Do we or do we not have renters in our Village?

This is addressing the Rental Department to which we Village owners subsidize. In our last Board meeting our general manager twice mentioned he didn’t know why rental numbers were down but guessed it was due to gas prices. Twice Director Steffensen said based on the number of renter wristbands sold to use our cement pond, the Village renter numbers were not down; they were just not going through our rental department.
This leads me and others to ask the following questions. Do we have a general manager on top of this department? Does he know and plan for the future situations and implement new policies for such? Are he and Aramark not being paid to run this Rental Department as if it were a business instead of a babysitting job? Should not our general manager be at least knowledgeable at the approximate number of renters entering our Village? Did we hear past excuses for 2005, 2006, and 2007?
Did not the majority of the 2006 Rental Program Committee determined our rental department should be closed until Director Burke explained her dubious findings to the board that showed our Village would lose twice as much money if this closing were to occur?
Does not our Declaration clearly state that our rental department is to have exclusive rights. Whose job was it to make certain this was adhering to?
To add, our Village was on KGBT 4 Action News twice yesterday. They interviewed a lady whose family’s 4th of July holiday was ruined solely from the actions of LIV’s rental department. Our management chose not to explain their side to channel 4, but instead told them to leave.
Do you wish to express yourself?

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I wonderin if thar's catfish in our cement pond?

It should be to nobody’s surprise that yesterday, July 15, 2008; our outdoor pool once again was closed due to water problems. Two weeks ago it was closed down when it was pond scum green and tested to have absolutely no chorine for water sanitation. A week ago we had five days of heavy rain so there were no bathers and lots of fresh water. On my day off from work yesterday I wanted to enjoy our facility and noticed the water was not looking quite right. I tested it before jumping in and I’m glad I did. No chorine registered again. I dropped the idea of using the pool and went to use the outdoor hot tub. Well it didn’t look right either. I found out the filtration pump was not operating. Not to make a fuss I went to use the indoor facility and while the water appeared ok, the tiles bordering the pool and spas had a thick dark filmy crud line. I called maintenance after using the indoor facility and turned in the problems about the outdoor facility. After an hour and a half without a response I decided to bothered our pools monitor. To her credit she immediately left the pool area towards maintenance to solve the situations. Within fifteen minutes we had Armando’s assistant Gino and Tony the plumber there. That was followed soon after with the appearance of Armando and the general manager. They close the outdoor pool until its water correction.
I went today and the outdoor pool and hot tub were opened and the water appeared considerably better. A person swimming in the outdoor pool asked the pool monitor if anyone had turned in that one of the pool lights was dangling out of its socket. The monitor told this person that she had told them (maintenance) several times, and promptly left to find Leo who works pool cleanup and light maintenance. This guy does work hard. Within 25 minutes the light, which had been out of its socket for well over month, was reattached. I think after seeing what our monitor can accomplish, I'd might hire her to manage the pool facility.
I feel we should question management on why we are paying Berry Pools nearly a grand each month for the last year to assure us the proper combination of pool chemicals are being administered and that they are on top of this by supposedly monitoring the chemical readings every two hours that should avoid these continuous dangerous situations. What’s your thought?

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Hey Pa! I'm gonna take me a dip in the cement pond!

We seem to now have our own cement pond right here in our Village. Last Monday, June 30th, the water in the outdoor pool once again got cloudy and by Tuesday it was pond scum green. Our Board of Directors was sold on the idea to give Berry Pools $10,000 a year to do what our management seemed incapable of doing, and this still happens. Berry's original proposal said they would monitor the water at two hour intervals.

It will be interesting to hear what caused the problem.
I hope this information that was put on the "pool close" sign posted on the activity center’s front door was not the same person in charge of our Village pools. Even the worse pool tech knows you don’t adjust the PH with shock.

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A PROBLEM SOLVED

It appears the Directors won’t mouse around with our Meeting Minutes. Director Mulch came up with a simple remedy at the last Board meeting. He’ll e-mail the minutes to each B-member and they in turn will e-mail back any corrections. This will eliminate the repeated editing and copying that Director Mulch had to do. This was a great idea on his part. This also keeps from eliminating any of the content spoken at our Board meetings which was the original thought to do. I'm sure every owner who reads the minutes in the LIV newsletter will be delighted to hear that nothing has been changed. They can still stay abreast of the happenings in our Village.

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DIRECTORS MEETING 6/25/2008

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

ROLL CALL

OWNERS SPEAKING: Jose Guerra at lot #779 had concerns about the comment of having so many Spanish channels LIV’s cable TV. He said the Hispanic owners are people and their money is just as green. Mr. Guerra had questions about our general manager’s evaluation meetings. Our president started to explain but was interrupted by the director Burke who laid her lengthy interpretation of the procedures of the evaluation process. Mr. Guerra’s third concern was about owners using LIV equipment and argued why only one owner is allowed to use Park equipment. The fourth concern was directors using the July cancellation of the board meeting as a way of manipulating by-law rules.
OWNERS SPEAKING: Betty Woodward lot #226, who lived in LIV for 28 years, gave our general manager praise and asked if we are trying to become a volunteer run park, This lead to a couple of the directors commenting and then having our president state there will be a future committee formed to look into the next management contract and see if we can get some good deals with concessions from Aramark, and also explore other avenues. We will look at dollar for dollar, service for service. He said the two who we have ready to serve on this committee are Director Burke and Director Steffensen. This started a series of board members questioning President Sullivan. Director Burke appeared more than just ready to serve. She seemed already in charge when stating that she would like to have Director Steffensen on the committee along with people from our Village. She recommend to the board to have four Village volunteers not associated with the board. Director Dodson requested having the board to first vote for this committee and then vote to who is to be on such a committee. The President seemed dismissive towards her request so Director Dodson volunteered to be on the committee. Director Burke immediately voiced stridently her displeasure by such an offer, quoting a list of reasons. The chairman was summoned that Director Burke was out of order. This ended without being finalized.
PRESIDENT’S REMARKS: Our president read a letter which was not read at the Coffee w/ Directors meeting. This owner wrote that a director had lied to him and wished for him to resign. If he did not, the owner would take legal action against that director for fraud. This owner also added that others should be recalled including the one reading this letter. He made a negative comment about another director’s background and more. If our president mentioned this person’s name, I didn’t hear it.
GENERAL MANAGER’S REPORT: Our G.M. talked for over twenty minutes before he did Armando’s report because he was being checked out at the hospital. Later Armando called to say he was OK. He also covered for Les who was not present because his car was broken down in Donna. Our general manager said the rentals were down and could only guess it was due to gas prices. He said last year we did real well. Director Steffensen informed him that she believes we had plenty of renters but they're not going through the Rental Dept. Our general manager agreed and said that it seems to be getting more and more like that.
**He said while he had the stage, our general manager wanted to make something very clear to the board. He explained it was said from the previous meeting there were no managers on duty Memorial Day weekend. He said that was not quite true. He explained he was here. He said Armando was also here day and night. He said there was an incident which proved that all three managers were here on that weekend. He repeated by saying he was there a half a day on Sunday and Armando was there the whole weekend. He said I will assure you we will always have a manager on location here and especially on holiday weekends. He said he didn’t know where this information came from, but the fact was that all three of us were there. Director McBride spoke up and said that this originated from him because the hot tub was closed down and he wanted some information about it. He went to both the Welcome and Activity centers and was told there were no managers on duty. This started questions from other directors asking about what time did this happen, who told him and so forth. When it became apparent that no Manager at that time was actually on duty, our general manager interrupted and wished to clarify what he had made clear earlier in saying there is no manager really on duty, per say, on the weekends, but we are on call.
**The general manager said that the Dept. of Public Safety came out on three different occasions to visit our gate attendants and found no problems. It was asked if the gate attendants were given a name in which to identify any of these three DPS representatives and our general manager said no.
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Was approved.
TREASURER’S REPORT: Director Steffensen as usual did a great job expressing her report. Every Center (Village Grill, golf course, rental, and laundry) except the newsletter was down a total of about $34,000 from last year.
COMMITTEE REPORTS
D&E: Director Dodson said July 12th Karaoke will have one dollar root beer floats. At the end of July there will be a HIT PARADE.
GOLF: President Sullivan said using the golf carts for shade was great and the honor system for after 5pm golf has been good.
POOL COMMITTEE: Director Steffensen said from May 15th through June 15th we had 830 renters who acquired wrist bands for the use of our pools and spas. Again she expressed this shows that we had a large amount of renters here. She said the gazebo hot dog get together was a success and will soon have another.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Status of Licensed Security Company Meeting: Director Dodson said letters were sent to 14 Licensed Security Companies ranging from Brownsville to McAllen. Director Burke intervened and said there was a letter that a member of the Security Committee asked to be read. This letter complained about me giving my input which was requested by Director Dodson. My intention was only to help and not hurt anyone’s feelings. It appeared that Director Burke and another director had a problem with not having the opportunity to give their contributions. The dialogue from Director Burke seemed quite odious. Director Dodson finished by asking the two remaining Security Committee members if they were completely satisfied with what the committee had accomplished. Both responded without hesitation with a yes. President Sullivan addressed this issue as to be resolved later.
Status of Time Warner: Director Dodson said our attorney is in the process doing the contract with Time Warner.
Other: Director Burke said she had issues of board members violating the motion made with regarding the evaluation committee. Director Burke said Director McBride violated a passed motion by sending negative comments to Mr. Polo at Aramark without first submitting them to the board. Director McBride’s rebuttal was he never bypassed the board. He always turned in every item as instructed, including the ones passed on to Mr. Polo. Director Burke said the evaluation committee had never received these comments. This went on for some time until it was found that these comments were given to the Board President, and from a mix up there they were not passed on to the evaluation committee. The Board President was asked if members of the board were not allowed to communicate with Aramark. Director Burke started quoting the evaluation motion that was passed when President Sullivan intervene by restating the original question and said he did not know of any reason why a director can not talk to Aramark.. Director Burke said why have evaluation committees, if board members are going to undermine its content. Director McBride said that Mr. Polo from Aramark had told board members that he had never known of any complaints. Director McBride felt he should be advised of situations and informing him has nothing to do with the board’s evaluation process or would undermine it.
**Our general manager spoke up and wanted to know why he had not seen the 2007 evaluation. He asked why Director Young had not attended the evaluation meeting. He asked why Director Dodson was attending. He declared that Director Dodson was to be Director Mulch’s alternate. He said he wanted to know where he stood. President Sullivan said the 2007 evaluation was delayed because you Larry would not accept Director Young’s evaluation and Director Young would not rescind his opinions. President Sullivan gave our general manager choices on how his evaluation was to be calculated. Several directors immediately said they had a problem with that. Director McBride asked the president if our general manager is evaluating himself and why is he even present during the initial evaluation discussion? Our general manager growl it’s against the law to have an evaluation without the employee being there. Director Burke elucidated that Director Dodson’s was Director Mulch’s alternate. Director Burke then volunteered to be the alternate for Director Young on the evaluation committee to even out in her opinion the pros and cons. Director Dodson made this statement. I was asked to sit in for Mr. Young here, not aware I was making any kind of problem. She said she is still on the fence and does not know how the evaluation is turning out. Director Dodson said she resents being categorized as being pro or con on any subject and said she walks right down the middle to see the full picture. She said she is not pro and she is not con. She tries to see things clearly and be as fair as possible for the betterment of this park. Director Burke argued that point immediately. President Sullivan said even though Director Burke’s feelings may be slanted, he thought she would look at the evaluation objectively.
**I had a hard time at following what Director Mulch was reading at the beginning but it appeared to reflect procedures that were not being followed by directors in the use of management and employees. This was to include their micro managing and that the new board members were being divisive. He commented their differences have seemed to put us in a crisis and wished both sides put down these differences so as to deal with the more important issues facing our park. Director McBride said he and the other new board members were elected because the majority of people saw different things that needed to be changed. We brought those as motions to this board with respect and have not tried to micro manage. I hope that’s not what is considered divisive. We have sat down and discussed issues that were brought to the table and I have supported you on this board. I believe we are not being divisive and should at the very least be given a chance. Director Mulch said we have members on the board who are not acting like board members and I have proof they are not acting like board members. They should start acting like board members instead of going off on their own little way. That’s it!
**Director Dodson said I am glad you used the word we so as to include all board members. I’m getting sick of hearing how bad the four new board members are doing. We are actively doing many things in trying to better our park. Providing a new cable network, a committee for new security, improving our golf course, and evaluation of our current management? We have only been appointed for four months. I feel it’s not right for these board members to bombard us at every meeting about what we have done that was so wrong. Not to mention the “no name” hate mail received from a few owners to whom I feel sorry for. She said it takes all nine of the board members to want to work together. It was asked how this hate mail gets back to the private mail boxes.
**Our general manager said if you want to make a motion to have your mail delivered to your door, we’ll do that.
**Director Dodson said there was a past motion already In effect to have any unauthorized mail requiring a signature. One senior board member said that was five years ago. There was a question if Director’s Young phone number and address were correct in the directory.
NEW BUSSINESS
Employee Fuel Cost Crisis: Director Steffensen said this is to affect 41 hourly Aramark employees. A 50 cents raise would result paying $3,280 a month plus a labor burden of $618 a month totaling $3,898. Six months would equal $29,382. This would result with a $58,782.increase for 2009 and would raise everything across the board. A gas credit was suggested for about half as much with a two month later evaluation. Director Burke made a motion to provide for the months of July and August the 41 hourly employees would receive a $50 a month gas credit. There was some discussion, a lecture by Director Burke about her opinion on economics, with some disapproval from owners in the audience saying this is treating the employees like they are children.
**Our general manager wanted to know where this idea of giving employees more money came from. He stated that no employee approached him on wanting more money because of gas. Our Board President said the idea came to him when talking with an employee at Whataburger in Brownsville. Again our general manager said nobody asked him about a raise. We were again blessed with two more short economic lectures from Director Burke and what she thought her paramount duties to the park were. In the end the motion was changed to be a HEB credit to also include food. It was approved.
Cancelling July Board Meeting: Director McBride made a motion to cancel the July regular board meeting. After Director Burke requested and received a list of which directors will be here that July month, it was approved.
Fence Removal and Replacement: Director Burke made a motion to notify Mr. Freeland that LIV wishes not to remove the current fence, and if he removes it, he must replace it with a same or better one. It was approved.
Audit Committee: Have five members on the committee. The committee will meet with management one day each month for four months starting in August. It will audit one center per month.
Golf Cart Control: Director Mulch wanted to have it written that carts can only be operated by or accompanied by a person with a valid license. The cart will not be allowed to accommodate more passengers than it can seat. No standing on the back or sides will be allowed. This form is to be given to our patrol staff to show this is a rule to the cart operator when enforced. Director Mulch made the motion to accept this and it was passed.
“Suggestion Box Records”: Director McBride made a motion to email the records to the membership. A motion was also that the minutes be email for review to make it easier for corrections. Both were passed.
Safety Committee: Director McBride made a motion to form a safety committee. It was approved by the Board President without the motion.
Board Action-Emergency Modular Housing: Director Sullivan asking to give the board special powers to allow modular homes in case of a disaster. This ended with having our attorney to look at our current by-laws, plus researching what new park models hurricane ratings are and what may be future requirements?
Other: Bids for bath house one is still open. Drop off at welcome centers. These will have three individual bathrooms in the bath house. Director Burke made a motion to set a time limit on bids and other qualifications too quick for me to get. It was approved.
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