the money in the bank totaled $586,240.45. This figure includes checking, savings accounts and CD’s and is the money to cover both operating expenses and the necessary reserve to fund maintenance and replacement of the Association’s capital assets. This total also includes $225,295.24 in prepaid assessments for 2016. Dave Ellis reported that expenditures were over budget for the year as a result of Board decisions to implement the improvements mentioned by a resident earlier in the meeting. The delinquency for the year ending December 31, 2015, was $12,589.68. This amount includes maintenance fees, accrued interest, the cost of force mows and legal fees.
OLD BUSINESS
Decisions Made by Board since the November 17, 2015 Meeting -
1.
As the price which we are paying for the perimeter fence replacement is unlikely to be matched in the future, the Board decided to increase the scope of the project to include that fence along Mason Creek. This will bring the total length of fence replaced in 2015 and 2016 to 10,442 linear feet. This will leave 2,014 linear feet to be replaced in 2017 bringing the total replaced over the three years to 12,456 of the 13,674 total. The MUD District 61 has agreed to pay for the 131 linear feet of perimeter fence on their 22023 Bucktrout lot as soon as the drainage project has been completed.
2.Approval was given to place a contract with Southern Shade Structures for the supply of the two new awnings now installed in the pool area and the replacement of the awning between the tennis courts at a total price of $13,868.96.
3.Approval was given to place a contract with Texas Lawn Care for the replacement of clubhouse landscaping at a total price of $4,953.88.
NEW BUSINESS
2015 Audit and Tax Preparation - The Board reviewed the audit and tax proposal from Elaine Combs, CPA, this is the same auditor who was used last year. The Board unanimously approved the audit and tax preparation for a price not to exceed $1,900.
Drainage from Recreation Parking near Homeowner Fences - The homeowner whose fence and that of his neighbor backs up to the recreational center car park requested that the Board take some action to address the issue of standing water illustrated in the photos that he distributed earlier in the meeting. He has been trying to repair the fence but is concerned that if the water ponding is not addressed any fence repairs made will be of little use as the replaced sections will deteriorate rapidly.
Larry Crain stated that the ground elevations have not changed since the car park was installed and expressed the view that if the Board raises the elevation of the ground where the ponding is now occurring the situation would be made worse for the neighbors as the excess water would then flow into their yards. One solution would be to install a drain to carry the water out to Hoyt, but this would be prohibitively expensive. The resident volunteered that he would be prepared for us to provide some type of drain to connect with an existing drain on his property as a more reasonable priced alternative.
The Board discussed this issue and agreed that more study is required before a decision can be reached. Larry Crain was given the action to work with the homeowner to review the alternative solutions and to report his recommendations to the Board.
2016 Annual Meeting/ Pool Tag Distribution - The Board reviewed the draft annual meeting notice and proxy form. They also reviewed the pool schedule memo and discussed pool tag distribution days. It was agreed that these should be Sunday, March 20, 2016 from, 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. and Saturday, March 26, 2016 from, 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. subject to agreement with the Swim team which uses one of these days for swim team sign up. Volunteer assignments will be determined at the next Board Meeting.
Mosquito Fogging Contract - The Board reviewed two (2) proposals for the 2016 mosquito fogging contract. A motion to accept the contract with Excalibur at $62.80 plus tax per trip was made by Martin Spears, seconded by Dave Ellis and unanimously approved.
National Night Out - Floyd Ball announced that our subdivision was selected as a National Award Winner for our outstanding participation in the 32nd Annual National Night out celebrations. The Board expressed its appreciation to Michael Wood, his team of volunteers and all those who attended for the success of this event.
ADJOURNMENT TO EXECUTIVE SESSION
At 6:40 p.m. the meeting was adjourned to executive session
Decisions Made During Executive Session
The Board reviewed the attorney status report. The Association attorney had collected $17,543.28 for the year 2015.
The Board discussed the new Texas Open Carry Hand Gun Law and unanimously decided that the common areas of Williamsburg Settlement should be gun-free zones. A motion was made, seconded and unanimously approved that PCMI purchase the signs required by Texas State Law for the clubhouse, and all parts of our recreation area.
With no further business the meeting was adjourned at 7:02 p.m.
The next meeting will be held on February 16, 2016 starting at 5:30 p.m. at the community clubhouse.
