Dues increase coming your way

Be sure to read the President's Report on Page 1 of the July 2025 Summit Scoop.

It reads, in part, 
"We are also in the process of addressing an emergency breach in the dam.  We are expending a great deal of funds to address this emergency and satisfy DEHEC’s oversight.  This is becoming a costly project that will impact our finances. 
"It has been determined that, based on our current expenditure and the future financial pending obligations, it will be necessary to raise our regime fees by $25.00 each six month period,  for a total of $50 annually."

By the way, somebody should tell Danny that it's DHEC, not DEHEC.

And does Danny mean an increase of $25.00 every six-month period? So, $50.00 in 2026, and $50.00 in 2027, and $50.00 in 2028, etc.? He's not clear, is he?

Danny Trapp must have forgotten that the Finance Committee requested a $50.00 increase in the 2025 Assessment in October 2024. That was rejected in a pre-board meeting, causing the Finance Committee to re-work the budget and cut out $124,000.

The budget was called "balanced", but it wasn't. Line 5111 is the Irrigation Contract, which is $10,140/month ($121,680/year). But only $75,000 was budgeted! Now the HOA must spend $46.680 that was not in the budget!

The repairs to the dam (one of them) will be paid out of Reserves, not out of Operations. But the 2025 Budget puts only $3,000 into Reserves. And the contribution to Reserves in 2024 was Zero!!! Compare that with $163,965 that was budgeted for Reserves in 2020.

A $25.00 increase in Assessment in January 2026 and then another $25.00 in July 2026 is nowhere near enough. Work should start soon on the 2026 Budget. 

Will William Hill follow the PRM and develop the Expense Budget first? And then develop the Income Budget? 

Will Hill recommend a $50.00 Assessment increase in January  2026 and another $50.00 in July 2026? That second $50.00 will require the approval of the Voting Members, and there aren't enough legitimate, duly-elected Voting Members to vote on it. The HOA can fix this problem by getting to work on it now.

Comments, anyone?

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