Leewood Homeowners Association

Board Meeting Minutes

July 12, 2016

Board Members Present:

President: Patricia Willingham

Vice President: Janet Rourke
Treasurer: Leona Taylor
At Large: Dayna Roy

Convening: The meeting was called to order at 7:30 pm at the Phillip School, 7010 Braddock Road, Annandale, VA 22003.

Approval of past minutes: No minutes were available for approval. June and July meeting minutes will be approved at the next meeting.

Open Forum: No homeowners were in attendance.

Officer Reports/Updates:

President- Pat brought up the following issues:

· The Board discussed the letter from the owner at 7008 Bradwood Court regarding rodents in the owner’s backyard. The Board agreed that rodents are a natural occurrence in the neighborhood, and individual homeowners should take care of rodents on their own property.

· The board discussed the letter from the owner at 5266 Bradgen Court regarding a neighbor parking his second car in the neighborhood. The Board agreed that having a second car is not a violation of the parking rules. The homeowner will be notified that the Board can only take action if the neighbor is violating a parking regulation.

· Pat was contacted by the President of the Braddock Mews Homeowners Association asking if the two communities wanted to share the cost of a dumpster for general use. Pat responded that Leewood was not interested; the Board ratified her decision.

· The Board continued the discussion of collection procedures for past due assessments that was tabled at the prior meeting. What the attorney outlined in the 2012 letter for collection procedures is not what was communicated in the May e-mail from the attorney. Janet will contact the attorney to determine if Leewood can send the collection letter required under the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act or if this letter needs to come from the attorney. The concern is that the attorney costs for the letter preparation and negotiation before a suit is filed may not be recoverable from the homeowner. Janet will also check with the attorney as to whether our current Resolution No. 3 on collections is sufficient to allow for acceleration of assessments. The Board also discussed whether the association can charge any fees or penalties for late payment. The association was previously advised that the $15 late fee that was being charged was no longer valid with law changes. The current Leewood documents allow interest at 6% to be charged on late assessments. Leona will research if interest can be set up and charged with the new accounting software.

Vice President- As a follow-up to the discussion last month on tree removal, Janet provided copies of the tree maintenance plan that had been drafted in 2011.

Secretary- No report.

Homeowner Accounts- Maggie provided the report of past due accounts. She also reported that past due and delinquent letters were sent to all the homeowners except for one account. For that one account, there is still the open issue of whether the owner received one or two POA packets which affects how payments have been applied to the account. Heather will be contacted to answer the question.

Treasurer- No financial report was presented, as the bank and investment statements and various vendor invoices have not yet been received. Leona will post the financial statements to the website when completed. In general, income and expenses are within budget with the exception of snow removal expenses from the January blizzard.

Pat did call Capital One Bank to obtain the paperwork to change signers on the CD accounts. The forms are to be sent to Leona’s home address. She will check if they were received while she was on vacation.

Leona indicated that no action was taken on selling the Vanguard shares or investing the proceeds. With the Brexit vote and subsequent US market decline during the past month, it was prudent not to sell. With the market at an all –time high as of this evening, the shares should be sold. Janet will contact Schwab on placing the sales order and also investing the excess funds in fixed income securities or CD’s.

At-Large- Dayna asked whether the Board needed to establish regular procedures for parking enforcement. The Board discussed various ideas. For instance, should the other Board members be notified via e-mail when a ticket is issued? Is there still a board-members-only section on the website with the ticket roster? Should we assign responsibility by street for ticketing? Leona will check with the webmaster for the Leewood site. Tied into this, Pat volunteered to ticket the van if still illegally parked as reported by the owner at 7072 Leestone Street. The Board will continue to deliberate on the parking issues.

Dayna also mentioned that she had been looking at the website of another association and thought that their website might be a model for the Leewood site. In particular, the other association site has fill-in forms for architectural change applications and POA packet requests. Leona will check with the Leewood webmaster on adding the forms capability and other possible enhancements.

ARC: The Committee members are in the process of re-inspecting houses in preparation for another round of second notices.

G&M:
Tree Proposals- The Board reviewed the two proposals from Professional Grounds. The board decided:

· Proposal 37110

o Item 1 & 3: Approved.

o Item 2: Check with Professional Grounds if this should be covered under regular G&M contract.

o Item 4: There was no item 4 (numbering error).

o Item 5: Not approved. Dayna will notify requesting homeowner that the Board did not approve the expenditure.

· Proposal 37071

o Item 1: Price seems very expensive to trim the ends of two branches; whole branches do not need to be removed.

o Item 2: Check with Professional Grounds if this should be covered under regular G&M contract.

o Item 3: Already completed by Professional Grounds for free.

o Item 4: Approved but stump should also be ground out and removed.

o Item 5: Check with Professional Grounds if this should be covered under regular G&M contract.

o Item 6: Check to see if this cost (which seems high) includes the stump removal. There is also a stump next to this tree that could be ground out at the same time. Both are subject to no Miss Utility conflict.

The Board also discussed that a full inspection of all trees should be completed, and the tree plan from 2011 updated for a more systematic approach to tree removals.

Proposals for grounds landscape management- The Board began its evaluation of the proposals received from the four landscape firms. First is to determine the basis on which the proposals will be evaluated. Besides price, what other factors are important? Dayna described putting together a chart comparing the proposals. Pat indicated that she had done something like that and would distribute it to the Board members. Leona volunteered to review the Better Business Bureau website for information on the various companies. Board members should provide input among themselves on evaluation criteria and additional information we will need from the landscape firms. It was decided that the highest proposal (McFall) should be eliminated since it was $10-20,000 higher than the other proposals.

The meeting was adjourned.

Certified for the record:

__________________________________________________ _____________________
Leona Taylor, Treasurer Date