President’s Message June 2013

It is amazing how we all take things for granted and assume that important matters are taken care of. With the fire department doing yearly inspections and requiring us to do things like move a fire extinguisher by a few feet and straightening up a storage closet, I am surprised that they never informed us that there were no smoke detectors or a sprinkler system in the office. I watched a documentary on smoke detectors that covered both photo electric and ionization (the most common one in houses). The photo electric detect smoldering fires, which create smoke but little actual fire. Ionization are best for rapidly spreading fires where there are lots of flames, but little smoke. Most deaths related to fires are from smoke inhalation rather than people being “burned to death.” I decided to change the ones in my house to photoelectric and went to check on the type in our buildings. To my surprise we had none- nor was there a sprinkler system. I had Josh check into putting in a sprinkler system and found it would cost well in excess of $50,000 to put one in. Needless to say one would question why it was never put in during the remodels of both buildings years back. We will be installing photoelectric smoke alarms to start with and will be looking at a sprinkler system in the future.

Having lived here for 10 years now I have also taken for granted our “warm” weather. I traveled to Fort Collins Colorado in late March for a week to be greeted by 8 inches of snow and 30 degree temperatures. I came home and thawed out then spent a week in Kodiak Alaska and another week in Palmer Alaska in mid April doing some training classes for the Operating Engineers Union. The high temp in Kodiak was 41 and we never got out of the 30’s in Palmer- needless to say I was glad to return to my home and our wonderful weather. I guess I have become a “desert rat” and would not trade it.

There are lots of rumors being spread about this BOD that are nothing more than that. Let me remind you that your BOD members are also homeowners and receive no compensation for the time they spend on association business, other than the satisfaction of making CRCA the best it can be. We all take our position seriously and attempt to look out for the community as a whole and not just the vocal few.  The big picture is what counts. Our home values are affected by association actions like everyone else and we all have a vested interest in CRCA.  Some rumors claim that covenants are not being enforced, by directive of the Board.  This is a bit farfetched, especially when over 800 notices were sent out in two months this spring which is almost 25% of the number of residences here.

The last scheduled BOD meeting did not include a homeowner forum. Because of travel, job demands, medical issues, illness, and prior commitments amongst Board members, there has been no quorum for the BOD meetings since February. I did not add the forum to the agenda in May, because I was concerned that after several months of no meetings, there would be more business than usual needing attention. With the meetings exceeding two hours in a normal month it was decided to not have the forum until we get back to the norm of making quorum for our monthly meetings. This did not eliminate input from homeowners on any agenda items but limited the points of discussion just to business related items. The forum has not been eliminated forever, just postponed until the pending regular business gets completed.

We were hoping to have Windmill Park open for Memorial Day weekend but the leveling and preparation was more involved than anticipated and did not allow this to happen. Have a safe and enjoyable summer- the pools are in good shape so enjoy them.