Finance & Legal minutes: 2003-09-08

Minutes:

Finance & Legal minutes, 9/8/03
7 pm, unit 11 Great Oak

Attendance: Jim G, Willie, Katie, Judith, Helen, Dave, Dale

Taxes: Why taxes are so low at closing. The wiki has been updated with information on this:
"The tax database is updated on 12/31 of each year. Last 12/31 we had no houses, so until next year (2004) we will pay taxes based on the value of the land."

Budget
This is the process we had from last time:
0. Put out survey results we have so far (in aggregate). Done
1. Survey (dollars & hours game)--deadline Sunday sept 7. Include what we're going to do with the results, a plea for participation. Verbally remind them of this. Done.
2. At F&L's Sept 8th meeting discuss results (today)
3. At GO business meeting Sept 15th (Monday) present (1st of two meetings) results of survey, and our suggested high, medium, and low budget.
High medium and low are a context--we are putting forth the medium. High and low are changes made to the medium.
4. At first meeting October we go for a decision.
How concerned should we be that it will be hard to up the association budget in later years if we go for a minimalist budget? Down the road we might be a lot more relaxed.
If we get a lot of "blocks" or concerns, have them help us work out the budget.

We discussed the results to date of the dollars and hours survey. Not as clear results as we'd like.
One route is to modify our process--bring a proposed budget and then ask for an ad-hoc committee to work on it. They'd bring a proposal for decision at the next meeting. This is a trying time for people since folks are moving in, but we hope we can get participation.

Monkey: Dale will send out in PDF the spreadsheet of budget items, along with other information for budget.
We note that some things can be deferred to future years, and some things that need doing the first year only.
Monkey: Dale will put out a high/medium/low budget, at $168, $135, and $100 levels, as a seed for the ad hoc committee.
Monkey: Willie will get us time at the next meeting for this discussion--20 minutes.
We will be asking for formation of an ad hoc committee, seeded with the information and proposed budgets. Handouts will include the high/medium/low budgets.
By the way, the secret address for the results of the survey is http://www.redcedar.com/cgi-bin/version14.cgi?formaction=Average
which now generates a "comma-delimited" section with priority information plus a calculated rank that can imported into a spreadsheet.


Budget process--how to make changes to the budget (yearly, mid-year)
Will we ever need to adjust the budget mid-year? For example, we realize we have a budget overrun on some major item, or we want to make an internal adjustment (no change to fees).
One proposal is that if this happens, F&L would just bring a regular 2-meeting proposal to the community.
(By the way, the finance committee should make monthly reports, that by the way will reflect cash balances.)
We should have a few months to worry about how to do a yearly review--moving to cooler.
Strong support to review the budget 6 months after the initial budget is adopted.

Monkey: Dale should find out what our fiscal year is.

A brief diversion--discussion of finance-related tasks:
Roles or tasks
--deposits checks
--treasurer--writes checks, reconciles bank account
--billing/invoicing
--accounting--keeps track of accounts, issues periodic reports
--tax preparation
--investment (LTCRF)




Garage & CH loans
* When needed--Mid Sept to early October
* Who will research?
* Term
Monkey: Dave will research loans for the CH and garage.
What term? If long, we can lock in the rate, but also prepay. Gives us flexibility. So look into 30 year.
If 30 years, we do note that we don't want to saddle the community with long term debt.
Dave reports on 15 year term (we asked for 30) loan from Sunrise--7% to 7 1/2%, wants everyone to be jointly and severally liable, and they view this as unsecured loans. We don't think we can work with them. We asked Dave to look into local banks, and we realize that it might be useful to have our deposit account there as well. We'll see what he finds out--probably this week.
Monkey: Dave will contact local banks about loans, and will send out info by email.


Transition date (12 units closed)
We are now officially in control of [[GOCA]] (Great Oak Cohousing Association), since more than 25% of the units have closed.


Comcast agreement
--Because Comcast is not giving us any value, it was agreed we can't sign the agreement they sent. If they need an agreement, we will modify it (see for example Dale's comments in an earlier email). The document they sent can be shared with interested members for comment.


Water policy
Monkey: Judith will massage and send out an email on the water billing cost.


LTCRF
Who to honcho? Buildings?
Monkey: Dale should look for email from [[Elph]] or [[Jenny]] on LTCRF spreadsheet. But we still don't think there's any work on the LTCRF calculations for buildings or individual units.


policies: "LTCRF will be kept in a separate account when possible, and any checks drawn on that account will require two or more board member signatures (which amounts to two or more GO members)."
Strong support, with suggestion that they not be in the same household.


Insurance
Kelly reports there are two issues left--
--workman's comp
--total amount of coverage
Dave mentions that we can get a form for people who are doing work to sign to make sure we are not liable.
Monkey: We'd like to ask Kelly to do a bit of research on the topic of uninsured workers.
We also need to answer Kathy S's questions in an email dated 9/8/03 regarding insurance.


AED/First aid
It sounds like membership is going to worry about the AED and first aid (CPR) issues.


Accounting for association fees
* Who collects?
* How deposited?
* Accounting/recording
* Invoices
Monkey: Judith will ask [[Elph]] if he is willing to continue collecting and depositing association fees into the [[GOCA]] account--and keeping track of who paid.
Can we get Mary King to coordinate the billing/invoicing?
Monkey: Katie will ask Mary King.
Monkey: Dale will research software packages, including talking to JD/Carol about Sunward's system.



Cooler:
H Labor budget
M Discretionary budget (process)--when does it begin? There might be some discussion in minutes from early May (Panera meeting)
M Review (audit?) CDC books
L-M LTCRF
L Insurance for snow plow truck (probably grounds)
L Investment policy for LTCRF
L set up review of books


Next meeting: Sept 21 (sunday 4 pm, Great Oak unit #11), Monday Oct 6 7 pm (Yom Kippur), Sunday October 19 4 pm, all at Great Oak unit #11.