Barony Place I/Barony Place II

The Finance Committee of the HOA should by now be hard at work on the 2025 Proposed Budget.  The Proposed Budget should be presented to the Board by the November monthly meeting (11/12/24), so that the newly-elected board members and those with one more year to serve have time to digest it, tweak it, and approve it at the December monthly meeting (12/3/24). It should be presented earlier this year, because there will be clear need for an increase in Assessment over 10%. For that, the approval of the Voting Members is required. The November BOD meeting is important, because it immediately follows the Annual Meeting of Voting Members (AMVM). Three Director positions are to be elected (or re-elected) this year. The AMVM is convened if a quorum of legitimate Voting Members is present. The terms of Dennis Rybicki, Tanisha Holmes, and the position vacated by the resignation of Tommy Williams are up for election.  Williams was appointed to succeed Vernell Butler, who had resigned whe...

I am happy to report that the Summit's HOA did not disappoint me today. I had requested the Minutes of the May 28th pre-board meeting and the Minutes of August 13th Voting Member meeting.  I did not expect to get them when I went to the office at noon today, and I didn't. So, in this way, the HOA did not disappoint me. Why do I want the May 28th Minutes? Because the Board made an important decision in its private, secret, closed, pre-board meeting on May 28 to restrict the use and enjoyment of a portion of the Common Property. And the Board did not announce that restriction. Not in the June, July, or August Summit Scoop. Not at the June 18th or August 13th board meetings. The HOA posted a "No Firearms or Weapons" sign on the gate to the office and Myrtle pool. The decision should not have been made in private. And I believe the Board cannot do that without the approval of the Voting Members. There are no Minutes of the August 13th Voting Members meeting. Although a me...

Why doesn't the HOA's board of directors use the Old Business and New Business sections of the agenda for monthly board meetings? I can guess, and I don't like the answer. The Number 1 item on the New Business list should be the establishment of legitimate Voting Members for 27 Neighborhoods, so that there can be a legitimate election of directors in November. Right behind that, as Number 2, should be the establishment of the other directors and the officers as legitimately in office, so that the business of the HOA can be conducted legally. Consideration of the two auditors should have been handled as Old Business during the August 13th board meeting. The tip-off by the HOA President that another Special Duty Agreement with RCSD might be in the works should have been introduced and discussed under New Business. The extreme liability risk of the HOA (under previous SDAs) should be carefully explored and the proposed SDA should be passed by the HOA's lawyer and the HOA...

At the August 13th board meeting Engagement Letters for two auditors were approved. That should have been an item in Old Business, except the Board doesn't use Old Business and New Business on the agenda. There will be an audit of internal financial affairs and an audit of external financial affairs. One audit will be conducted by Becca Brendle, CPA. She also performed the work for the 2023 Annual Audit and the 2022 Annual Audit. The other audit will be performed by an accountant (not a CPA). Or is the person a bookkeeper? Her credentials were not clear, when someone in the audience asked two months ago. No one asked why the 2023 Annual Audit has not yet been presented to the board. (The 2022 Annual Audit was presented at the June 2023 board meetings.) Speaking of Engagement Letters, no one asked about the Engagement Letter for Turner Padget, the law firm retained by the HOA at the May 7th board meeting. Because of questions surrounding the legitimacy of the Voting Members, Direct...

Would the HOA benefit from a Parliamentarian? Using a Parliamentarian would make monthly meetings smoother and shorter. The August meeting would have started on time. The public comment period would have been shorter. Each speaker would have been stopped after two minutes and directed to a Committee or an outside agency. When a speaker ran off the rails, a Parliamentarian could have coached the President to regain control of the meeting. Board members would learn how to use "Point of Order" to halt detours and runaways. When Dennis tore into Danny, that should have been stopped in its tracks. Danny could have shut him down, but it would have been better if any other board member had interrupted Dennis with "Point of Order" and followed Robert's Rules of Order to restore order. Dennis owes Danny, the Board, and the Association Members an apology.  If the Board is unhappy with Danny, it can elect someone else as President. A big problem is that, without the seven...

At the August 13th Board meeting, the HOA President, Danny Trapp, mentioned that the Association may re-start the use of RCSD deputies on special, part-time duty. The HOA had made a deal with RCSD several years ago u nder RCSD's Special Duty Agreement (SDA). A former Treasurer was involved in it. Then it was terminated. Another deal was made with RCSD that was effective February 1, 2023. The previous Treasurer, Vernell Butler, was involved in it and actually signed the SDA for the HOA. (Why didn't the President and Secretary sign?) Many of the terms were similar. It was terminated later in 2023. Both of the SDAs used RCSD's contract, which contained liability clauses that were very unfavorable to the HOA. I analyzed both SDAs and pointed out the potentially-bankrupting liability risk, asking if the  proposed   contract had been submitted to the HOA's attorney and the liability insurance carrier for review. Naturally, I didn't get any answers, and there was no indic...

The Summit's HOA may be threatened by at least two lawsuits.  At the August 13th Board of Directors meeting, it was revealed that the previous property manager, still a CAMS employee, ordered a new sign for the corner of Summit Parkway and Summit Ridge Drive. According to information presented to the Board, she had been authorized only to obtain bids, and her spending limit was $1,000. Instead, she ordered the sign at an expense of $8,600. Now the sign company wants to be paid. The Board later decided not to repair the wall or to replace the sign. They apparently weren't told that the sign had been ordered. A second possible lawsuit involves a DHEC engineer who is billing the HOA for about $12,000. Here's the problem. Can the HOA even defend itself? At the May 7, 2024 Board meeting a Motion was made and approved to "hire" (retain) the Turner Padget law firm. No mention was made of the law firm (McCabe, Trotter & Beverly, P.C.), which had represented the HOA fo...

Each November the HOA is to convene an Annual Meeting of Voting Members. To do so, a quorum of Voting Members (or Alternates) must be present. This means a quorum of legitimate Voting Members. Bonafide Voting Members. REAL Voting Members. A Voting Member is only legitimate, bonafide, or real , if he was elected by his Neighborhood Committee, after it was elected during a Neighborhood Meeting. If there aren't enough legitimate Voting Members to meet the Quorum requirement, the Annual Meeting cannot be held, which means no election of board members can be held. Previous boards have allowed fraudulent elections to occur. This means that the elections were invalid. In fact, no legitimate directors have been elected in recent years.  The current board is not legitimate. This means the HOA is in violation of the State law that requires every non-profit corporation to have a board of directors. What could happen? Could the S.C. Attorney General step in and enforce the law? Could he charge...

This is how long HOA meetings should last. One hour! Everyone knows the starting time is 6:30PM. The nice thing is they (almost) always start on time. It's not hard to manage time at a meeting. It takes intention . And planning. And discipline. Display a Time-Remaining Clock. Limit the CAT deputy to five minutes. Don't let the audience suck up 20 minutes of his time and your time with the same gripes every month (speeders on Summit Parkway). Tell him not to ask for questions. If the public is to have two minutes for each to air his statement or question, then that's it. Period. Use a timer. Refer the person to a committee. To the Ombudsman for County issues. To SC DOT with questions about Hard Scrabble Road. To Animal Control for dog issues. The Treasurer should give a concise report regarding finances. Figure out how to make the Motions for all those small expenses in a different less time-consuming manner. (Use the Consent Agenda process. Read them all at once; ask if any...

Last night's Board of Directors meeting could have started on time. The room was almost full, but da Prez hadn't arrived. When Danny hadn't arrived by 6:25PM, the VP could have begun preparing to start the meeting. Fortunately, Danny was only three minutes late. It didn't take long for the meeting to dissolve into chaos. The previously-announced time-limit is two minutes for members of the audience to make statements to, or requests, of the board. There was no effort at all by the President to control that limit. The first speaker read a statement to the board and requested a motion to remove the former on-site property manager from all HOA contact. The board accepted that request and acted on it immediately, instead of delaying it until the New Business portion of the meeting. The next speaker belabored several issues for much longer than two minutes: that the President was chair of a committee; pool gate fobs not working; landscaping at the corner of Summit Parkway a...

On July 16, 2024 a complaint that I filed against the HOA with the S.C. Department of Consumer Affairs (SC DCA) was accepted for investigation. The HOA had 20 days to respond, and CAMS responded for the HOA on the last day, August 5. CAMS informed the SC DCA that the board had approved the No Guns rule at a pre-board meeting on May 28. The Board of Directors did not follow proper channels for approving this sign before installing it. The office withheld complete information from the Barony Place Neighborhood Representative about the approval process. The sign may not even be a legitimate sign approved by the State of South Carolina. Because the on-site property manager had failed to disclose how the decision about the "No Guns" sign at the pool/office was approved, telling the Barony Place Neighborhood Representative only the "proper channels" were followed, this issue was part of my complaint to the SC DCA. How was the decision made by the BOD? They made it in priv...

Will the Board of Directors answer these questions tonight? Q. When will the Board announce the vacancy on the Board and appoint a director to succeed the one who resigned three months ago? Q. What did the President mean when he wrote in the May Summit Scoop, "We have a monumental hurdle to overcome financially"? Q. Is the Board still making decisions in its private, pre-board meetings?  Why aren’t the Minutes made public? Q. How many lawsuits is the HOA facing? Q. When will the 2023 Annual Audit be available to Members? Q. What topics are in the Notice for tonight's Special Meeting of Voting Members?

The following is an open letter sent today to the Board of Directors of the Summit's HOA. Members of the Board, One of the Standing Committees of the HOA is the Neighborhood Committee. The PRM describes the importance of this Standing Committee in Art. II, Section B, Paragraph 8. " Neighborhood Committee . This Committee is responsible for helping each Community in the Summit to locate and elect a local neighborhood committee that will represent their community at SCA Board meetings and there by [ sic ] allow their Voting member (elected by the local neighborhood committee) to vote on vital issues that affect the Summit and their local neighborhood. The Neighborhood Committee will assist and advise local neighborhoods with problems that they encounter." Prior to November 2023 there was an ineffective Neighborhood Committee. A Chair was appointed in October 2021, but he apparently never attempted to carry out the responsibility of the Neighborhood Committee, and previous b...

Or didn't know it? Or knew it and hoped no one else did? In the Procedures Reference Manual (PRM) are some guidelines that were developed to keep the HOA running smoothly. One of them is found at the bottom of Page 12.  "An unbalanced budget is not allowed, [ sic ] Income must equal Expenses." [ Emphasis added .] Perhaps it should have be stated differently: "Expenses shall not exceed income." But the Finance Committee and the Board of Directors should be able to understand it as written.  So, why did the Board approve a 2024 Budget with a $27,000 deficit? And that was after contributions to Reserves were removed! There are ways to balance a budget. Increase collections. Lower expenses. Any other ideas? But the Board took the easy way out. "Oh, just ignore that guideline." And what about the PRM Art. III, C, (4)i:  "Minutes of all Budget meetings are recorded and published." Are they? I guess not, because there isn't even a "Budget C...

About 3½ years ago there was an ice-storm, and that was the beginning of the end of this island in Barony Place II. A small, broken tree was eventually removed, and then the bushes were removed. The sprinkler system there stopped working, although that problem was probably not caused by the ice-storm. Many requests to the Landscaping Committee have not resulted in improvements. Shortly after the new board took over, Jeff Lummel was removed as Chair of the Landscaping Committee and Danny Trapp (President of the HOA) took command. Results in 2024? Nothing. Why won't Danny spend any money to update the three islands in Barony Place II? Forty-eight residents support the HOA with $24,480 every year. In three years that's $73,550. A reasonable person would think that some of that money should have been spent right in this Neighborhood!

Did you see on TV or read about the flooding of new homes in two neighborhoods off Rimer Pond Road, west of Hard Scrabble Road? I sent the following email to board members: Board Members, May I urge your attention to the problem described in this  WIS-TV article  about flooded homes in Coatridge and Sterling Pond subdivisions off Rimer Pond Road? I was surprised by this line in the article: " According to Richland County, the HOA is responsible for neighborhood drainage. " Newly constructed homes in Blythewood flooded after stormwater drainage ... Some homeowners in one Blythewood neighborhood are in uproar over what they said are drainage issues in their ba... My first guess was that the responsibility fell only with the Developer or maybe the County Zoning for failing to identify the flood risk. It seems a real stretch to include the HOA. May I suggest that the Board task a Director with researching whether the Summit's HOA has any similar unidentified liability?

The following is an open letter to the Voting Members of the 28 Neighborhoods of the Summit's HOA. Do you believe that the Directors, Officers and Voting Members should comply with the By-Laws of the HOA? Will you attend the Special Meeting of Voting Members this week? The HOA's President and Secretary should attend the meeting. Other directors should not. The President conducts the meeting. The Secretary keeps the records of the meeting and prepares the Minutes. But remember - it is YOUR meeting. The President is there to conduct it in accordance with the published Notice; it is not HIS meeting. The HOA's Secretary should establish that each Voting Member is actually a  legitimate  Voting Member, elected in compliance with the By-Laws. I suggest that you take your Neighborhood's documentation with you to the meeting. Did you have a Neighborhood Meeting within the past 12 months? Was a quorum (1/3) of your property owners present in-person or by proxy? The first order o...

A poster on NextDoor commented that she thought that she (in Indigo Springs) had a Voting Member. She doesn't. Several years ago I spoke with Eric Tilley, who then was listed as the Voting Member. He was a smart guy and had the interests of his Neighborhood in mind. When I checked old copies of The Summit Scoop, I found Eric's name last listed as Voting Member in the December 2022 Scoop. It's not there in January 2023, and the Indigo Springs Voting Member position is listed as "Open". There are 141 homes in Indigo Springs. No homeowner in Indigo Springs is represented before the HOA's board of directors! I can understand why the board in January 2023 didn't see that his spot was filled. But why hasn't the board since November 2023 done anything about helping those 141 homeowners to gain representation? There are three other Neighborhoods listed as "Open"- another 346 homeowners without representation. This means that 487 (141+346) properties...

On July 13 I filed a complaint about the Summit's HOA with the South Carolina Department of Consumer Affairs (SCDCA). The HOA's office had failed to response to three questions from me. On August 5 the SCDCA received a response, written by a "Community Success Coordinator", presumably at the CAMS home office in North Carolina. Complaint 1 was that the HOA office had not responded fully, when I asked how many homes (properties) were in each of the 28 Neighborhoods of the Summit's HOA. The CAMS answer was, in part, "The figure provided by the Property Manager is correct. 2480..." The problem? While part of her answer was correct, it wasn't true. The first answer from the HOA was a list of 27 Neighborhoods that totaled 2,526. Chapelwood had been omitted. The Property Manager didn't provide that answer (2480) to me. I already knew that 2,480 homes are assessed by the HOA. Why was the total 46 over the actual number of properties? The second answer fr...

Should all official records of the HOA be kept at the HOA office? A sixth-grader at Summit Parkway Middle School could answer that question. The answer is, of course, "Yes". But are all official records of the HOA kept at the office? The answer to that question is a resounding "No". For example, where are the Minutes of pre-board meetings? As you might know, pre-board meetings are closed to Members. They are held in secret; they are private. No decisions are supposed to be made at them. But how do you know, if Minutes are not available? All I could learn at the office today is that those records are not at the office. Today I filed a written request, on behalf of an Association Member (homeowner) for the Minutes of the May 28, 2024 pre-board meeting. I was told they are not at the office. They should be! I'll go back on August 16th to read them. I suggested the office should acquire them. Will it? Who has them? The Secretary? The President? The Vice-President? E...

 NO HOA MEETING TONIGHT This is the sign that could have been placed on the front door at the church tonight (and wasn't). Only one person showed up, and she thanked me for letting her know there was no meeting. Why didn't anyone in the office or on the BOD think about the possibility that Members might show up tonight for the regularly-scheduled meeting? It was either in 2023 or 2022 that Angela told me that the office has approximately 1,800 email addresses for the 2,480 homeowners. This means that about 25% of the homeowners did not receive the announcement last week that the meeting was canceled. How bad is the weather at 6:30PM? A nice summer evening's rain is falling.

On July 16, 2024 a complaint that I filed against the HOA with the S.C. Department of Consumer Affairs was accepted for investigation. The HOA has 20 days to respond which, I believe, is August 5. Today. If the Department does not receive a response from the HOA, it will follow up with the HOA by mail and by phone. If it does not receive a reply after the second letter, the complaint will be closed as Unsatisfied. I submitted a follow-up request to the DCA that I wanted the HOA to respond "correctly, truthfully, and completely". Why did I do that? I remembered the response by the HOA in 2023 to my previous complaint, when the board and the office were run by different people. Watch the video at the top of this article to learn more about the complaint process at the S.C. Department of Consumer Affairs.

The August 6th Board of Directors meeting has been re-scheduled to August 13th, 6:30PM. Ever notice how worried people get when "they" tell them something. So there may be rain tomorrow. So what? The church is on high ground. If you are driving and see high water, don't drive through it. Simple enough, right?  You could just put on rain gear, grab your bumbershoot, turn on your headlights, and drive to the HOA meeting.  How will the weather really be on August 6 at 6:30PM?

The August Scoop contains a President's Report. You'll want to read it.  "We are currently in the process of choosing a Safety Committee Chairperson. The process had been delayed due to the illness of our CAT officer. We have several very eligible candidates." Why is that appointment taking so long? The HOA's President has the authority and responsibility to appoint committee chairmen. Why doesn't he just do it? The RCSD CAT officer has absolutely nothing to do with the administration of the HOA. The Safety Committee has no law-enforcement responsibilities or duties. The CAT deputy's involvement is unnecessary. "We are also incorporating a solid foundation for a community wide neighborhood watch program. This program will be of a confidential nature that will not reveal its membership. Only law enforcement will know the contact information and will not make any physical contact unless requested." The HOA has no business being involved in a commun...

The August Scoop announces that the HOA office will be closed on Saturday, August 31, and Monday, September 2, for the Labor Day week-end. Why is the office closed on Saturday? That should be a busy pool day, and homeowners might need their IDs updated. What if there is a problem with a gate fob? Did last year's board of directors "give away the store", when granting days off to CAMS employees? The women who work in the office are not HOA employees. They are employed by CAMS. The contract should have provided for the office to be open and staffed.  Is August 31st a paid holiday for them? Why? The holiday is Monday - Labor Day. If CAMS wants to give its employee a day off with pay, it can do so. But it should provide a trained, capable, competent, knowledgeable, experienced substitute worker. Fall and Winter Hours should begin September 1, not August 31. The HOA got stuck with a two-year contract, signed by the then-President of the HOA, Justin Martin, and the then-Treasur...

14 Gardenhill Drive This fire occurred in the early morning hours of June 25, 2024, just over a month ago. A story in The State newspaper covers it. There are photos and a video with the story. Numerous online stories can be found. Search for "14 Gardenhill Drive fire". This house (14 Gardenhill Drive) is in The Summit, about three blocks east of the office.  Think your homeowners insurance premium is too high? Maybe it's time to sit down with your insurance agent and review exactly what coverage you have. Do you have Replacement Cost insurance or ACV (Actual Cash Value)? Is the replacement cost higher than your home's Fair Market Value (FMV)? FMV is, simply, what a willing buyer would pay a willing seller. What does the HOA require? Must the owner rebuild? How much time is allowed to demolish a total loss? What if the work goes very slowly? How can the HOA speed it up? And what about the 2,399 sq. ft. house that WAS at 13 Gardenhill Drive? It's gone, as in G-O-N...

Take a look at the list of Voting Members published on Page 2 of the August 2024 Scoop . Print Page 2. Think about this, as you look at the name of each Neighborhood. "When was the last Neighborhood Meeting held?" If you think it was more than 12 months ago, place an X through the listing. If you think a homeowner "got signatures" to become the Voting Member, place an X through the listing. If you think the person listed has just held the position for years without a Neighborhood Meeting, put an X through the listing. If the list indicates OPEN, put an X through the name of the Neighborhood. Come to the August 6th Board of Directors meeting and ask why so many names are listed, "as if" they are legitimate Voting Members. The HOA very likely has only one legitimate Voting Member. Barony Place held a Neighborhood Meeting on May 4, 2024, elected a three-member Neighborhood Committtee (as required in the By-Laws, and chose Tracy Manderino as its legitimate Vot...

About ten years ago I came across a question that has served me well. I was attending a series of online workshops offered by Axiogenics. The Central Question was, " What choice can I make and action can I take,  in this moment, to create the greatest net value?" If each member of the board kept in mind that he (or she) represents the Members , the homeowners, would their discussions and actions be handled in a different manner? Directors don't represent the Board; they represent the homeowners . They shouldn't "stick together" or choose up sides. They should do the right thing - all the time.  The Board is not one person's fiefdom. One .person isn't "in charge". While it's true that the Board elects a President, his duties and responsibilities are defined and limited, if not in the By-Laws (which they aren't), then by Robert's Rules of Order . He is not the Supreme Ruler. For example, there are many questions that need answers ...

Is the Board of Directors of the HOA organized? Does anyone know who does what? Or what each officer is supposed to do? Or what a Director who is not an Officer is to do? Right now the Board is short one director. The BOD is supposed to have seven directors. It has six, because Tommy Williams resigned earlier this year. After being appointed to succeed Vernell Butler, Tommy missed two board meetings (February-March), attended two (April-May), and resigned. His resignation has never been announced. The vacancy on the board has never been announced. No successor has been appointed by the Board. Upon information and belief, HOA President Danny Trapp does not want to appoint Tommy's successor. He wants to wait until November, when that term-of-office expires.  That is a poor decision because of the risk of votes on Motions failing. If the board votes and the result is a 3-3 tie, the Motion fails.  The other five directors should want that seventh director. Those five could out-vot...