Annual Lakewood Meeting, May 5, 2018 10 am, Northern Bay Resort
President Eric Koppa called the meeting to order at 10:15 am. Eric gave everyone 5 minutes to read over the meeting minutes from 2017 Annual Property Owners Meeting and this year’s budget.
Reading of the Agenda:
- Determination of a Quorum
- Introductions of the Board of Directors
- Approval of 2017 Annual Meeting Minutes
- Elections
- 2017 Budget and Results Review
- Communications
- Old Business
- New Business
- Adjournment
Quorum . At least 10% of membership or 38 lots must be represented for legal meeting. Secretary Maureen Bain confirmed that there were 43 lots represented in person or by proxy so the quorum was established.
Eric’s introduction of the Board of Directors and opening remarks . Present: Maureen Bain, Secretary; Kelly Bain, Treasurer; Steve Hensen, Vice President; Jim Walsh, Director; Betty Anderson, Director; Eric Koppa, President. Connected to community with Facebook, Website and email. Thanks to Maureen for enhancing the communication between us all. Please communicate if you see issues in Lakewood. We are all in it together. We still need help and participation from our homeowners. Improvement takes participation from everyone. Please get connected and involved. Board wants to hear ideas and we respond to comments in a timely manner. Email us at talktous@lakewoodpoa.org.
Approval of 2017 Annual Meeting Minutes . Eric made a motion to approve. All approved, none opposed. Motion carried.
Election. The Board of Directors currently consists of 6 people with staggering terms. This year Director Jim Walsh and President Eric’s terms are up and we still had one other opening on the Board as well. We received resumes from homeowners, Terry Anderson and Kathleen Pugh. All 3 were unanimously elected via ballot.
Secretary’s Report
2017 Improvements . Maureen highlighted some of the changes and improvements that took place in 2017.
- Facelift of our lakefront that included painting the pavilion, dock, entrance, shed, benches, communication board and all posts. With these updates there was lots of enthusiasm by our homeowners, and we received many emails and there were several functions held throughout the summer at the pavilion.
- Wooded area around perimeter of our park was sprayed for Poison Ivy
- Director Betty planted flowers at the entrance as well as at the pavilion and did a great job tending to them all summer.
- The hill was seeded with low maintenance grass
- Some landscaping rock was relocated to the waters edge for a nicer look
- The step on the dock area was rebuilt by VP Steve and his posse.
- Purchased new weights, hardware and noodles for the swim area
- Purchased a new volleyball net, straightened out the tree line east of volleyball court and squared the sand court off
- VP Steve graded our driveway into lakefront.
- Homeowner Sandy Weigel donated a new baby swing for our swingset
- Updated our communication board
- Hired Northern Bay as our lawn care and beach clean up service. Our membership recognized the great job that Bruce and his crew did for our lakefront. Bruce’s crew not only mowed and cleaned up the fish and seaweed off of the beach, but also periodically beachcombed the entire beach as well as volleyball court. Northern Bay will once again be maintaining our lakefront area in 2018.
- Compliancy Letters to homeowners concerning loose and barking dogs, misuse of ATV’s and general upkeep of property based on feedback and emails from homeowners.
Collections. For the second year, we posted outstanding past due lien amounts on the bottom of homeowner invoices. Kelly will speak more about this in her Treasurer’s report. We moved our annual dues payment deadline to align with the fiscal year, which is March 31st. By that due date, we still hadn’t received payment from 40 homeowners, who were sent a warning letter to pay their dues by April 30th and those who did not had liens placed on their properties on May 1st. The next step, as we talked about at last years annual meeting will be to file these properties with our collection agency. This step will take place on May 15th.
Picnic. We had great weather and a nice turnout, including several of our newer homeowners. Homeowners Amy
Landis, Kathleen Pugh, Carin Tio and Judy Geiger all donated raffle prizes. Those donations totaled over 55 prizes with a Grand Prize of a 1 night stay at the Brookfield Sheraton! Those generous donations raked in $519 that went into our gate fund. We also held our annual 50/50 which generated another $200. $100 of that went into the gate fund and Chad Landis won the other $100. The Gremers each won a $10 gift card to Northern Bay for being the Bags Champions. We had great participation with people volunteering to help set up as well as clean up and we certainly appreciated everyone chipping in.
Movie Night Under the Stars. Kelly reported on this. The Saturday nite of Labor Day weekend we held our (what we hope to be) 1st Annual Movie Nite Under The Stars with a double feature including GROWN UPS and UNCLE BUCK.
We could not have asked for better weather! The Caskeys lent us their AV equipment, the Hensens donated and popped hot buttered popcorn all nite, Kelly and Maureen donated soda, water and ice and the Anderson and Ott families tended to fire duties Everyone who attended was entered into a raffle for a $ 10.00 gift card to Northern Bay and our President Eric was the winner.Tonite we are having a 2nd movie nite and will be showing Black Panther and Fast Times at Ridgemont High. The night starts at sundown.
Contests. The past 3 years we have allotted money in the budget to “give back” to our community. We launched a
Summer Photo Contest that Jennifer Anderson-Ott won a $20 gift card to Northern Bay. Kelly also continues to run trivia contests on Facebook. We have used these gift cards for raffle prizes at our functions and this year we drew 2 names from all checks we received in the first month after the billing statements went out. Those people each won a $10 gift card.
Light at Hwy Z and Cypress Drive. The Board has decided that a solution to the dark intersection would be to put a solar light on top of the stop sign post. This has been budgeted for 2018.
Board of Directors Procedures and Forms Kelly and Maureen put together a manual that would serve as a resource for future Boards and consists of basic Board of Directors job descriptions, forms for filing and satisfying liens, the procedures that involve lien placement and release along with banking procedures and billing procedures for both homeowners and advertisers. This manual also contains lien paperwork, reimbursement form, all information pertaining to the closing process when a property is sold, information on contracts and bids just to name a few things.
The purpose is to hand off a complete guide to make future transitions for new board members and officers easy and seamless.
Emails and Phone Numbers. Our homeowner contact information has come a really long way in the past couple of years, but if we still don’t have your email and phone number please send that to us. That info is especially helpful in an emergency. Please send those to talktous@lakewoodpoa.org.
Get Connected. Lastly, if you are not currently part of the Lakewood Facebook page, please join us. Our Facebook page is a closed group for homeowners only and is intended to be a fun, positive and informative page for our members.
Maureen handed the floor to Kelly for the Treasurer’s Report.
Treasurer’s Report
Kelly reported that there are 380.5 lots, 2 out lots. 40 homeowners who haven’t paid dues yet this year. Dues collected so far $20,474.96.
Results for 2017:
Revenue. Liens : $1,625.99 liens prior to 2017 collected during 2017. We collected and released 11 past due liens!
Advertising revenue: $300 and another $1500 to renew. Raffle Money: $683 in raffle money and 50/50 from last annual meeting. $619 from picnic. T-shirts: $54 Total for 2017: $23,137.95.
Expenses were for the most part what we expected and budgeted for except Lakefront Needs. Some of the more “static” items that really don’t increase each year, that did in 2017 are: P.O.Box. The post office included a $2.00. increase upon our renewal last year; Safety Deposit Box still remains at $90 per year, however 2 annual dues checks bounced so we got charged a fee from the bank. Lakefront needs was higher than anticipated due to not having bid for painting yet by annual meeting last year.
Printing/Stamps and Office Supplies. because fiscally, 2016 was a really great year when It came to our bottom line and knowing we wanted to make some serious lakefront improvements, all office supplies and stamps were purchased to get through 2018 plus we paid all 2017 printing needs in advance.
Picnic. Once again, we did not even get near what we budgeted for the picnic, and still put on a great event with plenty of food for not a lot of money and we even added an event at the end of the year with the Movies Under the Stars.
Paypal. This is the 3rd year that we have offered PayPal as an option to pay dues. Our homeowners have really appreciated this convenience and makes it easier for Treasurer. Number of homeowners using it continues to increase. Kelly learned we can avoid the PP charge by homeowners paying as a “friend/family member” as opposed to paying a “merchant”. This saves us a $1.98 per lot. We updated the payment instructions accordingly on our website. After ending 2016 with 6,795.10. .Kelly set aside a couple thousand dollars just in case we needed it because of everything we planned for the lakefront. The remainder of that money went into the gate fund
Totals for 2017.
Savings – $14,413.20, Checking – $303.73 surplus, which was transferred over to the gate fund on April 1st. Gate
Fund – $21,815.05 We INCREASED this fund in 2017 by $7,664.89. $632 more than it was increased in 2016.
Budgeted for 2018:
Lawn Care and Beach Cleanup . Northern Bay gave us the same bid as last year which we felt was reasonable and they did a great job so we contracted with them again for 2018.
Printing/Stamps and Office Supplies. As stated earlier, we incurred the bulk of those costs in 2016 and are currently in need of replenishing the supplies.
Bank Fees. like last year, we have issues with a few homeowners checks bouncing that resulted in fees.
Picnic. I’ve allotted a few extra bucks to this line to do a movie nite at the pavilion like last year and we hope to do other events like this in the future.
Attorney. Update our Bylaws and Covenants that were written in 1982.
PayPal Fees. Opting to keep them the same since there will always be people who don’t read the instructions and pay as a “merchant.”. Also, we are working towards utilizing PayPal as our free way of billing our website advertisers.
Contests. Kelly has been running contests, etc. and give out Northern Bay gift cards as prizes. She was also able to work out a deal with them so it will not listed as an expense this year.
Lakefront Needs. 2nd seeding on hill, planting perennials this year end adding a decorative mulch, fertilizer, new noodles for swim area, fence repair esp. near retaining wall and a light at entrance of Z and Cypress Drive.
Liens. In 2018 so far, 12 more liens have been released totalling $2,240.63. We have $6574.20 to collect this year.
That money has been deposited into the gate fund and we have renewed $1,250 in advertising, bringing our gate fund balance to $23,230.00 As of this morning total of our 3 bank accounts is $59,081.21.
Comments about the Budget Jeff Levernier Lot asked if Association is reimbursed for bank fee if homeowner bounces a check or for postage and fees associated with past due letters and liens. And how often does that happen.
Anything not received by March 31, gets letter. Mailing is not charged specially but it is part of lien penalty. Line item for boat launch repairs or upkeep.Kelly said we’ve had the boat ramp dredged and we told our homeowners last dredging that we would try again and monitor it. It doesn’t make sense if we are going to be fiscally responsible to continue to throw money at that. We have contacted area realtors to not use that as a selling point. Levernier said it is our responsibility to maintain the launch as part of Association. He says it affects the value of his home. He said it is part of Association function to support boat launch. Eric mentioned that Northern Bay is open to county. Our launch needs to be rebuilt with a new grade. This would involve a $15,000-$20,000 capital improvement project. It hasn’t been tabled but the cost would be exorbitant to retool the launch. Norm Hampson said it is cost prohibitive and Adams county won’t allow. It would cost $5000 or $6000 a year to keep it dredged out. Eric thanked Maureen and Kelly for working behind the scenes to generate revenue for the Association with raffles, advertising, t-shirts.
Communications
Secretary Maureen was called on to give the Communications.She listed these the following items for reports and the directors reporting:
Picnic. Kelly asked all those who RSVP to keep the commitment to come to the picnic as we on the board have made the commitment to you to put this event on and we also base the amount of food bought on that number. We had generous donations by our membership for raffle prizes that made for a really fun afternoon. T-shirt sales, raffles, 50/50 generated $673 and that was added to our gate fund. We also annual water balloon toss and bags tournament!
2018 picnic will be held on Saturday June 30th and as of now our grand prize raffle item is an 18 hole golf extravaganza here at Northern Bay. If any of our members can and would like to donate an item to raffle off at our picnic we would appreciate that. It makes for a fun time and it generates money for our association. New items only please as opposed to a used or white elephant type item.
Pier and Swim Area Installation VP Steve reported that we updated weights and bought new noodles and that the swim area should be in by Memorial Day and he is working with Docking Solutions to get the pier in as soon as
Mother Nature allows. Got in late last year due to weather. Will continue to check.
Gate Update VP Steve gotten bids over the years. Not much change in pricing. We will need power and we don’t know what that will take to get out there. Waiting for electrical contractors for price. If anyone knows an electrician let us know. Hopefully next year at this time, we will have pass for electric gate. Project will start by summer end and be in place by spring. 2 quotes for decorative gate, American came in at almost $19,000. and Century was at $13,800 plus electricity plus accessories like security cameras. Terry Lipchow stood up and donated $100 to the gate fund on the spot. Power at the light poles but probably not enough. We will probably have to run from our source. Everyone will have a fob with different code that we can shut on and off.
Flower Update Eric said we will get mulch, fresh dirt, flowers. Betty has done a wonderful job planting and taking care of the flowers and will assume that duty again this year.
Beach Passes/Towing President Eric reminded us that towing is now in full effect. YELLOW 2018 hang tag must be displayed on your mirror to avoid being towed and that all membership dues must be paid in full to utilize our lakefront areas. If visiting lakefront on your ATV/UTV, you should also be prepared to show your beach pass if asked. Please be courteous to anyone asking for your pass- It’s all of our responsibility to be vigilant about this process.As we move towards getting the electronic gate, all dues past and present will need to be paid to get access.
ATV/UTV Eric stated that the Board has received complaints about speeding and other violations in the neighborhood. When possible, we have approached those homeowners and explained the ramifications of these violations. Know that our entire subdivision has a speed limit of 10 mph for all ATVs and UTV. Rules and regulations for all recreational vehicles are on our website under the ‘resources tab.’ Golf carts are not legal on any roads. This is a STATE LAW. Lastly, we were unable to get a Lakewood group ride together last fall but we will try to make it happen this year!
Dogs and Leash Laws Eric reiterated Lakewood and state laws regarding dogs. Homeowners have contacted us about loose dogs as well as excessive barking and we have addressed those issues with those owners. Also,
Wisconsin does have a “leash law,” which means that whether you are taking your dog for a walk or just hanging out in your yard, your dog MUST be on a leash at all times. If the police are involved, the fine for 1st time offenders can be $100 and after that as much as $200. Dogs are not allowed anywhere at the lakefront. If you see violators, contact Association immediately at talktous@lakewoodpoa.org.
Lakefront Responsibility Eric reminded us that with the updates to the lakefront and the influx of several new owners, our beach saw more activity than it has in recent years and you bring it in, you should also bring it out and we should all work together to pick up any trash left behind by violators. The Board is very connected. If you see a problem at the lakefront report it immediately to talktous@lakewoodpoa.org . Lakefront cleanup is being discussed as a neighborhood project. More to come on that. Also, please abide by all posted rules at the lakefront, including
NO DOGS anywhere or any time! By doing so we can all have a great experience.
Business Directory Secretary Maureen reported that the business directory on our website continues to grow.
Thanks to a couple of homeowners who have suggested prospects and actually sold listings! if you know anyone in the area that is a potential advertiser, please send us an email at talktous@lakewoodpoa.org
75.00 per year for a listing and we also offer display ads throughout our website as well. This money helps keep our costs down. Also be sure to patronize our advertisers and tell them you saw their ad on our website.
Neighborhood Watch Program Maureen stated that we have solicited the help of our some of our “full timers” in
Lakewood to form a neighborhood watch program, which is organized to work with authorities to reduce and prevent crime and vandalism. If you would like to participate in this program, please let us know.
Meet Your Neighbors Maureen spoke about this new feature we have added to our website in the ‘ Around the
Neighborhood’ box of the homepage. It is a brief introduction of homeowners. It is open to everybody, so if you are interested, you can access the form under ‘member information’ tab and then click on “meet your neighbors.”
New Business.
Advertising Maureen reiterated that this is an ongoing effort. Please utilize our advertisers and let us know if you have any leads for advertising. They can be emailed to talktous@lakewoodpoa.org.
Landscaping/Hill Kelly reported that our seeding of the hill last year was only partially successful due to the torrential rains of last Spring washing some of the seed away. We will put more seed down this year and we will again be planting flowers, probably perennials and we are going to spread out some mulch as well.
Collections Kelly reiterated that after May 15th we will proceed with having our collection agency pursue those owners with liens on their properties and hope to collect all past due payments by the end of 2018.
Picnic/Movie Night Kelly reminded us that the picnic will be Saturday June 30. We will be raffling off a spectacular 18-hole golf package at Northern Bay. Donations for raffle, be let us know at talktous@lakewoodpoa.org . Movie night tonight at 8 pm.
Lakefront Needs Kelly reported that we are investigating a new roof for the pavilion and replacing the split rail fence with something sturdy and long lasting. in the meantime we will replace a couple of the broken/rotting pieces near the swing set area. As a reminder, please stay off the fence as it wasn’t made to bear the weight of a person to sit on or climb over.
Lawyer Eric stated that our bylaws and covenants/restrictions are very outdated and we have budgeted money for 2018 to consult with a real estate attorney. As a Board, we feel this is in the best interest of all Lakewood property owners to have an assessment by legal professionals to make any recommendations that would be pertinent to our association moving into the future.
Wrap Up Comments and Vote on Dues Increase Eric stated that the Lakewood Board of Directors would like to ensure that we can continue to make improvements each year and would like to motion to increase the dues by 3.3% effective April 1, 2019. That would make homeowners dues $60.00 per lot, per year. Vote was unanimous in Favor, none opposed. Motion carried.
The Board has been working diligently to make the electric Gate over $21,000 in fund. We are currently finalizing details on cards, electricity, cameras, etc. Construction slated to begin this Fall. This will keep our investment at the lakefront protected. Eric opened floor to questions or comments.
Member Comments.
Boat launch Scott Geiger Lot 168 Wants an Association vote on dredging boat launch every year. Proposes to start fund to finance annual dredging. Eric said we would pull numbers together and bring back to the Association so we can take a vote. Norm Hampson $1200/dredging, $100 permit, additional permit to haul the sand away plus the cost to haul and it has to be inspected. A lot of stone in the dredged sand so not suitable to put on beach. Eric said it is not in 2018 budget. Teri Bullard Lot 254 said Dredging would have to be done on a monthly basis. Eric said 3-4 times for about $5000 a year.
DNR and Attorney Norm Hampson Lots 385/386 Wooden fence against the law (DNR) 35 ft in from water. We can repair not replace. Attorney is good idea. Needs to be done to update bylaws. Wanted to also know if we got quotes for asphalt for entrance by gate? Steve Hensen said it will be buried in sand but he will check with contractor.
Private road that is owned by Association. Eric said there is nothing we can do about easement road. Property owners have easement rights to that road because they need access. We have no liability but we will investigate further. There is another road that gives them access from Northern Bay. Hampson said only 2 or 3 given easement rights – one at each end.
Hwy Z and Cypress Drive Geiger suggested reflective tape. Eric said we will get solar lights.
Thanks Jeff Levernier thanked the Board for their hard work.
Signage Al Field Lot 221 People park where boat turnaround is. Signage?
Glass on Beach Kathleen Pugh shouldn’t be brought on the beach. We will consider putting sign in communication board.
2018 Budget Eric made motion to approve budget. All approved, none opposed. Motion carried.
Raffle winners Terry Lipchow, Lot 269 won the 50/50 Raffle of $50.50. The other half will go to the gate fund. Kelly Bain, Lot 193 won the Door prize, a $10 gift card to Northern Bay.
Adjournment 11:51am
Respectfully Submitted,
Maureen Bain
Secretary, Lakewood POA