Friday, August 5, 2011

Please get involved

Magnolia Point is a golf course community in Green Cove Springs.  Recently they were faced with the chance that their club would be closing.  The HOA and residents got busy trying to figure out if there was anything they could do to help preserve their property values.  I am providing the link to a recommendation to the HOA by Investment Opportunities Committee and the link to the agreement that was signed in July of this year.  These people really did their homework and I applaud both the BOD and the residents who volunteered to do this work.  The recommendation is a very interesting document as it compares to the situation Turkey Creek is faced with.  The largest exception to the comparison is that our club is already closed and to my knowledge there are no concrete deals in the making to change that.  Our HOA may have to take it a step further and find a management group willing to open and operate the club but there is a solution, someone just has to find it.
 I attended the meeting of the BOD on August 3, 2011 and the attitude toward the club was basically “make them mow or we will do it for them.”  The BOD purpose is to help preserve our property values as well as enforce the rules.  I feel they have dropped the ball, if they ever even picked it up, where the club is concerned.  The time to blame has passed and the time for searching for an answer is here.  I am asking, no begging, all homeowners get involved in the fight to preserve our community. 
If you have any suggestion for the Board of Directors, you can email them at board@tcmoa.com.  Using this address will send each of them your correspondence.
The link to the recommendation is http://magptioc.com/Final%20Report(1).pdf

The link to the agreement is http://community.magpt.com/use_agreement.pdf

I remind you that I only post comments of identified authors.

Theenie Smith

2 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for sharing this information. What a wonderful experience for this community/club to have!! So much personal growth, interaction, commitment, achievement, group/individual involvement, etc. This group has developed a great model which could be somewhat modeled in our community as well as others.
    My suggestions are:
    1. Hire the "project leaders" of the Green Cove Springs group to serve as consultants here to help us develop a similar plan. (Since our people have been unsuccessful so far in developing a plan for our community, it would be good to have some outside leadership to coordinate a similar plan here. Especially since they arrived with a successful plan!). I really like the process they incorporated and the written documents they prepared. Very specific and professional!!!!!
    2. Another suggestion I have is to someway involve the City of Alachua. This community also affects the city in more ways than one!!!
    If I come up with other ideas, I will share them. I would also be willing to serve on a planning committee if it is one similar to the one designed by the Green Cove Springs group. It needs to be a positive, proactive, dedicated committee with positive, specific goals!!! I am not interested in negativism, criticism, or personal attacks on people!!!
    Dot Thomas

    This is a P.S. to my previous comments in another e-mail message. Everyone is not going to agree on everything; however, people on the "planning committee" should feel free and comfortable about voicing their opinions without feeling that they may be "shot down" for their contribution. Each committee member should be listened to and the whole committee needs to "agree to disagree" in a positive, respectful manner. This kind of project cannot be done overnight and will take much commitment, involvement, interaction, etc. on the part of the committee members. It would be better to start with a smaller group (10 - 12) to begin the planning process and then involve others later.
    We have quite a few professional type people in the community with similar backgrounds as those involved in the Green Cove Springs project. My suggestion is to begin with a "planning committee" composed of 3-4 members from the TCMOA, 3-4 golf club members, and 3-4 people from the City of Alachua.
    Thanks for listening to (reading) my suggestions!!
    Dot Thomas

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  2. The document is rather lengthy; however, this type of leadership, professionalism and action is what Turkey Creek has not yet had. It seems many are passionate and ready to work, but a sophisticated plan, and options, do not exist. If the Green Cove residents are more homogenous, it might also be easier, as I think our residents are very diverse(?). At the big meeting I was impressed by two things: the passion of many and the total disorganized approach to the matter. Since I feel many did not really believe the course would close, there was no time to create a solid investigative report like the Green Cove one. There needs to be a coalition of golf pro- management- business- facilities knowledgeable people at the helm. Do we have that? I am on a fixed income and it will be very difficult to invest a lot more (some, yes) but I have always been willing to help in some way (retired math teacher, degree in economics) but there seems to be an "in" crowd here and then people like me (my quiet offers to help in some ways have not been addressed, so i finally assumed if I did not come with money I was not needed......). There has been no organized foresight committee, it appears to me...........however, with so many people who love Turkey Creek (I have lived here less than two years), I would assume some are out there. There is no question that owners have an investment and we want to protect it; selling the necessity of action is imperative. Marjorie Ryan ps and ALL residents rely on the fact that driving in here is totally enhanced by the beauty of the course and its surroundings.........coming into a wasteland vs a thriving facility (no matter how big or small or how limited.......) is simply obvious. Please let me know what I can do, and I will try to join the effort.

    Marjorie Ryan

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