Barony Place I/Barony Place II

For the third straight year Barony Place held a legitimate Neighborhood Meeting. There are 78 homes, meaning that a quorum is 26. Thirty-three (33) homes were represented in-person or by proxy. The homeowners elected a three-person Neighborhood Committee: Tracy Manderino, George Ellis, and Della Glynn. Then the Neighborhood Committee elected Tracy as the chairperson and Voting Member. Barony Place continues to be the only neighborhood out of 28 that has a legitimate, duly-elected Voting Member. Tracy, George, and Della will serve for 12 months as your neighborhood representatives.

When the Board of Directors of The Summit's HOA meets, there should be no secrets. The Board should be transparent with the Members about what it's cooking up. It should work within the CC&Rs and the By-Laws. The Board was involved in two off-schedule last week - April 22, 2026 and April 23, 2026. What was discussed? Minutes should be written for ALL Board meetings (pre-board, Special-Called, and Regular Meetings). They should be published within one week of the meeting on the HOA's website. The Board has yet to publish the Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Regular Board Meeting. That's the one where the Board President announced that Board Meetings would thereafter be bi-monthly. When did they decide that? Was there a vote? Why didn't they think to ask the Members (homeowners) what they thought? The HOA has held monthly board meetings for many years. Why change that? Minutes should also be written and promptly published for ALL Committee meetings. Since they aren...

Why would a board member wait nearly 12 months to challenge the legitimacy of the Barony Place Voting Member? If you have been reading this blog, you know that I have written that Barony Place has the ONLY legitimate, duly-elected Voting Member - elected in compliance with the By-Laws of the HOA. Why would a board member claim that some (all?) of the proxies at the 2025 Barony Place Neighborhood Meeting were fraudulent? In 2024 I solicited enough proxies that a quorum of homeowners was present at the Barony Place Neighborhood Meeting. In 2025 others and I solicited enough proxies for a quorum. I was not the named Proxy on many of them; some homeowners named a neighbor who attended the Meeting.  The proxies naming me as Proxy were used only to satisfy the requirement of enough homeowners  present to conduct the Meeting. I did not vote them during the election of the Neighborhood Committee. I believed that those present in person should select the three homeowners they wanted t...

Just how bad could the financial condition of the HOA be? The Board of Directors has failed to publish the monthly Financial Operating Results on the HOA's website since August 2025. The Results have not been posted for September 2025, October 2025, November 2025, December 2025, January 2026, and February 2026.  The March 2026 Results should be available at the May 5, 2026 Board Meeting. You can get a copy there, if you arrive early enough. They should have been posted by then on the website, so you would have time to study them and ask questions. Is the Board hiding adverse financial information by not posting them on the HOA's website in a timely manner? If the Board offers an explanation for its failure to post Results, I shall be happy to publish it here.

Your Board of Directors held two meetings last week, and you should inspect (read) the Minutes of both meetings.  The By-Laws give you the right to inspect and copy those Minutes. (Art. VI, §4(a)) On Wednesday, April 22, 2026, the Board met with the ad hoc committee on Governing Documents. On Thursday, April 23, 2026, the Board met with some of the Voting Members. There should be Minutes of both Meetings. The By-Laws (Art. VI, §4(a)) give you (a homeowner/Member of the Association) the right to inspect Minutes of all meetings of the Board and of committees. Why should you do this? A director on the Board is challenging the legitimacy of the 2025 Barony Place Neighborhood Meeting. Barony Place has the only legitimate, duly-elected Voting Member , because our neighborhood complied with the By-Laws. None of the other 27 neighborhoods in the HOA has a legitimate, duly-elected Voting Member. Why is the Board meeting in private with that committee ( which may not even be a legitimate co...

What is your Board of Directors up to? On Wednesday night. April 22, 2026, the Board met with ad hoc committee that is reviewing the Governing Documents.  First of all, there isn't even a legitimate, duly-appointed " ad hoc committee". It's my recollection that Danny Trapp formed it. It was never voted on or approved by the Board of Directors. I believe there is nothing in the Minutes of any Regular Board Meeting about it. No members or chairman were ever mentioned. Therefore, it is not a legitimate committee. My recollection is that the Covenants Committees spent years reviewing the Governing Documents. They were presented twice to the Board. In November 2023 the new board, in response to a question, said that the previous board had not turned over the recommendations for amendments to the new Board. No one asked why not or apparently made any effort to obtain them! My recollection is that Danny Trapp created the ad hoc Committee and said that, after the Board re...

Did you like the "Everybody Be Nice" message from the Board of Directors on April 22? Why didn't somebody from the "Board of Directors" sign her name to it? The email from the office led off with, " After several incidents that have recently occurred,  ..." No examples of "several incidents" were given. That would have been informative. What were they? Who participated? Where did they happen? When did they happen? Did they happen? How many of them involved board members?  Is there a grievance system when the problem is caused by a member of the Board? How do you get a hearing with the Board? The last board meeting was mostly calm and polite. So what did the Board do? It announced that meetings would be bi-monthly. What does a homeowner or resident do, when the office does not response to emails? Emails are great for a paper-trail. My experience is that the trail leads into the office and never comes back out. Did you notice that "Residen...

Who can contact the HOA's lawyer, ask questions, complain, get answers - at HOA expense? Only one board member should be permitted to contact the HOA's lawyer at HOA expense , and that person is the Board President! If anyone else contacts the HOA's lawyer, it should be at that person's personal expense. For example, if the Board Vice-President, Secretary, or Treasurer, or any of the other three directors, contacts the lawyer, they pay for it. They should not run up the HOA's legal bill with their questions. What they should do is ask the Board President to get a legal opinion on a specified topic. Then the President might either do that or ask the full Board if they want her to get a legal opinion - at the HOA's expense. An organization, any organization, cannot afford to have all its directors calling the organization's lawyer and asking questions. A small town in Illinois ran up a huge legal bill with the contracted Town Attorney, after many members of ...

How many of this month's 36 articles (so far) have you read? To find past articles, there are two ways: 1. Click on MORE POSTS at the bottom center of each page of article summaries; or 2. Click on Archive in the left side-bar below my profile. Happy reading. Please forward articles to neighbors, friends, and other Summit residents by clicking on the SHARE icon at the top right and lower-left of each post.

The HOA's April 2026 online Calendar is still completely blank . If there are no meetings of the Board or of any committees, is the HOA out-of-business? Is the Board holding any meetings? Workshops? Special-Called Meetings? Pre-board meeting (April 28)? Did the Activities Committee meet? The Finance Committee? The Modifications Committee? The Covenants Committee? Will the Safety Committee meet? Is a Board Member or Town & Country responsible for maintaining the online Calendar?

Who is liable for the failure of the HOA to post the Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Regular Board of Directors Meeting? post the Minutes of the Special Meeting of the Board of Directors on April 6, 2026? post the Financial Operating Results for  September 2025? October 2025? November 2025? December 2025?  January 2026? February 2026? post the 2026 Approved Budget? post the Minutes of the Annual Meeting of Voting Members on November 18, 2025, at which four directors were "elected"? Is the Board President liable? The Board Vice-President? The Board Secretary? The Board Treasurer? Town & Country Management Company? Who can hold the responsible persons/officers liable? The Voting Members!  This is why it is so important to have 28 legitimate, duly-elected Voting Members, not just one .

What's cooking with the cases filed by Vernell Butler and Michele Rattray against four residents of The Summit's HOA, who also happen to be the board members elected on November 18, 2025. Rattray's case (2026CV4010900304) is virtually identical to Butler's case (2025CV4010405381).  The four residents are Brenda Bryant, Thomas (Jeff) Lummel, Linda Potter, and Angelo Turley-Moore. Butler and Rattray filed their cases pro se . This means they did not have their own lawyers file the cases. The four residents, who are listed in the litigations as individuals, are represented by an attorney for the insurance company of the HOA. They have a first-class attorney who will give them a strong and proper defense. The Defendants' attorney filed a motion to move Rattray's case from the Pontiac Magistrate Court to the Blythewood Magistrate Court. The cases will now both be heard in the Blythewood Magistrate Court on May 5, 2026 at 9:00AM. Butler and Rattray, in their separate ...

I am on the e-mail list of the HOAleaders.com organization and regularly receive information that the Board members of The Summit's HOA should be reading. An upcoming webinar on May 14th is titled: " HOA Board Members and Fiduciary Duties: What You Must Know to Fulfill Your Duty to Your Association and Protect Yourself from Personal Liability" I have written numerous posts about fiduciary responsibility and the potential of exposing themselves to personal liability because of how boards of this HOA operate. The May 14th webinar will cover: The legal definition of a fiduciary—and the real-life risks you face if you're found to have breached your fiduciary duties The specific responsibilities you carry because of your fiduciary duties, including: What it means to act in a "representative capacity" Understanding the "business judgment rule" How to meet confidentiality requirements Tips to help you understand potential conflicts of interest and how th...

How can The Summit's HOA and the Board of Directors avoid being sued? It's really simple. Comply with the CC&Rs, By-Laws, and the published Guides, such as the PRM. Act like you really are one of the homeowners. Be friendly and courteous. Be transparent. Stop doing business in secret. Publish reports (Minutes, financial statements, etc.) on time. Stop recognizing "Voting Members" who were not duly-elected by their neighborhoods. Set up a section on the website for Q&A. When a Member or a resident submits a question, post it and answer it. Many others probably have the same questions. Set up a maintenance and/or project log on the website.  How long are those street lights on the Parkway going to be out? How many more weeks will pass before that light pole (by the hole and the traffic cone) on the Parkway between Timber Crest Drive and Autumn Glen Road is finally re-installed? Running a HOA is not rocket-science. But it's not an after-school club, either. ...

Should Members (homeowners) sue the HOA and the Board of Directors? Why would they do that? The current Board and past Boards have allowed homeowners to be recognized as "Voting Members" who have not been duly-elected by their neighborhoods. If a neighborhood doesn't have a duly-elected Voting Member, that neighborhood is not represented in the HOA. More than ninety-six percent (96.9%) of homeowners (Members) are NOT represented by duly-elected Voting Members. Four neighborhoods (20.9% (518/2480) of the HOA) have no Voting Member at all, legitimate or "recognized". The current Board has never staffed the (HOA's) Neighborhood Committee, the Mission of which is to assist neighborhoods in holding Neighborhood Meeting and elected Neighborhood Committees, which then elect their Voting Member. HOA committees have spent months (over the past four years) talking about amending the CC&Rs and the By-Laws. Without duly-elected Voting Members, neither can be amen...

Here is an important question for the Members (homeowners) of The Summit's HOA. For whom does the management company, Town & Country, work? A. the Members (homeowners)? B. the Board of Directors? Town & Country was "hired" by the HOA. It is contracted by the HOA. Its contract started October 1, 2025. It is paid by the HOA. It works for the HOA; i.e., for the Members of the HOA. But it takes directions from the Board of Directors, or maybe just from the Board President (which is the way it should be). The Board, as a whole, should decide what it wants Town & Country to do (or not to do), but it should be the Board President that directs the Property Manager. With that mind,  When will the Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Regular Board Meeting be posted? When will the Minutes of the April 6, 2026 Special Board Meeting be posted? When will the Financial Operating Results be posted for September 2025, October 2025, November 2025, December 2025, January 2026, February ...

Do you know that there is an online Calendar of HOA meetings and events? Go the the HOA's website at www.summithomeowners.com Hover over RESIDENTS. Click on CALENDAR. Select April. You might contact the Property Manager for the HOA or the Board President to ask why the April Calendar is still blank on April 16. I recall hearing 2½ years ago that the communications with the Members was going to get a badly-needed make-over. Will the HOA survive long enough for that to happen?

Got an opinion about yesterday's email regarding the Spring Yard Sale? The office sent out this email "from the Board of Directors" yesterday. Why would it embarrass itself with this type of message? Dear Homeowners, On behalf of the Board of Directors, we would like to inform you that there will not be a Spring yard sale this year. A decision regarding a Fall yard sale will be considered and communicated at a later date. We appreciate your understanding and cooperation. Sincerely, Board of Directors How many homeowners really care about a yard sale? If homeowners want it, shouldn't the homeowners be active on a sub-committee and not place any work burden on the office or board? What was the stupid registration requirement in the past? Why should they "register" it? Last year's yard sale was April 5. Did they really need to announce that there wouldn't be a yard sale? Couldn't they just have remained silent? The wording doesn't make any sense...

The next Board of Directors monthly meeting is currently scheduled for Tuesday, May 5, 2026. Will it be held as scheduled? Questions for Members to ask: Why did the Board remove Jeff Lummel as Vice-President? Why did the Board replace him with Noel Weatherbee? Did anyone on the Board bother to read Art. IV of the By-Law? Section 3. Removal. Any officer may be removed by the Board of Directors whenever in its judgment the best interests of the Association will be served thereby .   How were the interests of the Association served by that action? Was there a personal agenda at play? Will Minutes of the April 6, 2026 Special-Called Board Meeting be published? Will the Vote on any Motion be recorded by name, to show who voted for and who voted against? How much, in total, did the HOA spend on its illegal litigation against Gus Philpott (me) between December 2024 and January 2026? Why haven't six months of Financial Operating Results been published? What happened to $445,336.86 Ca...

About three months ago I emailed the HOA's office and suggested correcting the spelling of the last name of the RCSD deputy who is the CAT officer for The Summit. Her last name is spelled Gillespie, not Gillepsie. It hasn't been corrected yet, and I'm sending them another suggestion. The description of "CAT Team Officer" is incorrect. CAT is the abbreviation for Community Action Team, so "CAT Team" is redundant. Maybe it's only at the HOA office that they'd say "Community Action Team Team Officer". The April 2026 Scoop still carries Robert Williamson's name as "On-Site Community Manager". Wasn't his last day at the Summit HOA March 4, 2026, the day after the March Board Meeting? The HOA should have an editor of the Scoop who is a homeowner with fine close-reading and editing skills. Is The Summit's HOA getting its money's worth for the $185,000/year being paid to Town & Country for staff? The office hasn...

The April edition of The Summit Scoop was published today. What a joke! Why not just kill it and save time and money? The first joke was the "Manager's Report" (Page 1), which wasn't a "report" at all.  Why didn't the Manager report why the Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Board Meeting have never been published? Why didn't the Manager report why the Financial Operating Results have not been published for September 2025, October 2025, November 2025, December 2025, January 2026, February 2026? Why didn't the Manager provide details on the 85 violations issued by the Covenants Committee? Were any of these for parking on the streets of The Summit? The second joke was the "President's Report", which also wasn't a "report". Why didn't the President report what actions have been taken by the Board after the last Board Meeting on March 3, 2026? Why didn't she report that the Board removed Jeff Lummel as Vice-President and...

The lists of Voting Members on the HOA's website and in The Summit Scoop are false and deceptive. If the lists are to be correct (and they should be), only Barony Place would be listed. The rules for becoming a Voting Member are spelled out in the By-Laws. Each of the 28 neighborhoods is to hold an Annual Neighborhood Meeting. For the Meeting to convene, there must be a quorum of homeowners present in-person or by proxy. A quorum is 1/3 of the homeowners.  Those homeowners elect a three-member (local) Neighborhood Committee. That Committee then elects one of the three as its chairman, who is referred to as the Voting Member. This is the one and only way to become a Voting Member. "Getting signatures" is not a way to become a bonafide Voting Member; yet Boards of Directors have allowed that for years. Those who got signatures are "recognized" as Voting Members, but they are not. The (HOA's) Neighborhood Committee is charged with assisting the neighborhoods to...

Three of the biggest problems for The Summit's HOA are: no legitimate officers no legitimate directors Far too few legitimate Voting Members Problems (1) and (2) cannot be fixed until Problem (3) is fixed. Problem (3) can be fixed in 60 days, without legal help. The solution? Each neighborhood needs to hold a Neighborhood Meeting. The Meeting needs to be attended by a quorum of homeowners, in-person or by proxy. A quorum is one-third.  At that Meeting the homeowners elect three to a (local) Neighborhood Committee. (Not to be confused with the HOA's Neighborhood Committee.) The Committee serves for one year, until the next year's neighborhood election. Then the three-person (local) Neighborhood Committee elects a chairman. That chairman is the Voting Member. Duly-elected and legitimate. (It's not a lifetime appointment, if the neighborhood never has another Meeting.) The other two members of the (local) Neighborhood Committee are Alternates.  The next step is for the le...

Here are additional tasks that the Board President could assign to the Board V-P. Determine and report to the Board and to Members why Financial Operating Results have not been posted to the HOA's website for September 2025, October, 2025, November 2025, December 2025, January 2026, and February 2026. Determine and report to the Board and to Members why the Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Board Meeting were not published promptly on the website. The Minutes should have been typed up on March 4 and distributed to Board Members that day. If three days were allowed for Board Members to review them and provide corrections, then the Minutes could have been published on Tuesday, March 10. They are not posted as of April 8. Prepare a spreadsheet of legitimate, duly-elected Voting Members, listing Name of each Neighborhood Date of last Neighborhood Meeting Number of properties in the Neighborhood Number of Members required for quorum Number of Members attending in-person and by proxy; Whethe...

Here's another task that the Board President could assign to the Board Vice-President. Investigate the litigation that was filed against resident Gus Philpott in December 2024. Ascertain  by what authority then-Board President Danny Trapp initiated the legal action;  why the Board did not vote to approve it;  whether Trapp knew that the CC&Rs prohibited the litigation;  whether Trapp informed the full Board of the likelihood of success with the litigation;  whether Trapp informed the full Board of the estimated cost of the litigation;  whether Trapp directed that only he (and possibly one other director) were permitted to contact the HOA's lawyer; what source of funds would be used to prosecute the litigation; Whether the full Board was informed of its failure to obtain three of the six restrictions against Philpott that were sought in the February 11, 2025 court hearing; Whether the full Board was informed when Philpott prevailed against the Associatio...

William Hill and Noel Weatherbee are not legitimate, duly-appointed Board Members of The Summit's HOA, and Weatherbee cannot be Vice-President. None of the other directors or officers is a legitimate, duly-elected director or officer. The process of their appointments to the Board was never clear. The Minutes of the July 1, 2025 Board Meeting carry this line on Page 2: " The new board members were introduced: William Hill, Treasurer and Noel Weatherbee, Secretary. " Two vacancies on the Board arose in May 2025, when LaToya Adams and Ciara Bates resigned from the Board. Adams had been Treasurer, and Bates had been Secretary. The HOA had no Treasurer or Secretary for approximately 45 days, even though both officers are required by State law. (Did anyone on the Board move money around during those 45 days? Was it done with Board approval and by Resolution?) How did Hill and Weatherbee come to be appointed? When were they appointed? They should have been appointed at a Regul...

The Association has set a record for updating its stale website. Late Monday afternoon Noel Weatherbee was elected Vice-President of the Board. By today (Wednesday) the Board Members' section of the website has already been updated to show "Vice-President" after her name! How in the world did that happen so quickly? The HOA has not published monthly financial reports since August 2025. The reports for September 2025, October 2025, November 2025, December 2025, January 2026, February 2026 are languishing on someone's hard drive, but there must be no time to publish them on the website for Members to read. The April 2026 Summit Scoop hasn't been published yet (as of April 8). The Minutes of the March 3, 2026 Board Meeting have not been published. The 2026 Approved Budget has never been published. But somebody thought it was so important to add "Vice President" to her name without delay. How did that happen?

When will the Minutes of the April 6, 2026 Special Board of Directors Meeting be available? Will the Minutes include the required Notice of the Meeting? Who was present? Who was absent? Was Jeff Lummel present during the entire discussion or was he excluded? If he was excluded, how was that decided? By Motion and vote? What was the Motion by which Noel Weatherbee was elected to be Vice-President, replacing Jeff? Will the Minutes include details of the discussion?  Who voted in favor? Who vote against? By-Laws, Art. VI, §4(a).  (a)  Inspection by Members and Mortgagees.  The Declaration, By-Laws and Articles of Incorporation, any amendments to the foregoing, the rules and regulations of the Association, the membership register, books of account, and  the minutes of meetings of  the Members,  the Board , and committees  shall be made available for inspection and copying by any  holder, insurer or guarantor of a first Mortgage on a Unit,  M...

Generally, a Vice-President of a HOA doesn't have anything to do. The VP just sits around, waiting for the President not to be available. That won't happen in The Summit's HOA. Board President Brenda Bryant is working hard to be on top of everything. Here's a job that Brenda could assign to Noel Weatherbee, the Board's new VP as of 4/6/26. Give her something to do - to keep her busy - to find out whether she can do something right... Assign this task to her. Find out what happened to $445,336.86 of the HOA's Cash & Cash Equivalents between 1/31/25 and 1/31/26.  Task her with examining and recording every transaction from each of the various cash accounts, including the dates of the transactions, who made them, who authorized them, and on what dates (before the transactions) the Board of Directors approved them. Then trace where the money went. Require her to approach the transactions as if there was a problem with each one and not to just gloss over details ...