History of the “Renaissance Plan”

NOTE: This post was created by Joe Moore during his 2023 MCA Board member campaign.

Recently I decided to read nearly all of the Meadoword issues during the past several years in an effort to understand how the Renaissance Plan evolved.

In addition to the Meadoword, I used the original “Renaissance Plan” developed and published by the Strategic Planning CommitteeI and all of the the audited financial reports from 2017-2022. Another excellent source of information was a special issue of the Meadoword published in May of 2021, after nearly all the projects had been completed or in the process of being completed.

From the Meadoword, I have summarized some comments made by the MCA president at the time of publication.

2016

A community survey was distributed, collected, and analyzed. It was reported that the survey indicated a strong desire for more amenities. That same year a committee was formed to develop a strategy to answer the concerns and desires expressed in the survey.

2017

In April it was announced that a long range plan was being developed and this plan was near completion. One month later the strategic plan was approved by the board. In the President’s comments, it was noted that additional details would be presented in upcoming editions of the Meadoword. For the next 3 months it was only reported that more details about the plan were forthcoming.

In October most people were surprised to learn that TMCC (The Meadows Country Club) planned to sell the club’s assets to a private developer. Through the efforts by many different people over the next 8 months a plan was developed for the MCA to buy nearly all TMCC assets for about $6 million.

2018

In January the board president announced that more time was needed to develop the Renaissance Plan. In February, the “Renaissance of the Meadows” was selected as a term to describe the master plan for the future. It was also noted that completing the plan and fully implementing it could take years. Purchasing TMCC assets became a part of the overall vision of the Renaissance Plan.

In May we completed the purchase of TMCC property. As reported, “Historically, the MCA always had cash on hand, and through sound financial management, the MCA built healthy reserves. We have now invested a significant portion of our reserves into buying the property, and we have taken out a $3 million line of credit from Centennial Bank to help us meet our obligations at the MCA and those associated with the purchase of the land.” The cost of this purchase was projected to be fully paid for by the end of 2020. This activity was not officially part of the Renaissance Plan but it happened in the middle of that plan and later became part of the plan..

Later in the year the MCA announced the intent to create a dog park and to manage environmentally friendly projects around the tennis facilities as part of the Renaissance Plan. No cost estimates were reported with these projects.

2019

In July, it was reported that a contract had been signed for the renovation of the 17th street entrance. By September, construction had started but I could not find an announcement about the cost of this project. It was also announced that work had started on the Groves golf course but no comment was made about the cost.

In December, an announcement was made about the Renaissance Access Card. As reported in the Meadoword, “This plan directly responds to residents’ desires to have activities, dining, and wellness programs not available through the Meadows Community Association.”

2020

In April, it was announced that design work had started on a community/fitness building. This was part of the Renaissance Plan and long-term capital plan which was not widely distributed. The capital plan indicated that debt was expected to grow to $8.8 million by 3/1/2022.

In May, another article reported planned “improvements to tennis facilities and around the pool and Centre Court Lounge (CCL), significant renovations to golfing (Meadows course) and dining facilities (Regency room), and planned new facilities such as a dog park, added pickle ball courts, walking trail improvements, etc”. The cost of these improvements were estimated to cost $2,000,000.

2021

In the May edition of the Meadoword we were all given, for the first time, a comprehensive report of the capital projects, the actual or projected costs, and the source of funding for the Renaissance Plan. We learned that the Plan was costing nearly $7,000,000 above and beyond the cost of buying TMCC assets ($6,000,000).

We have seen our assessments go up year after year. They increased another 10% in 2022 and are increasing another 10% in January, 2023. The assessments, however, have not been able to keep up with our spending. We ended fiscal year 2/28/2022 with a debt by $5,800,000 (notes payable, net) and our audit report of future maturities of the notes payable are as follows:.

Year Amount ($)

2023 317,796

2024 380,752

2025 397,252

2026 414,468

2027 2,381,150

Thereafter 2,014,248

———-

Total $ 5,905,666

2022

Most of the discussion in the Meadoword was about progress on the new community/fitness center with anticipation about all the possibilities this facility offers the community. I don’t have any information about what our debt might be by the end of this fiscal year and I don’t have any detail information about the beautification projects that were planned for the year.

Summary

It is obvious that a lot of changes have been made since the 2016 community survey. Looking through the comments by our board presidents, it was difficult to understand what was happening with the “Renaissance Plan” as we moved forward from month to month..

I believe the Renaissance Plan would have been better understood if we could have been presented a capital plan at the end of each year along with our budget for the coming year. This capital plan would be a 3-5 year plan that shows revenue and spending over that time horizon with a list of projects to be done and the cost estimate of each project and the estimated date of completion.

Personally, I decided to run for the MCA board because I don’t believe our past board members did a good job of monitoring and reporting the spending associated with the Renaissance Plan.

It is my intent to work hard to see the board adopt a 5-year plan of revenue and spending that includes homeowner involvement so we are not surprised about our assessments or debt,