December 2017 – SCA Strong

The cautionary tale of the City of Bell

What we can learn from The City of Bell Scandal

The Bell scandal involved the misappropriation of public funds in Bell, California, United States over a period of several years in the first decade of the 21st century. In July 2010, the Los Angeles Times published an investigative article on possible malfeasance in the neighboring city of Maywood, revealing that the city officials of Bell received salaries that were reported as the highest in the nation.[1] Subsequent investigations found atypically high property tax rates, allegations of voter fraud in municipal elections and other irregularities which heightened the ensuing scandal.[2] These and other reports led to widespread criticism and a demand for city officials to resign.[3][4]

In the end, seven Bell city officials, including former mayor Oscar Hernandez, former city administrator Robert Rizzo, assistant city administrator Angela Spaccia, and four city council members were convicted on graft and corruption charges, and were given sentences ranging from probation to twelve years in prison.[5] – Wikipedia City of Bell Scandal

In order to pull this scam off, step one was to conduct a fraudulent election to become a charter city so controls on salaries imposed by the state would no longer apply. The voters were poor and 90% Latino which made them easy marks. The City Council gave themselves salaries and so they turned a blind eye when the Manager authorized excessive compensation to the Attorney, Police Chief and other top managers Manager Rizzo’s salary during the final year of the scam was $1.5 million, five times what the L.A. country executive earned. Rizzo was unapologetic for years, falsely claiming he could have made that amount in the private sector.

Could that happen at SCA? Or does SCA have adequate internal controls to prevent such corruption?

Let’s see, how would we know if adequate protections are in place?

The Board, GM and attorney claim that unit owners cannot access information needed to evaluate the adequacy of internal fraud prevention controls. They put lipstick on this pig by claiming it is their fiduciary duty to keep confidential whatever they say is confidential – even if there are specific provisions in the law that prohibit SCA records being withheld by SCA agents from owners or individual members of the Board.

It is an abuse of privilege to demand that routine business correspondence/emails or training sessions must be treated as “confidential”. To prevent owners from knowing about these Board or GM actions that are supposed to be exclusively for the benefit of the owners violates both the spirit and the letter of the law.

It’s particularly troubling when the attorney gives the bizarre interpretation of SCA bylaws 6.4c to falsely claim that the attorney has the authority to restrict an individual Board member from inspecting ANY SCA records. While I was a Board member, I was ORDERED to stop asking questions about GM compensation and denied access to ANY SCA documents until they were partially released a month after I was kicked off the Board on false charges.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out why concealing records from a Board member who is trying to ascertain the adequacy of fraud prevention controls looks a little suspicious.

Excessive secrecy is a giant red flag.

Owners have a right to know:

Does SCA pay extraordinarily high executive salaries without using a process that would justify them as a rebuttable assumption?
Have there been failed attempts to remove elected officials followed by allegations of election interference by the highly compensated GM?
Are board actions taken in secret without tolerating any owner involvement?
Do SCA agents make policy decisions which NRS and SCA bylaws prohibit the Board from delegating?
Has the system for owner oversight been decimated under Self-Management?

My conclusions

Prior Boards should be congratulated for the excellent start toward a good governance system that they accomplished by the creation of the Board Policy Manual. It’s tragic that the current Board President led the Board away from the simple task of following it.

As a result, SCA is now swinging without a net. We do not have a fair and open system. Owners must be involved to strengthen the system so the rules apply equally to us all and the rules protect us all equally. And we certainly don’t need an attorney to charge us $325/hr to tell us how to do it wrong.

It is a waste of time to keep bickering over whether the individuals on the Board are corrupt or not. It is enough to say that the Board is not exercising enough competent control over SCA’s agents to adequately protect owners from the negative consequences of their actions, intentional or not.

Make your vote count

We simply need to elect people who are willing to be trained to ensure that a governance system is established that is transparent, FAIR, and strong enough to protect owners no matter who is in charge. This process cannot simply be delegated to the GM for a “recommendation”.

But, even if it such delegation were appropriate, the GM has not demonstrated that she would have the necessary leadership or analytical skills to lead an inclusive, collaborative process to a satisfactory conclusion that meets the needs of the SCA membership.

Is SCA Board protecting owners from scams?

Owner oversight, the bedrock of good HOA governance, has been decimated by this Board

SCA Board has gone a step further than just emasculating owner oversight by committees. It has also developed a self-righteous strategy to delegitimize ALL owner complaints about Board members, the attorney, and the GM (performance, pay, and recall election interference).

Their claim,

“It’s just CAVE (Complainers About Virtually Everything) people”,

has worked well for the Board (kept the majority in power). But, there is a huge downside. Marginalizing a large segment of the community has not been good for SCA as a whole and has divided the community into factions.

SCA Board refuses to listen to both sides of the story and acts according to their own spin

The Board puts the entire SCA community at risk by arrogantly ignoring well-substantiated complaints simply because they don’t agree with the complaint, or don’t like the person who complained. They’re not doing their job if they don’t address these issues fairly:

Paying the GM $100,000+ over the market rate for the job without having done any due diligence;
Allowing the GM to compensate at least two other managers double the going rate for their jobs;
Refusing to allow ANY owner oversight of personnel matters;
Having no system for GM accountability – no management agreement, no performance standards, no salary survey or bonus criteria, no spending limits, no insurance requirements, no written terms & conditions of employment;
Allowing the GM & attorney to unfairly influence the recall election in their favor;
Abdicating control of the budget to highly compensated agents;
Blaming the recall proponents for the GM expending $85,000 for an incompetent execution of the petition counting and ballot distribution/collection which benefitted at least one Board member unfairly;
Making unbudgeted expenditures of more than $150,000 in six months over the normal budget for Legal Services which is in conflict with NRS and SCA bylaws provisions as well as defies good common sense.

The Board either has refused to respond AT ALL to these issues, or worse, has used SCA official communications (as well as its sympathetic blogger) to viciously attack whoever speaks up about these Board failures to properly govern.

Worse still, the attorney enables the Board’s dysfunctional (lack of) response to owner complaints by wrongly advising that the Board and the GM don’t have to answer.

Good governance = a fair and open system

Good governance depends on a fair and open system that SCA has yet to develop.

Good governance can best (and perhaps only) be guaranteed if there is a transparent system of checks and balances to prevent fraud, errors, and omissions.

Owner oversight is the bedrock of a good governance system in any public agency or in any non-profit corporation like SCA is. Owners (like taxpayers or donors) are ultimately responsible for footing the bill.

Agents and elected officials are there to serve the owners and not the other way around.

SCA Board, GM and attorney have a lot to learn before they can claim SCA has a system of good governance. They act as if SCA agents and the Board are co-equal branches of the association/government and that the owners are like wards of the court. This is nuts.

What if you contracted with a Realtor to sell your house, and he refused a great offer without telling you? What if he failed to disclose a relationship with a different potential buyer that he was pushing? I imagine you’d fire him and get somebody that would work SOLELY to get you the best deal.

It’s the same with SCA agents. It is their duty work SOLELY and EXCLUSIVELY in the best interest of the SCA membership. It is unlawful for them to put their self-interest before the best interests of the owners, but it’s a little harder to see what’s going on if the Board is helping (even if unwittingly) the agents to act in ways that are not the best for the owners.

It is a major failure of the Board’s duty of care to the membership to abdicate, i.e., just hand over to SCA agents independent authority, power and rights over SCA policy and our wallets that neither you nor I would so cavalierly hand over to agents in our personal lives.

Clark County Manager’s raise gets her almost to Sandy Seddon’s pay

The Review Journal just published an article about the Clark County Manager’s performance evaluation and pay increase:

Updated December 20, 2017 – 6:15 am

Clark County Manager Yolanda King will receive a $5,200 raise to her annual salary.

County commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to increase King’s pay during their first annual review of her as the county’s top employee. The raise is 2 percent of King’s current $260,000 base salary.

King also received a 3 percent bonus worth $7,200.

Commissioners conducted the evaluation during a public meeting and lavished King with praise.

How does SCA Board justify paying $257,500 + $20,000 bonus for managing an annual operating budget of under $10 million for 7,144 rooftops? Compare that to the $265,200 + $7,200 bonus paid to the Clark County Manager paid to oversee a $5.9 Billion budget serving a population of 2.1 million residents and 45 million annual visitors?

Maybe the complete lack of justification for her excessive compensation is why they insist on keeping Sandy Seddon’s performance standards secret. Does anyone know if she was given another bonus this year after 836 residents gave her a failing grade for customer service?

Excessive compensation + secrecy = inappropriate loyalties

It’s a small wonder that the GM protects the Board incumbents as if her job depended on it.

Hello, recall election interference!

And a little help for her friends…

Don’t forget that the Board’s refusal to allow appropriate owner oversight of the personnel management and compensation systems under self-management has also allowed her to pay two other managers double what their jobs are valued in this market.

CFO Jim Orlick is paid over $190,000. Compare his compensation for shock value to the much, much bigger Clark County CFO/Comptroller job which has a pay range that tops out at just under $180,000.

The other SCA job pay that is totally out of line is the Facilities Manager position which was paid $154,000 and who knows what it is going to be in January.

Don’t get me started on the unnecessary staffing with both a GM and a CAM for our tiny organization…

Refusing to allow competent owner oversight of employee compensation is a big failure of the SCA Board’s duty of care.

Clark County is an ocean liner to SCA’s row boat

Clark County is committed to providing a high quality of life for its more than 2.2 million residents. That means providing a broad range of regional services countywide, including the nation’s 9th-busiest airport, air quality compliance, social services and the state’s largest public hospital, University Medical Center. The county also provides municipal services that are traditionally provided by cities to almost 952,000 residents in the unincorporated area. Those include fire protection, roads and other public works, parks and recreation, and planning and development.

The County Manager’s Office is responsible for the executive oversight of the nation’s 14th-largest county, which provides regional services to more than 2.1 million residents and 45 million visitors annually and municipal-like services to 954,000 residents in the unincorporated County. The county manager is Yolanda King, who, in her position as the County’s chief executive officer, is charged with carrying out the policies established by the seven-member County Commission.

King and her staff are responsible for the fiscal management of the County’s $5.9 billion budget and provide administrative oversight for 38 diverse and geographically dispersed departments, including McCarran International Airport, the nation’s 9th-busiest, and University Medical Center, the state’s largest public hospital. King is assisted by Chief Financial Officer Jessica Colvin, Assistant County Managers Jeff Wells and Randall Tarr, and Public Communications Director Erik Pappa. – Clark County website

Clark County CFO/Comptroller description

Jessica Colvin was appointed Chief Financial Officer for Clark County, effective December 2016. Prior to this appointment, she was Comptroller, a responsibility she currently maintains. In her dual role as the CFO/Comptroller, Colvin is responsible for administering the County’s $6.2 billion total budget and overseeing the County’s bond program, Risk Management, Budget and Financial Planning, Accounting, Accounts Payable, Central Payroll and Timekeeping, the Automotive Division, Detention Operations and more.

SCA CFO description is unavailable.

Bernie Madoff and how NRED risks being like the SEC

What’s up with the Ombudsman?

Several people have told me that their NRED complaints of GM election interference were summarily rejected without satisfactory investigation or explanation. They feel the rejections were unfair as the complaints were rejected for reasons unrelated to the substance of the issue raised.

For example, they reported that NRED did not independently verify the accuracy of the allegation that two pages of valid petition signatures were not counted which caused Bob Burch to be wrongly left off the recall ballot. I was told that NRED’s rationale for the rejection was the unrelated reason that the Ombudsman had validated the vote counting process for the other three directors who were on the ballot.

Limitations of enforcement agencies

We have to educate the NRED investigators on the specifics of the violations alleged in SCA owners’ complaints so investigators can understand the complaints within the context of needed homeowner protections.

We must not get overly discouraged even if it appears there is “zero enforcement” rather than “zero tolerance”. As we’ve seen nationally with response to sexual harassment complaints, that can change in a heartbeat.

NRED has all the problems faced by other enforcement agencies, like you’ll see below were exhibited by the SEC, – an inability to see the forest for the trees. Even if there is no corruption in NRED, they have limited authority, limited funding, and have to balance competing interests between monied stakeholders (attorneys, management companies, debt collectors, etc.) and the people who are supposed to be served (homeowners). NRED’s problems are compounded in Nevada by historic complicity in HOA corruption by attorneys and judges and the fear people have to speak up and be whistleblowers.

But, just as Rana Goodman helped to expose how guardianship abuses depended on complicity between attorneys and judges and unscrupulous public guardians, we have to shine a light on what is happening at SCA because Board/GM misconduct too requires lack of transparency and complicity by legal authorities to be sustained.

Why I am publishing my complaints in full

While I haven’t seen the other owner complaints or the rejection notices they received, this action by NRED raises a red flag for me. So far, I have received no word from NRED about the status of my complaints, but I am not willing to leave NRED’s investigative thoroughness to chance.

In light of this disappointing development, I am going to emphasize the way I use this website to expose evidence substantiating my claims. I am doing this primarily so the allegations and supporting evidence are in a usable format to assist the investigators. I believe that will reduce the chance that my complaints will be dismissed without a full investigation and a fair hearing.

As far as the chance of influencing the beliefs of the readers of this blog, I have low expectations. I don’t believe people who think I deserved what happened to me will easily change their minds, and when you read below about cognitive dissonance, I think you’ll see why.

What happened to me sets a bad precedent for ALL Nevada HOAs.

Kicking me off the Board was based on false and defamatory accusations and was simply a continuation of their retaliation against me for speaking out.

Such flagrant disregard of homeowners’ right to vote and choose who represents them on the Board absolutely cannot be tolerated or ignored.

Throughout my days on the Board, I was harassed, defamed and retaliated against for my having:

recommended that the attorney be terminated,
warned them about the theft and fraud of SCA’s former agents,
requested information about excessive management compensation and for
complained about violations of NRS and SCA governing documents, particularly in the areas of GM/CAM threatening frivolous litigation, abuse of privilege, misuse of attorney, concealing information and recall election interference.

If my removal from the Board is upheld, it will set the unhealthy precedent in Nevada that ANY majority of ANY Nevada HOA Board can remove any HOA Board member whose views they don’t like simply by falsely accusing her and then deeming her position vacant.

Good-bye, due process.
Good-bye, owner control of Nevada HOA.
Hello, unjust enrichment by attorneys and other HOA agents.
Hello, corruption.

Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) let Bernie Madoff’s fake hedge fund grow to over $50 billion over decades despite repeated credible complaints.

Let’s hope NRED is more responsive than the SEC was to warnings and does not allow SCA Board, GM and attorney to act unlawfully in ways which allow SCA agents to be unjustly enriched or which allow a majority of a HOA Board to act unfairly for personal political advantage.

Remember Bernie Madoff?

Probably everyone does. Bernie was the former chairman of the NASDAC securities exchange. He had an impeccable reputation that allowed him to operate a hedge fund that grew over decades to $50 billion by 2008. Although it was a just a low-tech Ponzi scheme, it was successful as an affinity scam among wealthy Jewish communities, Madoff remained untouched by the regulatory Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) for decades.

But you probably haven’t heard of Harry Markopolos, the financial analyst who figured out Bernie Madoff’s fraudulent hedge fund at least a decade before Bernie turned himself in. Marcopolis submitted at least five formal written complaints to the SEC which the enforcement agency failed to investigate.

SEC’s enforcement failure cost victims $50 Billion

Had SEC done its job in 2000 when Markopolos told them Madoff was a fraud, less than $7 Billion would have been lost, and many fewer people would have been victimized. SEC still didn’t listen in 2001 when the fund had doubled. SEC still didn’t listen in 2005 when Markopolos documented 29 red flags on the then-$25 Billion fund. In 2008 as the global economy was in meltdown, and the Madoff fund had ballooned to $50 Billion or more, Bernie turned himself in to spare his family, never having been investigated, much less found guilty, by the SEC.

Markopolos’ book is aptly entitled, “Nobody Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller” as the true story of how the regulatory agency SEC was over-lawyered and using lawyers in areas outside their expertise. SEC, therefore, did not have adequately trained investigators who knew diddly squat about financial markets.

The SEC failed to act repeatedly on Markopolos’ extremely precise directions on what sources to check or what single phone call to make and what question to ask to verify the accuracy of Markopolos’ analysis.

Why didn’t SEC investigate thoroughly? Congressman Gary Ackerman grilled SEC attorneys after Bernie turned himself in to find out why SEC blew off credible complaints for a decade in this interesting CNN clip of the Madoff Congressional hearings.

Ackerman Scolds SEC for Not Stopping Bernie Madoff Scheme Despite Being Warned for 10 yrs

What were they thinking?

Maybe lawyers were the wrong people were doing the job.
Maybe it’s was the financial conflicts of interest regulators had with the industry they were regulating.
Maybe the theory of cognitive dissonance explains why nobody could believe that Bernie Madoff was anything other than he appeared to be.
Maybe Madoff’s reputation was so stellar and everybody was making money, no one wanted to question how he alone could get such stellar returns year after year.
But, whatever the reason, SEC investigators couldn’t see what was right in front of their face.

How does all this about Bernie Madoff and the SEC relate to SCA owner complaints being given short shrift by NRED?

Remember SEC’s failures and expect to find similar problems with NRED investigations.

Remember the SEC’s failure to listen to Harry Markopolos for a decade cost victims $50 Billion, and the SEC attorney still tried to weasel out of it, claiming “executive branch privilege“.

Remember nobody believed Bernie Madoff was running a scam. If you find yourself not believing what I tell you is happening at SCA is true, it might be simply because it is unimaginable, or it might be because it creates a lot of cognitive dissonance to think I might be right.

Remember that, while there are limits on what we can expect enforcement agencies to accomplish, a lot can change if a critical mass of people speak up.

We’ve just seen nationally how the pendulum swings when a tipping point is reached. The way sexual harassment complaints are now addressed has gone from zero enforcement to zero tolerance seemingly overnight.

A critical mass of SCA homeowners must insist that at SCA, there will be zero tolerance of misconduct by SCA Board members or SCA Agents, and zero tolerance of their harassment of, or retaliation against, whistleblowers.

December 7 Board meeting: Part 4 Penny wise, pound foolish

SCA agreed to pay $55,000 to settle dispute over $4,400 delinquent dues

In his President’s report, Rex reported the Release and Settlement of A-14-702071-C. SCA agreed to pay Citi Mortgage $55,000 as full and final settlement of all claims in a case where the homeowner defaulted and so the fight was between SCA and a bank. This is an example of how the Board is very wasteful by not avoiding problems or solving them when they are small. The excessive use of attorneys is a core failing of this Board under Rex.

Rex stated that Citi insisted on confidentiality and so he could not comment further. I seriously doubt that because what I’m going to tell you is in the public record. I happen to be familiar with this case from before I went on the Board. I learned nothing about it as a Board member because I was forced to recuse myself from ANY SCA collection matter “so as to prevent even the appearance of impropriety” regardless of whether it had any bearing on my quiet title case whatsoever.

Long story short.

In 2014, SCA’s agent RRFS refused to accept Citi ’s tender of the $825 super-priority portion of SCA’s lien for delinquent assessments claiming it was less than the full super-priority amount due. After four years of nonpayment of assessments ($275/quarter x 16 quarters = $4,400), RRFS claimed Citi owed $17,591.81. Citi paid it under protest, and RRFS cancelled the SCA foreclosure sale. Citi filed to get $16,766.81 back from RRFS that the NV Supreme Court said it was unlawful to force Citi to pay more than $825, the amount that has “super-priority” over the bank’s loan.

The Court ruled in Citi ’s favor against SCA, a year ago, stating:

“…(SCA’s) position ignores the question presented in this action, whether a homeowners’ association can force a first-security lienholder, or agent acting on its behalf, to satisfy the entirety of its lien, rather than pay the super-priority piece to protect its secured interest. The Court concludes it cannot.”

Even though this overcharging was done by SCA’s former agent’s, SCA was on the hook for it since RRFS was acting on SCA’s behalf. I don’t know why SCA even stayed in the fight. Why didn’t they make RRFS pay it and get out of the litigation years ago? Anyway, SCA deposited $5,000 with the court last December toward the $16,766.81 the Court ordered SCA to pay Citi . Then, Citi demanded $51,000+ in attorney fees and court costs.

Bottom line:

SCA owners are on the hook for $55,000 to settle with a bank over the misdeeds SCA’s former agent in collecting delinquent assessments of less than $5,000.

Wouldn’t writing off $3,575 in delinquent assessments have made more sense?
Or even better, shouldn’t SCA handle assessment collection in house rather than being on the hook for the wrongdoing of unscrupulous attorneys and debt collectors?
Can you see any risk SCA homeowners face by my telling you about all this?
Can you see any way I would profit by sharing this information with owners?

I guess you can see that the real risk is to the attorney’s profits. That’s why attorney Clarkson (SCA’s current legal counsel and debt collector) insisted that I be forced to recuse myself from all SCA collection issues even if they are not remotely connected to my quiet title action.

Cost of collections and fraud by SCA agents are other reasons SCA needs to be (better) self-managed.

Here is another reason SCA needed to go to self-management that Tom didn’t mention and probably isn’t even aware of. FSR was actually unfairly profiting from failing to pay SCA asset enhancement fees and new owner set up fees when there was a foreclosure. This happened twice with my late fiance’s house so it’s a better than even bet that this scam was done when other houses were snatched for a few dollars of delinquent assessments.

October Financial Report

This issue is also connected to a good reason why SCA needs to be self-managed, but also needs to have better control over its agents and managers.

The CFO reported that the revenue from Asset Enhancement Fees are $103,268 over budget. SCA gets 1/3 of 1% of the sale price when a home is sold, and other fees associated with home sales are up a similar amount. This is due to an increase in the number of sales reported to SCA which is, in small part, due to SCA’s former agents not crediting SCA with these fees upon sale of foreclosed properties. Title to my late fiance’s house was transferred three times in country property records, and FSR twice failed to record that SCA was paid any of those fees as if two of those three sales never happened. Those two incidences can’t be the only times that SCA was shorted fees due to us.

I mention this not just because it’s something nobody else would notice, but SCA’s way of handling collections is flawed and when I offered evidence of it, I was seriously and wrongfully attacked. I reported this problem to Lori Martin and Rex Weddle before I decided to run for the Board and they refused to even talk to me about it, let alone assess the degree of loss to SCA. I included it in my court filings in the quiet title case, and our current attorney (who is also SCA’s debt collector) used it as a bogus justification for kicking me off the Board (putting matters before the Board from which I could make a profit) rather than looking at how SCA was getting ripped off by our agents who are supposed to be fiduciaries.

CFO Jim also reported that there are 45 cases in collections with $77,000 outstanding. This is a small amount, a fraction of the nearly $9 million in annual assessment revenue, but it is a completely unsatisfactory level of accounting and reporting to prevent problems. This level of Board control/owner oversight is insufficient to prevent possible mismanagement, theft or fraud by SCA agents.

Turning collections over to attorneys when there is only a budgeted projection of having to write off $12,000 in 2018 is a gross waste of money. It is truly fighting fire with Napalm, and then making owners pay for all the collateral damage.

December 7 Board meeting wrap-up: Part 3 Board owner communications

Board Communications Task Force Report

Rex appointed two Board members (and no owners) to propose solutions to poor Board-owner communications. This is like appointing two members from Anthem Council to propose solutions to communication problems between SCA and Anthem Council. Not involving all stakeholders in the development of shared solutions is a core failing of this Board under Rex.

Transparency and inclusiveness are not Board values. They seem to be primarily motivated by risk aversion. They are afraid of letting go of control because without clutching onto control, SCA will be sued or stormed by barbarians or something really bad. It’s unfortunately counterproductive strategy and actually brings on the problems they are trying to avoid.

The Board has the same problem over and over because the Board does not trust or utilize the expertise in the community to bring the community together or to provide necessary oversight over the GM, oddly referred to as the “self-manager”, or the attorney who have been given more power than is healthy for the organization and been put in inappropriate roles.

For example, the Board should never have assigned the GM to “mediate” the dispute with FAS. A mediation can only be successful if it is conducted by a skilled and disinterested neutral mediator. Acting as if that structure had a snowball’s chance in hell of working is like Jered Kushner claiming he could mediate a two-state solution after Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Even if Kushner had some skill, the message that about which side the mediator is on overpowers any individual skill or pretense at neutrality.

Suggestion: timing of first owner comment period

Tim Stibbins suggested that the first owner comment period should be after the President’s report because Rex does not put his remarks in writing in the draft Board book. (I say this suggestion would enhance protection of owners’ rights. Rex frequently self-servingly biases his President’s report to obfuscate that he personally usurps and/or abdicates the authority of the Board, e.g., to create false legitimacy for executive session actions or to conceal them instead of noting such actions properly in minutes.)

Rex unhelpfully suggested that maybe owner comments should be after the GM’s report since hers wasn’t in the draft Board book either. Tim said fine, but that was less important, and then the matter was dropped. (Do you think any action will be taken on this request?)

Anthem Council – November 16 meeting

No report.

When they kicked me off the Board, they also kicked me off as SCA’s representative to the Anthem Council even though there is no requirement that SCA’s rep be a Board member. After all, Jean Capillupo was just leaving the at-large seat on Anthem Council in which she served even though she was n longer on the SCA Board. I guess they thought I could make a profit from sitting on the Anthem Council or i was somehow going to cost the owners money by my service.

Anyway, my replacement did not file a report to the Board about what happened at the November 16 Anthem Council meeting. So, I guess we’ll never know.

December 7 Board meeting: Part 2 Self-management and the GM

Self-management Status Report

Tom Nissen described the management company’s (FSR) deficiencies that motivated the Board in 2015 to decide to go to self-management. He said the decision was not primarily to save money, it was to “get better information to manage the business more effectively”.

True, FSR dropped the ball on maintenance projects and bungled the reserve study. True, FSR allowed IT, the phone system, and financial reporting to become obsolete. These were all good reasons for converting to self-management everyone agrees on. Tom also gave a detailed report on his personal study of how SCA compares to other highly-rated HOAs. He came to the obvious conclusion that the transition to self-management was the right decision for SCA.

No argument here.

True, FSR had to go and SCA should be self-managed. Good points and totally true, but his praise was like Nancy Pelosi praising Senator John Conyers as an icon of the Senate before she said he had to go amid sexual harassment allegations.

Tom described the research he did, as an individual Board member, and it was great. What he didn’t mention was that when another Board member tried to review the transition plans, the Board unlawfully held an unnoticed, “emergency executive session” to order her to cease & desist and paid the attorney to block all of her document requests.

However, Tom didn’t mention any of the things that are areas of disagreement, like excessive compensation for the GM and several top managers, or how the GM conceals association records or how the GM has not developed written transition plans or timetables since she got here in 2015, and does not have adequate personnel management systems needed to protect SCA from “employer liability”.

Below is an excerpt from one of the many “legal letters” Clarkson graced me with (and you paid for) to explain why they would not let a Board member examine any SCA records. This one says SCA doesn’t have to produce the transition plans because SCA doesn’t have any. Then, to fake the Ombudsman out, they submitted 184 pages of powerpoint slides done by Tom Nissen in 2015 before the GM was hired.

It is simply wrong for certain individual Board members to “get better information to manage the business more effectively” and at the same time, tolerate the GM concealing that same management information from other Board members and the unit owners.

GM’s Performance Appraisal
(as reported in President’s report)

Rex stated simply that the GM’s performance appraisal was completed and will be put in her personnel file. The end.

Seriously. Not another word about it.

Unless you uncharitably interpret the self-management status report Tom gave later in the meeting as a surreptitious justification for giving her a raise/bonus without telling owners.

Here’s why I say the Board is not protecting owners if they don’t hold the GM accountable for customer satisfaction as much as for facilities maintenance:

Board refused to put the petitions for vote of no confidence in her file as requested. Petitions signed by 836 owners called for a vote of no confidence in the GM were turned in during this performance rating period. This is more than 10% of ALL owners (and probably more than 50% of the owners who even knew there was a petition or how to sign it) who gave the GM a customer service rating of “F”. That is extraordinary, and yet the Board vehemently refused to honor the simple request to put the petitions in the GM’s personnel file. Board members, notably Bob Burch, expressed outrage and castigated the owners for even signing the petition.
The Board did not respect owners’ right to express their dissatisfaction with the GM’s performance. Instead, a lot of time at meetings is spent with them droning on and on about how much they love her because she answers all the Board’s questions and she is way better at not deferring maintenance than the prior managing agent (that we fired). It is the Board’s job to treat customer service concerns as legitimate and attempt to address them even if they don’t agree or even if they think that any owner who doesn’t agree with them is a worthless malcontent.
Rex didn’t say what the Board did about her bonus. Is she getting a bonus when she didn’t meet any objectives (No restaurant or even a recommendation about whether to have one. Poor job dealing with the Foundation. Springing surprise changes on Clubs. Lots of unhappy owners) If not, her pay should drop by $20,000. The 2016 bonus cannot be considered a part of her base compensation. I wish somebody other than me would make an information request to find out if they are letting her keep the $20,000. I can do it, but the GM slow-walks my requests and uses the attorney to write me “legal letters” manufacturing bogus reasons why information legally available to any unit owner should be withheld from me.
Rex didn’t say what the Board going to do to fix the significant problem of the GM’s excessive salary.

No Recommendation on the Restaurant

“The SCA Board earlier this year directed the GM to make a restaurant space recommendation to the Board.”

Actually, when the restaurant was discussed at various Board meetings, Rex reported that in her last year performance evaluation, the Board instructed her to have the recommendation completed by this December. A rejected 6/22/17 information request was fulfilled by the attorney through the Ombudsman on 9/13/17, in which was the actual wording of the performance expectation about the restaurant:

“2017 GM Criteria for Bonus Consideration
Prepare a recommendation for the use of the restaurant space. The recommendation should result from a detailed analysis of the possible uses of the space. If not used as a restaurant, the analysis will include costs for each option to include those costs associated with the modification of the space.”

I have argued for the past six months that allowing the GM a year to come up with just a recommendation is an extremely low standard, particularly since the CC&Rs require the continuous operation of the restaurant without the written authorization of 75% of the owners to close it. Is it too much to hope that the Board will hold her accountable for not having accomplished ANY “detailed analysis of the possible uses of the space”. After she refused to consider any analysis I submitted or let me see anything she was working on, I certainly don’t want to see her getting a bonus if Tom Nissen or Forrest Quinn whip something up for her.

Most recently the Board asked that I send RFPs to restaurant consultants to produce an opinion on the restaurant option. Some directors were reluctant to proceed without a definitive expert opinion on the viability of another restaurant at our location. And if viable, in what likely format.

Really? When did the Board ask her to get a consultant? I remember objecting to her reporting that she was going to do it because a) there was no money budgeted for that purpose, and b) she is costing homeowners over $300,000/year in salary and benefits, she ought to have the skills to put together a competent analysis. Also, why is she holding back because “some directors were reluctant to proceed”? Why isn’t she dealing with the Board as a whole and treating all directors equally?

On January 25, the GM will recommend to the Board whether SCAshould have a restaurant or repurpose the space.

“That recommendation only awaits one clarifying legal point connected with repurposing the space.”

SCA already has a legal opinion about owners getting an opportunity to vote if they don’t like what the Board wants to change it to, IF 10% petition for it. I’m mystified about why the attorney has to be brought in over and over. I’m also surprised that this important sentence is on the audio, but was left out of the written version of the GM’s report that David Berman posted.

In the interim, I will also prepare an RFP for possible restaurant tenant response. Then the Board will have all the information needed to concur or disagree with whichever recommendation I make.

I don’t know if you noticed, but the recommendation I made six months to have a local commercial broker specializing in restaurants, bars and gaming handle the process was ignored even though the GM’s approach is doomed to be a repeat of past failures. There needs to be an independent expert to develop a lease that is fair to, and protects, both parties, allows a vendor to deliver a product the residents want, and keeps the GM’s and the Board’s fingers out of the pie.

December 7 Board meeting wrap up: Part 1

It was my birthday and I had a golf clinic at 3:30, but I dragged myself there and listened to the audio of the part I missed. Spoiler alert – there is no recommendation on the restaurant and the Board does not blame itself for anything wrong: nothing wrong with the transition to self-management; FAS eviction was all Favil West’s fault, and the $85,000 spent so far on the recall was all the fault of the petitioners.

Owner Comments: $10K for medical equipment

Roger Cooper, SCA owner since 1999 commented on item 12g, the Community Service group’s recommendation for “Approval of an expenditure up to $10,000 to purchase durable medical equipment” (to replace what was previously provided by the Foundation Assisting Seniors (FAS).

Accurately assessing that this is a drop in the bucket of the cost of replacing what FAS was providing free, Roger said that this medical equipment request of $10,000 was just the beginning of a bottomless pit.

Emile Girard had a lot to say (loudly) about this item both at the first comment period and when the item came up on the agenda. Emile highly complimented the Board and the CSG for their good works while he stridently blamed Favil West for everything except the weather: Favil didn’t negotiate to stop FAS’ eviction, even sending out a postcard about service interruption was vindictive and revenge.

Emile apologized for his emotional rant, but Rex welcomed his attack on Favil in a way that was a far cry from Rex’ oft-stated policy to stop speakers from making personal comments about other owners. (Rex certainly stopped me cold when an innocuous comment of mine included a unit owner by name.) Emile is certainly entitled to his opinion, but the meeting chair is not entitled to allow personal attacks when he agrees with them and shut owners up if he doesn’t.

Rex even passed along an untrue rumor stating that FAS was moving out of the area, but I am informed by a FAS Board member that FAS has rented a space not too far from Von’s.

Construction Defect Litigation

Construction defect lawsuit on Liberty Center is in mediation. There was one session in November and there will be others until it goes to trial in 2019. (Rex’s comment that SCA has not changed any of our demands disturbed me a little bit as an odd choice of information tidbit to share with the members. It leaves the impression that he personally approaches mediation with a “my way or the highway” attitude which is the antithesis of the good faith needed to achieve a win-win solution.)

Surplus Funds

I don’t even want to get into the issue about surplus funds, but they changed the minimum acceptable equity level from $500,000 to $250,000 as recommended by the Finance Committee. It’s not my issue, but it might be of concern to owners on fixed incomes who would like the Board to refund the excess to owners or reducing the assessments going forward rather than collecting more than is needed for annual operating costs.

Recall Costs

CFO Jim Orlick reported that the costs for the recall through November approximate $85,000, and I would like to report that I consider that expenditure an egregious failure of the Board’s duty of care to the membership.

It is an beyond disingenuous for Rex, the GM and the attorney to pretend that these expenditures were made in the best interest of the membership. They ordered these unbudgeted payments in violation of NRS, SCA bylaws, the Board Policy Manual the SCA Election & Voting Manual and prevented the Election Committee from performing their chartered duties as volunteers. They should be held accountable for it.

Director Comment Period is awash in self-righteous indignation

Bob Burch spoke at length about his opinion of the recall which he said was because of the Foundation, the vendor issue with the Clubs, and poor communication on less visible issues. He said the recall was caused by a “perfect storm”. He offered a semi-apology to the Clubs for not informing them of the insurance and business license changes, which he then negated by saying that vendors should have business licenses and insurance is a real problem for HOAs. He did not seem to see the real issue as being the autocratic change of practices without prior notice or negotiation with those affected.

Bob’s main point about the FAS eviction was that it didn’t have to happen that way, but still, that it was all FAS’ fault because the Board had bent over backward to be fair. Other people see it quite differently. Please see Favil West’s response that I posted on my campaign website last March. Also, a resident’s answer to refute Bob’s claims published on the AnthemToday blog is worth reading to set the record straight.

Bob read some incendiary passages from blogs, and tried to elicit sympathy from the audience about how beleaguered Board members are being subjected to such horrible, unwarranted abuse by malcontents.

Bob echoed Rex’ concerns about how tragic all this abuse of Board members was because it meant that there wouldn’t be qualified people applying for the Board. This is failing to see how the Board is pushing good people away.

What they are really saying is that the petitions to recall four Board members constituted abuse. Such abuse would make qualified people not want to run. Maybe, but more importantly, Bob and his cohorts are doing everything they can to get people who don’t agree with them not to run.

Totally backward. Qualified people don’t want to serve because of the way the Board treats Directors that don’t “go along to get along”. Who wants to serve on a Board where a majority can just kick a political rival off based on unproven allegations?

I have spoken to three women who would be excellent on the Board, and they all said they wouldn’t run because they didn’t want to be treated the way I was treated.

“It’s just not worth it. At my age, I don’t want to deal with it.”

“They are a bunch of ‘good ole boys’ who won’t listen to anyone with good ideas.”

“They’re just on a power trip.”

“I haven’t got thick enough skin to take it.”

Bob, you really need to stop whining about all the abuse that you and the other Directors take after what you and your buddies on the Board did to me.

You, the other male Board members and the attorney ambushed me and accused, berated and attacked me for an hour and a half in July 27 executive session and refused to have an open hearing I requested.

It’s that type of bullying of a person who is supposed to be an equal Director is what drives qualified owners away from wanting to serve on the Board.

But then, I guess you guys already figured that out.

Missing in Action

Stuff that should be on the Board agenda, but is not…

GM performance and compensation is not on the open agenda but it is on the Dec. 7 @ 9 AM executive session agenda

Here is what I predict will happen tomorrow. The Board will:

continue to overpay the GM, including possibly another unjustifiable $20,000 bonus, without transparency or accountability to the owners
fall prey to the Halo effect to give excessively high ratings by giving her a pass on failing to adequately perform significant aspects of her job.
refuse to consider that customer service ratings might diverge greatly from their assessment of the job she is doing.
continue to ignore that there have been multiple incidents of actions on her part which would be just cause for her termination as a violation of her duty to the membership and violations of the standards of practice of her license.
fail to hold themselves accountable for paying her over $100,000 over the value of that job and allowing her to pay other SCA managers at excessive rates.
continue to refuse to allow appropriate owner oversight over the personnel system in favor of less qualified “Board work groups” controlling policy or abdicating too much authority to the GM.
continue to dismiss and trivialize the concerns of the 836 residents who gave the GM an “F” for owner relations and signed a petition of no confidence against the GM. The Board did not seriously evaluate one single criticism by owners to attempt to improve the division in the community. Instead, the petitioners were insulted and marginalized as if they were not members of the community of equal value. The Board treated them like just a bunch of whiners and malcontents and discarded the petition was if it was just unwarranted “negativity from small vocal elements“.

I hope I’m wrong.

Not even a recommendation regarding the restaurant space

SCA CC&Rs 7.2(b) requires that the restaurant (or any other amenity) shall not be discontinued without the written authorization of 75% of the owners. CC&Rs 7.9 define the process by which the Board can change the use of the space. Neither of these provisions have been followed.

The Board locked up the restaurant right about the time the GM was hired. Ignoring the owner vote needed per 7.2(b) to lawfully discontinue operation of the restaurant and giving the GM over a year to just come up with a recommendation for the space was bad enough. Then, Rex made it worse by paying the attorney to opine in yet another no-good-for-owners violation of Board Policy Manual 4.10 that a temporary use of the space would require a vote of the owners. Then, the Board made it worse by letting her hire an unbudgeted consultant for an unknown amount of money to do the one job, by the one deadline the Board actually gave her.

So, what are we waiting for? How many excuses do we have to listen to? And how many people are we going to pay to not get the job done?

December 7 Board meeting items of interest

The last SCA Board meeting of the year is tomorrow at 1:30 PM. I’d like to point out a few things that you might not notice immediately, but which are important to for owners to know the full story.

Click here for full agenda. Click here for draft Board Book.

Financial Report for October

Two things mar an otherwise brilliant job of bean counting:

How much are we paying for who to do what? SCA is now an employer with 80 employees costing $3.5 million -over 40% of operating budget, there should be a clearer accounting of cost of staffing by budget objective. The Board cannot hold the GM properly accountable nor can the owners be protected from such failures as excessive management compensation or featherbedding, if the accounting obfuscates these facts. And, more importantly, the Board is not holding itself properly accountable to the owners by letting the GM hide what SCA employees (particularly managers) are being paid and what they are being paid for.
Since Adam Clarkson became SCA Legal Counsel on May 1, there have been $185,010 expended for legal fees which was 411% 0f the $45,000 budgeted for legal fees over half a year. This is the same attorney
- who told the Board the GM did not need its authorization to expend SCA funds for unbudgeted purposes.
- who does SCA’s debt collection function in the least cost-effective and most draconian way available.
- who, along with the GM, is responsible for additional unnecessary expenses of at least $73,000 for the recall election which were STRONGLY objected to by the proponents of the recall.
- who is being paid $325/hour to cause or allow the Board to take unlawful actions against political opponents of the GM and certain members of the Board.

Election and Voting Manual Revisions

Reviewing policies on voting may be really boring, but it is important to protect homeowner control over who represents us on the Board. There has to be a sound, uniformly administered system in place to prevent ANY election interference from tampering with ballots, abuse of power, or even unfair communications.

The largest HOA board election rigging scandal in Southern Nevada involved primarily attorneys who were supposed to be neutral outsiders who stacked HOA Boards to channel construction defects litigation. This Election and Voting Manual is intended to ensure that the SCA homeowners actually control who sits on the Board and that those Board members actually work SOLELY for the benefit of the homeowners.

Yet, it doesn’t matter what is in this or any other SCA policy manual if the Board doesn’t follow SCA’s own rules or if it allows the GM and/or the attorney to manipulate the process in favor or against certain owners.

Cherry-picking which laws to follow is a slippery slope

There are several areas where our election process is not in conformity with NRS or the SCA Bylaws. For example, SCA Board does not have a nominating committee as required by SCA bylaws 3.4a below. While there may be good reasons to not want to have such a committee, this is an example of how problematic it is to simply disregard a provision. The bylaws must be uniformly enforced and not simply disregarded. The narrow exception is when the bylaws explicitly conflict with a mandate in a Federal or state law.

Filling Board vacancies after a director is removed.

The final clause of SCA bylaws 3.6. requires a vote by the unit owner to fill a Board vacancy caused by a Board member being removed.

“Upon removal of a director, a successor shall be elected by the Owners entitled to elect the director so removed to fill the vacancy for the remainder of the term of such director.”

The proposed change to the Election Manual, below in green, apparently attempts to justify retroactively how Jim Coleman was appointed, but even the new provision doesn’t allow for an appointment to be made without any notice to owners, any candidate nominations, or the required vote of owners.

Note that there is nothing in either the existing nor the proposed versions of the Election Manual that gives the Board legal cover for what they actually did to remove me nor what they did to replace me nor what they might be contemplating to do in the next election (keep me off the ballot).

How they removed me from the Board by simply declaring my position vacant is not authorized in NRS 116, NRS 82, SCA governing documents or any existing or proposed Board policy.
By extension, that also means that there is no legal means by which the GM, the Board or the attorney could refuse to allow me to be a candidate for, or to serve on, the Board should I choose to run again.
Also, note that this manual includes the NRS provisions which the Board President and GM violated by using the Spirit to publish their one-sided argument regarding the recall without permitting equal time and access to the opposition. Complaints of these violations are currently being investigated by NRED.

These proposed changes don’t describe what the Board actually did nor do they conform to the bylaws. The Board is simply pretending they have the authority to act against laws and policies “upon the advice of Counsel”. We’ll see.

Complaints to the Election Committee are not fairly handled

The Election Committee complaint process is to informal and allows for problems at both ends of the spectrum. On one end of the spectrum, informal complaints may be submitted without evidence or substance which could just waste the committee’s time .

On the other end, there is substantial risk of unequal treatment occurring, or even being merely perceived, if there isn’t a good enough procedure defining accountability, investigation, documentation and notice requirements. It’s sloppy management, and it reduces the community’s trust of the election process. It also allows interference in the independence and neutrality of the Election Committee.

In the proposed draft, there is still no standard format for resolving complaints, no required documentation to be maintained in the official SCA record, and no notice of the disposition formally given to the complainant.

I recommend the process defined in the SCA CC&Rs and utilized by the Covenants Committee would be a good model for the Election Committee to employ to fairly investigate and document complaints regarding Board elections.

Board Communications Task Force

In June, I proposed a resolution to improve Board-owner communications , but couldn’t even get a second to the motion. Now, five months later, nothing has been done to increase transparency or meaningful utilization of owner expertise in governance.

Rex appointed a couple of Directors to be a Board Communications “task force” (with no owner involvement) and here are their recommendations:

Here’s what should be done immediately:

Either use SCA-TV to video broadcast Board meetings live or use some service like GoToMeeting.com to make the Board meetings accessible online in real time and interactive.
Take the password off the website.
Make the eblast mailing list opt-out instead of opt-in
Follow the lead of Sun City Summerlin’s new GM in attitude.
Stop using Board work groups that withhold information from owners.
Expand the committee structure to utilize expertise of residents and have meaningful owner oversight and influence in governance.

Item 15B “Self-Management” is listed as New Business to be presented by Tom Nissen rather than the GM. The paragraph above the total back-up in the Board book to let owners know what the Self-Management item is about.

This raises a lot of questions about the Board’s failure to protect homeowners by hiring a GM without ANY of the defined terms and conditions of employment required in a management agreement.

Why is a Board member making a presentation on the transition?
Why doesn’t the GM whose compensation is $100,000 greater than other GMs at comparable Sun Cities like Summerlin make the presentation?
Why hasn’t the GM been held accountable for the development of the complete policy framework needed to protect SCA from legitimate risks and potential liability associated with becoming an employer or
Why hasn’t the GM held accountable for AT LEAST having written plans and timetables for getting the job done?
How will the Board – let alone the owners – even know if the job is done right and on time?
Why did the Board let the GM unlawfully conceal SCA records on the transition to self-management from one Board member in violation of our bylaws 6.4c when this information should have been easily available to any unit owner?

After the Board meeting, I’ll let you know if any of these questions have been answered. Or if there are just new ones.