Greg Goodwin Resigns over Board’s Direction for Oakmont’s Future
Prior to the October board meeting, Oakmont Village Association’s former Director, Greg Goodwin submitted his letter of resignation highlighting the following: “I cannot in good conscience continue my tenure on the Board.”
Following is Goodwin’s letter, as submitted to President, Steve Spanier.
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Mr. Gregory Goodwin
Mr. Steve Spanier, President OVA Board of Directors 6637 Oakmont Drive Santa Rosa, California 95409
Dear Mr. Spanier: Effective immediately October 16, 2018, at 9:00 a.m. I am saddened to inform the Board that I am resigning my position as Director at large. First, I want to thank all who have supported and voted for me to serve this community. It has been a great learning experience and my honor to have researched issues, represented my constituents while voting in favor of my beliefs and their best interests. I have always based my decisions and voted with my original pledge to always keep three things uppermost in mind: safety of the community; budget (fiscal responsibility); and service ensuring that our recreational facilities were properly maintained and upgraded. I cannot in good conscience continue my tenure on the Board. I cannot in good conscience continue working with the majority of this Board who have an agenda of gentrification to increase attraction by people with higher incomes which can lead to displacement of people who have lived here for many years. Oakmont was never intended to be a “premier” community. It was to be affordable living for active adults. I cannot participate in resolutions that this Board of Directors has brought forth that may lead to irrevocable decisions that may be challenged in the courts and directors held personally liable. I have done my very best to persuade my colleagues that pursuing certain funding, even if deemed legal are in my opinion ethically questionable. Leadership is much more than civility or so-called transparency. This Board has occasionally been lacking in timely transparency. This delay of information has promoted an underlying dissension and public mistrust. I feel my leadership concerns have been politely listened to but never taken seriously and have been totally disregarded. Some of the goals I have worked on have come to fruition such as:
Although I have succeeded in the above matters, I am troubled in what I consider the most important issue facing Oakmont and that is to upgrade our bylaws. While over one year has been spent on activity in compiling information to upgrade our bylaws, there has been no resulting information which has brought forth actual upgrades or changes to the Articles of Incorporation and bylaws to comply with Davis-Sterling. I must resign now because, as I previously stated, I can no longer accept the overwhelming influence that a group of powerful, well to do people in leadership positions have, which is to gentrify Oakmont, contrary to what I believe was the vision of Mr. Berger had when he created our community. In conclusion, I became aware that is now time for me to leave because I realize that while being in the arena is an achievement, it is a hollow experience when I have little or no Board influence and cannot make a difference in the direction Oakmont is heading. I wish this Board well in its future endeavors. Sincerely, Gregory Goodwin cc: Kevin Hubred, Manager OVA |
You will be sadly missed, thank you for all you have done.
Greg, I am also very sad to see you leaving the Board, and I share your concerns about gentrification. I am in strong disagreement with the OVA Board Mission Statement, adopted in 2010, which states that one of the primary purposes of the Board is “to have Oakmont perceived as a premier
active adult retirement community in comparison with other similar retirement locations.” While this is subject to a lot of interpretation, I see the current leadership using that statement to justify emulating high-end retirement communities (e.g. Rossmore) that also have high-end dues ($800 to $1,000/month), a direction that will change the nature of Oakmont by driving out our lower-income residents. One particular danger is the dues comparison, which leads some to believe that doubling our dues would be of little consequence because of how low they will still be in comparison to Rossmore.
I hope that the Board will come to believe, as I do, that their duty is to realize a vision of Oakmont that is derived from OVA members and which can be supported by most OVA members, rather than a vision that they make up on our behalf. The topic of the November 6 workshop is “What Should Oakmont’s Future Look Like, and Who Should Decide?” At the very least, those of us who feel as you and I do should show up and have our voices heard — who should decide is all of us, not just our elected directors!
Being new here, I am just catching up with news of what is going on, and I am sad to say the news does not coincide with the reason I bought in Oakmont. I too have a vision of community for the retired to enjoy as it is, and not as a high priced, high dues country club for the well off. I have a large investment in my home here, and am very concerned about where the direction of Oakmont is going. I am trying to be informed, and the letter from Mr. Goodwin kind of said it all for me.
If the Board will not comply with the wishes of the community they will have to go.
The last resort would be to hire a lawyer to oversee our interests.
Thank you Bruce for helping to enlighten me on Oakmont news.
I am very sorry that you have felt the need to leave the Board. You were a good influence and you will be missed.
Well said, Greg, and thanks for your service. But, I suspect, fear might be a better word, that you are right. Oakmont is transitioning to something different than its heritage of affordable retirement living for a wide diversity of people. Whether the electoral scales have tipped will be determined at the next election. Best wishes to you and family.
Thank you Greg for your kind-hearted and compassionate service to the Oakmont community.
Greg,
I echo Elihu Smith’s thank you for your kind-hearted and compassionate service to Oakmont. I always felt you cared for the residents in our community who needed a helping hand — those who needed to feel more safe, the shut-ins, the people who hobble as best as they can to church at the Community Center.
Gentrification by design has no heart. The widows, the retired teachers, fire fighters, small business owners in Oakmont get pushed out to make room for the Silicon Valley “successful, professional, accomplished”, etc. This is “community” ?
My thanks and my heart are with you, Greg.
Mr. Goodwin should be thanked for his service. However, the topic of the advancing “gentrification” of Oakmont is a bit confusing. Anyone who bought here after 2010 was made aware of the mission statement. In addition, if anyone can figure out how to arrest increases in the cost of housing, and living generally, they need to run for public office. The cost of housing is going up almost everywhere, particularly when the area is a highly desirable place to live. We are blessed to reside in one of those areas. The Baby Boom generation is still entering retirement in ever increasing numbers. They will be seeking a pleasant place to retire. Oakmont fits that description. If they owned their homes then they will benefit from its appreciation over the years. That, simply put, translates into more cash to spend on their next residence. The law of supply and demand rules. Fewer homes for sale translates into higher sale prices. Those Oakmonters who are “sellers” are probably happy to sell to the highest bidder. Maybe it’s just their heirs. Either way, it does not appear that any of the more “traditional” residents are lowering their selling price. In the meantime, the dues structure must be more realistic for the needs of the OVA assets. The reserves need to be set and maintained at levels that reflect the actual level of need. Otherwise, more loans will be necessary to renovate our facilities. The OVA needs to be a steward of the community assets. Keep what we have in good working order and repair. Fix what needs to be fixing. While Oakmont doesn’t need to be “gold plated”, it does need to stay relevant. It’s 2018, not the 1970’s or 80’s. Times change.
Inflation is inevitable and has always been a burden on retirees whose income doesn’t keep up with it. Gentrification is not inevitable, and should only be undertaken if it is the clear will of Oakmont owners. We need to maintain our facilities, and make essential improvements for safety and ADA compliance, and we need to maintain reserves adequate to do that. I believe that the 2017, 2018 and 2019 dues increases should be enough for those purposes and to pay off the loan that is being taken for the ERC refurbishment/upgrade. Future dues increases that exceed the rate of inflation should not be needed, unless the community decides that we want to add facilities. I see a split between a number of our leaders, who believe that we need to compete with newer retirement communities by adding facilities (necessitating major dues increases), and most of our community members, who really don’t care about that.
Agree, Bruce, that if a majority of residents want upscale facilities, then we’ll likely get upscale facilities. I wonder though if we don’t have a structural problem that risks some undesirable consequences. As you know, a slight majority of Oakmont homes are multi-family, with over a thousand 3- and 4-plex units. Does anyone know if the owner-occupants of these homes will accept the higher dues necessary? Some OVA members dismiss repeated double-digit percentage increases in dues as trivial. That seems like wishful thinking to me. OVA increases are hardly the only cost pressures many retirees face, with most going for necessities of life and unavoidable taxes and co-pays.
The risk here is that we end up with a continuing increase in the number of renters versus owner-occupants. Is that something we want? The subject merits consideration, imho.
In any case, I hope we don’t try to finance these facilities entirely with debt. No retirement community should carry a large debt, absent an extreme emergency. Think about how worse it would have been had the fires last year swept through Oakmont and we were heavily in debt. Please, don’t go there.
There is gentrification and there is GENTRIFICATION. Property values are determined by the local market. Yes, higher prices do add a bit to a changing demographic and higher quality remodels will also add a bit, but as with all markets, there are “peaks and valleys” in values due to the general economy and local conditions… BUT, when it is a stated goal to remold a community of over 4500 people into a place that offer upscale amenities for people who don’t even live here in Oakmont yet (and possibly never will..) seems “putting the cart before the horse,” and comes off as mean spirited and insulting to a vast number of older residents who ARE LIVING HERE AT THIS TIME. If they wanted to live in an upmarket, community, they should have moved to one in the first place. There are plenty around. What they have done is after discovering one of the most beautiful places in the world, found the property values low, making them attractive to buy in and do lavish remodels. Now that they finished remodeling their homes, they have joined with the “ball boys and girls” who want a younger and more athletic resident, to remodel the whole community into something it is not. All of this apparently is being “engineered” and will be at the expense of the majority. To someone looking at this from the outside, it appears like the present “fearless leaders” are using technology to exclude the very people who could be most affected by an expensive future being thrust upon them. This thing is playing out in an interesting manner. The Bergerbuilders vs.the Let-It-Be-but-keep-it-nicers. I wonder if forcing the elderly, especially people who might own their homes outright , but are living on a limited income, could be considered elder abuse???
Greg, So sorry you chose this time to resign. However you see your influence on the Board, we still need your voice there.
I totally agree with Greg Goodwin’s issues about the Board’s direction. Although I have lived here for almost 15 years I had no idea about Mr. Berger’s vision when he built Oakmont. What I do know is the Board has dragged its feet about what to me is the main issue: All major decisions need to be made by
a vote of the Oakmont Membership including significant financial expenditures rather than routine or
planned maintenance, and therefore, clearly the foot dragging about rewriting the by-laws is to avoid
letting the community vote on major decisions. Unlike Mr. Spanier who writes patronizingly in our Newpaper in his “President’s Message,” about how we need to act like a community, he and the Board
who think they know better than we do, need to rewrite the bylaws quickly and stop dragging it out ad nauseum, hoping they will prevail with their vision that I doubt represents most of the people in Oakmont- If I am wrong, prove it by calling for a vote of the membership.
Mr. Spanier also needs to look up the word “recusal,” since the unfortunate Wall Street Journal article about Oakmont included his smart mouth comment about how our pickleball issue is nothing compared to the OGC issue. Is this the kind of PR Oakmont wants from our so-called RECUSED Board President in a major national newspaper?
I also agree with Greg Goodwin that if things keep going as they have been, he might have potentially been involved in a lawsuit. It has been clear legally, from the beginning of the OGC debacle, the Board cannot make residents pay to bail out or financially support a private, non-Oakmont business. And they were clearly on the path to forcing this until there was a push-back that also made it clear they legally couldn’t. So instead of getting on with the by-laws rewrite, all these months have been wasted forming a committee with the OGC to figure out how to manipulate us in some other way to get our dues or money for the OGC, or frighten us about our property values to get us to do it. I want three things from my OVA Board: take care of regular business, rewrite the by-laws so we all can vote on major decisions, and represent us with good PR to the outside world. Maybe the wealthy people who have a fancier vision, could ban together and privately pay to hire a consulting firm like McKinsey and Company to teach the OGC how to run a profitable business without dragging the rest of us into their own lack of vision and financial issues.
Short report on the Bylaws Revision Committee: I have been attending their meetings, and they are working diligently to perform a complicated task, namely considering for revision every article in the Bylaws and the Articles of Incorporation. They are not foot dragging, but are working toward providing recommendations to the Board in time for the Board to put together a ballot to be included in the spring Board election ballot mailing. And they held well-advertised workshops last week, at which I and any other OVA member could express their opinions about how the Bylaws should be amended.
In today’s meeting, they reviewed and discussed the member suggestions.
Note that the BRC only recommends to the Board; i.e. nothing will be on the Bylaws revision ballot except what the Board decides to put there. The BRC is likely to recommend a number of desirable changes, including increasing the Board size to 9, so that only 1/3 of them are replaced each year, making slate elections more difficult; making membership petitions for OVA meetings effective, with resulting votes binding on the Board; and, if they can figure out a reasonable way to do it, allowing 2-member households to have 2 votes in elections. From what I have observed, everything they are likely to propose is good; they just are not willing to go far enough in the direction of membership empowerment, and even if they were, such proposals would likely be vetoed by the Board.
I have proposed to the BRC, an amendment to limit dues increases to no more than 20% plus inflation in any 5-year time period. Under California law, which is the only current legal restriction, the Board could increase dues 20% per year without a membership vote, which amounts to almost 150% in five years. I have also proposed an amendment to require a binding membership vote for capital improvement expenditures exceeding 10% of the reserve study Total Current Replacement Cost (about $10M in the new reserve study) of all OVA property. I know a lot of you would prefer a much lower threshold than the $1M that would result from this, and I would be OK with a lower threshold, but I was trying to make a proposal that might be accepted. The truth is that enough BRC members are adamantly opposed to either of these proposals, that I don’t expect anything like these to end up in their recommendations to the Board. Some members seem to have the philosophical position that the Board should be making these decisions, and that to allow any membership votes beyond what we already have would be a mistake. More moderate members may see pros and cons, but not enough pros for them to push such a position. From what I understand, the Board (or at least a majority of it) is similar.
I have tried logic, i.e. suggesting things like this, with little success, and apparently not enough people contact the Board or the BRC to matter (and it is not clear that they would change their minds even if a lot of folks did express this to them). The only thing left, I think, is to try to make sure that candidates who share our membership empowerment sentiments run for the Board and understand that this is important to lots of OVA members.
Any changes to the bylaws will fail unless they have voting on each major change as individual amendments. It will be difficult to have enough votes on a major overhaul to the bylaws. Some voters will agree to some changes but not others therefore vote to reject the total overhaul.
Lisa — you are correct. It will require a major push just to get enough OVA members to vote to pass any amendment at all. The amendments will be grouped, considering what is totally non-controversial, what is critical to match California law, etc. They haven’t figured it out yet, but you can be sure that it won’t be just a large conglomeration on an all-or-nothing vote!
Totally agree with you, Ellen
Perhaps we should consider the possibility of legal representation at this stage, before the ‘social engineers’ become totally irresponsible with money not their own. A 300,000 dog park, anyone? And twenty thousand already down the drain for a
‘feasibility study’!!
Mike
Mike
Regarding fiscal responsibility our projects such as the ERC seem to have an open ended budget. We started with a $300,000 remodel and ended at over $1 million for ERC. Anyone who has read the ERC progress reports has not missed the language on all the unexpected scope items such as rerouting pipe and irrigation systems. The reports indicate contingency dollars will be spent or change orders and overruns are likely instead of scope reductions to keep approved project costs under control.
The fact there is no competitive bidding for major construction does not guarantee getting the best price. That’s worries me much more than the $20,000 dog park study that was voted down. I seem to recall the ERC is spending $12,000 on art work, again hand picked by the PM, instead of soliciting bids from other Oakmont artists.
With 2019 dues at $75 per person and some reasonable cap on annual due increases of 5% ( as similarity proposed by Bruce in the bylaw revision), dies will be at $315 per person in many of our lifetimes or $730 for couples. Would you really want to pay $730 a month in your 80s for facilities when you could find suitable facilities a few miles away in Santa Rosa for less money. If we continue at the recent annual 12-16% due increases, dues will be a a lot more and tough to stomach in our 80s!
Thanks for your thoughtful reply, Lisa.
I think the system as it stands is open to abuse. I do have some suggestions, but will come back here after research.
Mike
A board of 9 with one-third elected each year means 3-year terms. Correct? That will frustrate a majority who is displeased with the actions of any board majority.
Greg:
I was shocked to hear the news of your resignation at this October’s Board Meeting.
Thank you for publishing your resignation letter to the Board. You have made your concerns clear. Knowing you, this decision could not have come easily. You are a man of his word, and take your commitments seriously.
Thank you so much for your dedication and endurance through a very trying year and a half on our Board of Directors.
To Mike Olliffe
You will find in the October BoD meeting video a confirmation that the $20,000 “feasibility study” was voted down, for the present, by a vote of 3-3.
Thanks, Kerry, for bringing me up-to-date. The fact that someone actually suggested a study at that cost indicates that the people running things don’t mind how they spend others’ money.
Mike
Greg:
Thank you for your eloquent, clear writing that explains much about salient Oakmont issues. From the response to your resignation letter, it is obvious that you made a valuable contribution to Oakmont and that your presence on the board of directors will be missed by many people.
One pattern I see is the waste of money for studies and plans, when the final decision on an issue turns out to be among the most simple, and one that would have saved much money. For example, how much money was spent before the final decision to put pickleball courts where two tennis courts used to be? As I recall, the pickleball issue started with the desire to convert two tennis courts to pickleball courts.
As a regular, avid tennis player, I had no problem with the idea of converting tennis courts to pickleball because
1. Tennis courts are empty most of the time after noon.
2. When tennis players must give up tennis, it is nice to move to another game they can play. I know many Oakmonters who have done so.
3. Pickleball is the game of the future, and demand will increase.
4. There seem to be more pickleball players than tennis players in Oakmont.
5. Tennis requires more space for fewer players than does pickleball.
6. Pickleball can be learned quickly, but tennis expertise requires years of dedication.
I was shocked that tennis players were unwilling to give up two of eight courts. To me that was the height of selfishness.
When the dust settled and pickleball courts were in place, I was playing tennis one day on the upper East Rec courts. After the match, I walked to my car and saw six pickleball courts full, plus spectators in the deck area. Most surprising was that during my tennis match, I was completely unaware that anyone was playing pickleball–and I am known for my keen hearing, which my tennis buddies will confirm because I am often the only one who can hear a “let” serve.
I encourage Oakmont residents to make changes (by-laws? voting?) that will stop draining funds for proposed projects. Surely there must be a better way of making improvements without wasting money. The obvious first step is a willingness to put the Oakmont community before the interests of small groups.
Yvonne Alexander
Bruce, thanks for clearing up my misperception about by-law footdragging. I would however like to reiterate, and I could be wrong, I think it is likely that if major expenditures, certainly less than 1 million,
were allowed to proceed or not based on OVA membership votes, we not only would find out what most
people in Oakmont want, but based on votes, there would be much less angst and dissension here. And
many of us do not agree with the views of the the majority on the current Board – if we were allowed to
vote, then we would know how many.
Ellen — I completely agree with your logic. We just have to figure out how to get from here to there!
Well folks it is now 2026 and Oakmont hasn’t learned a thing since this wonderful man sounded the alarm.
The same powerful to do people have now circled back and are implementing their desires yet again. This time they want to refinance a multimillion-dollar loan for higher interest. The fiscal mismanagement of Oakmont will continue. Gentrification is defiantly the intention.