Prefer SCA’s Annual Dues Be $2,000 or $850?

Former board member Bob Sansing and his Unity Party associates are deceptively promoting the notion that our dues would still be “reasonable” if they were DOUBLED to over $2,000 per year:

This is being promoted because for the past two years so many of us have been hammering the board for illegally overcharging the assessments and for keeping the accumulated surplus instead of refunding or crediting it back to homeowners–as clearly required by the laws and IRS rules. It is possible the involved individuals could be held personally accountable for their actions.

Meanwhile, the facts concerning setting the SCA dues/assessment levels are:

1. Because SCA does not own and operate golf courses, our operating costs are much, much lower than those communities who do operate golf courses.

2. Because our SCA community design includes vast areas of desert landscaping with very little grass, our community operating costs are much lower than most comparable HOAs.

3. Because Del Webb provided SCA with an exceptionally well designed set of community facilities and grounds, our buildings operating costs are much lower than many other communities.

4. Laws and HOA rules empower the board to collect annual assessments based on NEED–NOT what is comparable to what other HOAs are charging. The board is NOT allowed use the for-profit corporate practices of charging whatever the market will bear. It must collect only what is needed for the community properties.

5. If an excess of assessments is accumulated, it must be refunded or credited to the unit owners on an annual basis. Otherwise, the surplus is considered taxable “profits”. There are no other options.

6. Failure to refund or credit members with the excess/surplus and/or failure to an file income tax return to accurately report on the disposition of previous excess/surplus assessments could be considered evidence of fraud and/or tax evasion by the State and the IRS.

7. The 2009 SCA board reported (for the first time) it has accumulated between $4 and $5 million in excess/surplus assessments since 2002. But, only a small fraction of those accumulated excess/surplus assessment have been refunded or credited to members (via the deceptively-named “dues holidays”) as required by law. And, no income taxes have been paid on those millions of dollars of “profits”.

Acting in good faith, Senator Briggs alerted members during the 2008 campaign that the board was violating the laws by not returning the surpluses/slush funds to SCA members. But, instead of dealing with the facts, the board and finance committee members and unity party members viciously attached John Briggs and his wife using political dirty tricks tools to try to smear Sen. Briggs’ outstanding lifetime public service reputation and to divert attention away from the financial misconduct being reported.

However, SCA homeowners should have been paying more attention during the past two years of the reported failures by the directors to comply with the above. FAILURES by the directors (specially Mike Dixon, Roz Berman and Shirley Cheri, finance committee members (especially Jack Troia and Don Manning) and tax preparer Gary Lein to legally handle those surpluses may become a serious financial liability for them and the whole community.

Bob Sansing and his friends are DEAD WRONG when they say such things as our dues would be “reasonable”–even if they were doubled. That is both deceptive and legally wrong.

The assessments should be set to what is actually needed–no less and no more. Past history suggests that the annual assessments should be routinely set in the $800’s instead of the $900’s.

This entry was posted on December 20, 2009 at 11:47 and is filed under SCA Board, Community Affairs, Laws & Rules, News!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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