Civic Association of West Springfield Village
General Membership Meeting Minutes
13 October 2022
Attendance – Outgoing-President: John Cooley, In-Coming President: Jeff Fasceski, Vice President: Bernie Koehle, Treasurer: Jim Womack, Secretary: Molly Alonzo, Website: Bob Havey, Neighborhood Watch: Jeff Carter, Village West Pool: Jen Guernsey, Members: Gale Bowers, Suzanne McCormick, Bob Lomax, Julie and Dick Cheslock, Anong Billet, Becky Duckworth, Bradley Swain, Glenn and Dianna Demarr, John and Lois Hoffman, Kathleen D’Amato, Kathy Ciro, Lauren Fasceski, Bill and Maria Daugherty
Not in Attendance – Membership: Julia Hale, Directory: Andrea Lewis, Facebook: Wendi Dorey
A Quorum was established. The meeting was called to order at 7:30 by President John Cooley
Minutes from Last Meeting (May 2022) – Secretary Molly Alonzo – minutes from the May meeting were approved by those who attended that meeting and can now be found on our website. Similarly, those attending this meeting and who provide their email address will be asked to review minutes from this meeting and approve them for posting.
Vice President Comments – VP Bernie Koehle –
Financial Report – Treasurer Jim Womack – see attached
Past President Comments – Jeff Carter – Nothing to Report
Executive Council Reports:
· Membership – Julia Hale –She asked that I (John Cooley) report we have 231 fully paid members, 84 who are also prepaid for FY24 and 58 who also paid for FY25. Drive ends 1 November but those still needing to join may do so anytime during the membership/calendar year.
· Directory – Andrea Lewis – cover photo entries needed and please review the current edition to offer constructive suggestions.
· Village FaceBook Group – Wendi Dorey – Wendi is at another event, but I (John Cooley) believe the FB Group is a perfect complement to our website and the enews. Too many do not want to join the group fearing loss of privacy and possible compromise. Not the case! And you can remain pretty much a ghost until you decide to post something or comment on someone else’s post.
· Website – Bob Havey - I am going to move the site from GoDaddy to A2 Hosting when the current hosting plan expires – maybe a week or so before then. GoDaddy will not give me an updated database server for the hosting package that we have, and I need the update for the underlying software on the site (Drupal 9 if you are interested). The A2 Hosting package will cost about $220 for 3 years and includes the security certificate – this is a good deal. It does renew at $160/year after 3 years. It’s still less than GoDaddy because it includes the security certificate. I don’t plan on moving the domains, though I might have to. The hosting package may include a domain, but that’s not clear. I will leave the email at GoDaddy because I don’t want to disrupt the email. We had to get Exchange (MS 365) because AOL/Verizon kept tagging us as a spammer when John sent out the Village News, of course if Jeff decides not to continue with the Village News it’s academic and we won’t renew the account next year. We get cPanel email with A2, and it works OK for small volume.
· Neighborhood Watch – Jeff Carter – Neighborhood Watch report
1. We are fortunate here in the Village to experience very little crime, but the following are suggestions to keep your home and property a bit safer:
2. Don't provide places for thieves to hide; keep hedges, shrubs trimmed
3. Don't let thieves know you are not home; use light timers and leave radio on
4. Install a security camera system and/or a home alarm system
5. Always lock doors and windows and secure sliding glass doors
6.Lock your vehicles
7. Get to know your neighbors comings and goings and report suspicious activity to the FCPD non-emergency line at 703-691-2131.
· Village West Pool – Jen Guernsey – Village West Pool just completed its first season as a self-managed operation. Instead of contracting with a pool management company, we did most of the work ourselves. We still contracted out the big pool operations tasks (opening, closing, major maintenance) to an experienced service provider. Everything else - lifeguard hiring, training, and supervision; acquiring and utilizing pool chemicals; and performing minor pool maintenance tasks - we handled ourselves. We estimate that this saved us at least $15,000. In addition, this arrangement provided greater staffing flexibility, so we were able to modify staff levels as needed and host an early-morning lap swim program. We also had greater control over lifeguard training, and we added two days of pre-season site-specific training and refresher guard training, trained additional certified pool operators, and provided several in-service training events during the season. Overall, the season went really well, and we plan to self-manage again next year.
Village West also experienced a significant bump in membership this year - from about 150 households to over 200. Our swim team was also commensurately larger than in previous years. We attribute these increases primarily to the considerable turnover in the neighborhood, which has brought in a lot of new families with young children. Pool membership income was about 25% higher than expected - certainly a welcome surprise! More members also equals higher guest pass and concessions sales figures.
The combination of additional income and lower expenses meant that at the end of the season we were able to invest $19K in covers for both of our pools. The covers are expected to save us $100K-$200K over their expected 20-year service life. Because they keep leaves out of the pool over the winter, the covers will greatly reduce staining and thus the amount of acid washing required each spring, and this in turn is expected to nearly double the life of the plaster bottom and better protect the coping stones (around the top edge) and the tile.
We finished the season in a much-improved cash position, with about $130K in the bank. Per our bylaws, we continue to reimburse the bondholders left on the waiting list at a rate of about six bondholders per year, and we expect this process to be completed over the next few years. Over the past five years, we have performed much major maintenance and repair: a wholesale overhaul and upgrade of our electrical system, a new main pool pump, new sand in the pool filters, removal of a dying tree on the property, and a significant sewer line repair. However, much remains to be done to preserve this beloved community asset. The pool itself is in need of its next major renovation (replacing coping stones, tile, and plaster), which will cost somewhere around $130K. We hope to be able to complete this project by Fall 2024 at the latest, but perhaps as early as Fall 2023. After that, the major tasks before us include replacing the disintegrating parking lot (around $60K) and paying off our mortgage ($80K), which has a balloon payment due in five years. We hope to accomplish all of this without having to sell our cell tower lease; while the sale would bring in about $500K, it would eliminate our annual cell tower income of about $35K. While we also carry a balance of just under $60K on the Economic Injury Disaster Loan we took out to help us make it through the pandemic, it is a very low-interest loan payable over 30 years, so we have no plans to pay it off early.
Village West continues to look for opportunities to host community events, including jointly with the Civic Association. In years past, the Civic Association would help sponsor an open house and grill event on Memorial Day weekend. However, we decided not to resume this event post-pandemic, as it turned out to have no appreciable marketing value and it puts a tremendous strain on the lifeguard staff and the pool board during opening weekend. This season, we teamed up with the Civic Association once again for another successful National Night Out, an event which brings local law enforcement out into the community. Our planned second annual Oktoberfest, alas, was a washout due to the remnants of Hurricane Ian; we plan to try again next year. But we are looking forward to our second annual Winterfest in early December.
· Weekly Enews – using mail merge makes any attachment to the newsletter very difficult. Please send your reports in a narrative format and not just a flyer or announcement.
Old Business: none
New Business:
Rolling Road Widening Project Update – nothing new to report other than the utilities are to be moved next calendar year. They develop their own plans and schedule and not under the control of VDOT. Expect service interruptions.
Ratify FY22 Audit Report – vote delayed.
· FY23 Budget (see attached). Budget proposal was unanimously adopted without markups.
· Election of new Board of Directors (President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer). NOTE: Executive Council members are appointed by the Board of Directors; no vote required. All on the BOD continued in their position, but by unanimous consent – Jeff Fasceski was elected the New President of the CAWSV and took control of the meeting to make personal remarks.
Adjourn – at or about 8:20 PM - CAWSV President Jeff Fasceski adjourned the meeting.
Program – None
Respectfully Submitted by:
Molly Alonzo
