Finance & Legal minutes: 2018-09-11

Minutes:

Minutes of 9-11-18 GO Finance & Legal Committee Meeting

Present: Sharon, Debbi, Becky G., Becky H., Amy

1. Bob Van Oosterhout’s request

Bob inquired as to how to proceed with the possibility of a donation from
Great Oak Cohousing to the Fellowship for Intentional Community to support
their film-making efforts. FIC videographers were recently on site at our
three communities. All three communities participated and TS and SW are
considering making donations.

F&L’s recommendation is that this expense go through the Membership
Committee. They may have the funds to do this already this year; they’d
need to check their balances. If the total expense is under $500, they can
take funds from any or multiple budget line(s). If over $500, Membership
should inform the community and F&L that they’re making this expenditure.
They should not overspend the committee’s total budget. If they want to
spend more than they have, they need to go to the Steering Committee to
request funds from the Critical Needs Fund. It should be the committee
that makes the request, not an individual.

2. 2019 Budget Process

a. Schedule
• Saturday, September 15 – full budget presented, opportunity for questions
and requests for more clarity
• Wednesday, October 3 – possible extra budget meeting
• Monday, October 15 – committees come back with firmer budgets, along with
answers to questions raised earlier
• Wednesday, November 7 – possible problem-solving meeting
• Monday, November 19 – final budget agreement (hopefully!)
• Extra meetings, if needed, can be held on Wednesday, December 5 and
Monday, December 17

b. Changes to F&L budget for 2019
Insurance Master Policy – add 2.5% factor for inflation
Truck insurance – add 2.5% factor for inflation
Leave volunteer workers’ policy premium as is
Prof bookkeeper fees: leave as is. Our expenses are low this year because
we paid our attorney a retainer last year.
Becky G. will research the professional fee history.
Raise Truck tag fee to $110

3. Proposed North Slope Stairs Project

In January 2018, we agreed to hold 2017 surplus $ for stairs. The project
would need to be completed by the end of 2018. Here is the text of the
proposal:

Proposal written on the floor:
We propose approving the expenditure of $2,000 from the 2017 Steering
Critical Needs fund, to be held for the North Patio stairs, contingent on
the project being approved by the community. The funds will be held in a
temporary Steering savings account. If the project is not approved, the
funds will revert back to 2017 surplus."

It is too late to complete the project this year because we are at the
point when we would normally put the 2017 surplus into the mix for the
budget process.

The households’ options at this point are:
1) let the money go, and ask for money in the future when they’re ready, or
2) ask the community to approve transferring that money into an earmark for
the stairs with a hard and fast deadline rather than to apply it to the
surplus. In Becky G’s opinion, the proposal should be approved before June
2019 so that it can be built next summer.
Becky will write to the households.

4. Bookkeeping Updates

a. Arrears
The household that had recently crossed over $2,000 in arrears, leading to
correspondence from GO’s attorney, has now paid in full. Becky H. will
write to attorney Rick Delonis to ask him to remove the lien on the unit.

b. Statements
Quickbooks made changes to their software without informing users; this
resulted in many GO statements not having gone out. The situation has now
been corrected.

c. Surplus for 2017
The surplus from 2017 has been calculated. All savings accounts have been
topped off.

5. Master Deed & Bylaws – Next step is Debbi will talk with Rick.

a. F&L will lead one alternative meeting next work season

6. Jobs for next work season
a. Amy informed Work Com that the two budget jobs should be removed during
the work allocation. They appeared in the survey despite her effort to
inactivate them.

7. Insurance – waiting to hear from Tiffany re: boardwalk – no news

8. Basement egress

Becky G. recently received responses to some of our questions from our
attorney. We will read these over and discuss next time.

9. Risk in the event a teen has been doing illegal activities at GO, then
leaves and has a car accident, would GO be liable? We asked our attorney
this question at Katie’s request.

QUESTION TO OUR ATTORNEY: If underage kids drink or smoke pot at Great
Oak—both of which are violations of several of our rules—is Great Oak
responsible if they then leave and get into an accident? Our committee
does not think we are, because this would have been a clear violation, and
done without any adult’s knowledge. But we have been asked to get your
legal take on it.
COMMENT: I do not believe that the Association would be responsible in that
type of scenario. Of course, any enterprising and imaginative plaintiff's
attorney may attempt to assert a claim, but I do not believe that it would
be successful.

Amy will respond to Katie with this information.

10. Any next steps on this item from last time?
a. A new item is that Bob O. from Membership would like GO to require a
window of time when sellers provide three months for internal interested
parties to make an offer on units for sale before hiring an outside
realtor. This is a question for our attorney. Debbi will write to him.

b. Certificate of Occupancy issue - Has Debbi sent info to Mary, convener
of Buildings, and to Ted and Dale, who were very involved in construction
in the early days? Debbi will check.

c. Truck Proposal –Amy still needs to talk with Gayle Turner about the new
billing idea.

d. Buildings re: guidelines on digging. Amy still needs to follow up with
Buildings. Unless consensed upon, there is no legal ground to stand on to
enforce financials.

e. CH Com re: CH Leases and proof of insurance. Amy still needs to follow
up with them.

f. F&L calendar of routine tasks – Sharon is going to meet with Elph to ask
for guidance on how to make it a GO calendar.

11. Review and discuss Cooler Doc if time permits. The group wants this to
move up higher on our list. How to proceed? Put as second item on the
agenda next time; remind everyone to read it before the next meeting.

12. Next meeting Weds 9/26


Cooler doc:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_dmnNJmHmrwwFIfnscnRbPK-_8_kmahfFsOTn_fEvTY/edit
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