WATLING’S ISLAND PROPERTY OWNERS ASSOCIATION
WIPOA
NEWSLETTER AND DUES BILLING, MARCH 2009
It has been some time since our last newsletter, and for that I apologize. In some respects, the island hasn’t changed much, but in other ways there are some new happenings. Let me try and catch you up.
ANNUAL MEETING: The annual association meeting was held at the Paradise Café on Feb, 10, 2009. We had a nice turnout with 30 property owners being present. The agenda items, which will be discussed later in this newsletter, include road work, building permit process, revisions to the dues structure, WIPOA board membership, financial results, the trash situation. The complete minutes of the meeting will be posted on our new website.
WEBSITE: Thanks to the help of Tim Smith, a property owner in CL 3 who is building a home, we now have a new website, WIPOA.ORG. As with most websites, this is a work in process, and will be updated as we go forward. At this time, the website includes some pictures of the island, copies of our Articles of Association, a draft set of operating bylaws, links to The Riding Rock Inn, The Gerace Research Center, and The Bahamian Government, a copy of the Associations financial statement, and a list of the associations board of directors.
ROADWORK: Thanks to the work of our contractor, Mr. Raymond Russell, significant improvements have been made on most of the main roads. That work included crushing and hauling of gravel, and then spreading, watering and compacting the roads. He applied a soil stabilizer in a number of areas to test the effectiveness in controlling dust and preventing erosion. On a go forward basis, we will incur some annual expense for keeping the roads to there current state, but at a significantly lesser cost than what we spent over the last 1 ½ years. Since we don’t have the funds to pave the roads, we believe this in the most effective and least costly method.
BUILDING PERMITS: Although it has always been a requirement that no drilling, excavation or construction could be undertaken within Columbus Landings without the prior approval of WIPOA, that has been problematic since we did not have a method of enforcement. Now, the island administrator has agreed that his office will not allow any construction without written approval from WIPOA. This shall assist in maintaining compliance with our building, drilling, septic tank and similar restrictions. (the Building Restrictions will be posted on the website)
FINANCIAL STATEMENT: The financial statement of WIPOA as of Dec 31, 2008 is shown below. Clearly the largest expenditure in 2008, has been on the roads. That coupled with the fact that there was not a dues billing in 2008, showed a reduction in the associations funds balance. However with the 2008 dues being billed at this time, and the reduction in road expenditures, the association is still in decent financial shape.
DUES REVISIONS: After discussion at the annual meeting and a subsequent board meeting, it seems to make sense that some change in the dues structure is appropriate. One of the principle points that led to this discussion, is the reality that those owners who have a home, use the infrastructure, i.e. roads, dump site, etc. more than the property owners with vacant lots. Also, those lots, i.e. multi-family, resort, that have more than 1 living unit should pay more than those with only 1 living unit. And since a commercial business has more traffic than either single family or multi family lots, the commercial business should pay more. Thus the board has adopted the following annual dues structure beginning with the 2009 dues.
Vacant lots $30/lot
Single family living unit $50/unit
Multi- family living units $50/unit
Resorts $50/unit
Commercial $500/business unit
NEW CONSTRUCTION: At the present time, there are 9 single family homes in some stage of construction. 2 in CL 3, and 7 in CL4. Of those in CL 4, 5 of them, 4 are in the area near the warehouse. In addition, a mini resort with 6 small cottages is being built in Snow Bay.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS: At the annual meeting Jo Ecklund and Mike Weber stated that they would like 2009, to be their last year as Sec/ Treas and President respectively. The board for 2009 is as follows;
Bill Bickle Courtice, Ontario
Stefan Bommerer, San Salvador,
Bahamas
Steven Harris, Boston, MA.
Jo Ecklund, Sec/Treas, Houston, TX
Brendalee Jones-Strachen ,San Salvador, Bahamas
Raymond Parino, Billerca, MA
Mike Weber, Pres ,Montrose, CO