Minutes – SIA open Board meeting Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 10am in the driveway at 1991 W. Barefoot Pl.
Minutes – SIA open Board meeting Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 10am in the driveway at 1991 W. Barefoot Pl.
Attending: President Flax by phone Facetime on speaker, VP Finn, Sec. /Treas. Lehnhardt, Board members Melchiori and Garrard. Members Beth Darragh, Renee Hall, Andy Dlugosz, Dave Wolfram and Diane and Ed Seemann.
The meeting was called to order at 10am.
SIA Board meeting Agenda items
1. Finance update – with 2/3rds of the year gone we have spent about 1/2 of the annual budget and have a balance of $66,134.86 in our reserve and operating account. We have spent only $4000 of the $10,000 budgeted from the reserve account for E. Shell Stair repairs and none of the $10,000 budgeted for the SIA perimeter fence repairs.
2. Fence proposal from 1801 E. Pebble Path – the discussion raised concerns about the reason for the fence and the oddity that the request was generated by the renter. There was much discussion on whether these questions regarding the purpose of the fenced mattered if the submission. The submission, after several tries, eventually was the document to be submitted to the County for permitting with the owners signature. It met the current SIA ARC guidelines and was recommended to the Board for approval. Approval was tabled until further clarification could be attained from the owner on whether the fence was to be permanent and who would oversee installation.
NOTE – the owner was contacted by the President right after the meeting and he said the fence was for the renters dogs and would be removed after the end of the rental.
Opinions were also expressed that the ARC current guidelines, revised in 2011 with a few amendments since, based on the original founding documents from 1960, were not specific enough and did not sufficiently reflect esthetic concerns for preserving the jungle like environment the neighborhood is famous for or the cottage-like construction. There was expressed concern that the ARC and Board were not pushing back enough on submissions. It was pointed out that virtually every project built within the SIA in the last several years has had significant pushback from the ARC and Board, with requirements that projects be modified significantly or denying them from being built.
The concern for conservation of the neighborhood look and feel was acknowledged, but it was pointed out that many of the houses in the SIA are older bungalows. Many were damaged in the 2004 hurricanes and replaced with new houses. At some point in the near future, many of the older homes will be purchased and torn down. The new housed built on these lots will not be the old bungalows from the 1960’s. Change is inevitable.
It was agreed that a review of the ARC Guidelines was probably appropriate at this time. They were last fully amended in 2011 with a few additions since then. Several attendees committed to being on a committee to review and propose revisions to the ARC GuIdelines. This has been proposed in recent years but never accomplished. Renee Hall offered to chair the committee. John Finn offered to be the Board representative for the group. Beth Darragh offered to serve and it was suggested that the three ARC committee members, Andy Dlugosz, Steve Melchiori and Lil Fox also participate as they know the issues well. Walter Garrard had been part of the last review in 2011 and he suggested that the committee be 7 people including the Board representative, so that there was a tie-breaker for votes of dispute. We will look for an additional member.
The task will be to deliver to the SIA Board, by August 15, 2026, for its review, a revised ARC Guideline document. The Board will review the document and vote on approving it for distribution to the members for a vote at the annal meeting Nov. 14, 2026. The letter with the revised Guidelines and board election info must go out by September 30, 2026, which is 45 days prior to the annual meeting on Nov. 14.
3. Extended renter stay request from 1801 E. Pebble path – the owners have rented the house out for two months already this year from 1-8-26 to 3-8-26. They have a renter from the area who’s started renting 5-1-26 and wants to rent continually through to June 2027 as their house is being renovated. The renter indicated that they have a home in the Carolinas they can go to if the rental extension is not approved.
The original SIA Declarations limits rentals to six months of the year per property. There have been a couple exceptions made in recent years for significant external circumstances. In one, the renters had stayed 6 months while waiting for their new home to be completed and a hurricane delayed completion by two months. A two month extension was granted. In the other, a renter had their houses in both North Carolina and Vero damaged in the same year by consecutive hurricanes and an extension of two months was allowed until the person could find another alternative.
It was moved and seconded not to approve the extension for the rental at 1801 E. Pebble Path beyond six months for this year. The rental will need to end Sept. 1 2026 for this year, when the six month limit is reached, but can start again Jan. 1, 2027 through May 31, 2027. The motion was passed unanimously.
4. Road repairs update – a sample of the proposed crushed, washed coral stone was provided by the road contractor as the surface coat for all five roads as stated in the original contract signed in August 2025. The contractor has agreed to provide 2 inches of the material on each road, wet down and rolled for no additional cost to the association. Steve Melchiori vouches for the material as he consulted with another contractor he has worked with in the past who strongly supports this material.
Great concern was expressed by attendees that this contractor has delayed work for almost 9 months, appears to have limited ability or desire to complete the job, and was paid for completion of the job before it was in fact completed. It was proposed that this contractor not be allowed to finish the job. However, it was argued that the contractor will do this work at no additional cost. He is still under contract and SIA has nothing to lose in allowing this to move forward. If the contractor comes through, great. If not, we are no worse off than we are now and we can look at other options.
After much debate, it was moved and seconded that the material and installation be approved but that SIA would estimate the amount of material needed, confirm with the contractor that this amount of material and method of installation would be done (Steve Melchiori agreed to get the estimates), and that the contractor be present for the installation and an SIA Board member would oversee the entire project. The motion was passed unanimously.
5. Request for coral stone around E. Shell cul de sac costs + removing posts – there is no cost to this job as it will be included in the road work by the contractor.
However, this sparked a discussion of how the cul de sac planted areas are managed. In general, historically, the cul de sac plantings and wood containment were put in by residents of the cul de sacs and managed by the residents of the cul de sacs and were not actually managed by the association, except for annual trimming and maybe periodic mowing. A desire was expressed to revisit this and add some design features to increase beautification of the plantings. The E. Barefoot Pl cul de sac is under court order for a different management and would not be included in this discussion.The planted areas are on common SIA ground and maybe SIA should be more active in their management. It was decided to include a discussion of this topic at the annual meeting to determine member interest in this.
6. Delinquent dues for one member – one member is currently delinquent in the 2026 dues. There are extenuating circumstances around this as the owner of record in not currently in residence and future ownership is in dispute in divorce court. It was decided to take the next appropriate legal step which is formal notification of the owner of record by letter from stating payment is due within 30 days or the association will move to take a lien on the house.
7. SIA Fence repairs and trimming – update on bids – have two bids only and are awaiting a third bid before moving forward. Action was tabled until the next meeting
8. June Mailing to all members – need nominating chair and committee appointed. The task of the Nominating committee is to come up with a slate of names for the ballot for the annual Board election, vetting each nominee to determine that they meet the bylaws definition of eligibility. Ed Seemann, who has dutifully chaired the committee for 8 years, asked if someone else could take over. It is a difficult job because there is very little interest in being a board member. Ed said he has had only one person from outside the board come to him with interest and only one other person was recruited by his committee in those 8 years. Given that, one of the hard parts of the job was then convincing current board members to run again.
Since all current board members were present at the meeting, we were able to get commitments from each that they would stand for re-election for next year. With that commitment we were able to convince Ed to be our Nominating Committee Chair for another year. Renee Hall volunteered to become a member of the committee representing E. Barefoot Pl., replacing Jean Etzel, who passed away last year. We will approach each of the other members of the committee from the last few years to see if they will represent their streets on the committee.
The meeting was adjourned at 11:45am
submitted by John Lehnhardt, Sec./Treas.