Marymoor Trails
Annual Meeting of Homeowners
February 22, 2021

The Annual Meeting of Homeowners convened at 6:32PM on Monday, February 22, 2021 via Zoom. Due to pandemic precautions, we were unable to meet in person.  Attending on behalf of the Marymoor Trails Board of Directors were: Michael Niksa, President; Josh Gibson, Treasurer; Van Chesnutt, Landscape; Jerimiah Willhite, Special Projects; Linda O’Hara, Secretary; and Tim Hollingshead of Morris Management.

Roll Call and Determination of Quorum

The first order of business was a formal roll call and establishment of a legal quorum to do business. With 35.193% attending, we do not have a quorum – 51% is required. This 51% requirement is a vestige from so-called “Old Act” condos, the legal requirement in Washington state when Marymoor Trails was legally established in 1989.  Associations with newer construction now only require 25% for a legal quorum.

Without a quorum, we cannot take any legally binding actions at this meeting. However, we will go ahead and have the meeting, updating all present on a wide variety of items, in case someone challenges conducting normal business. Tim has spoken to the attorneys about this, and we are good to proceed.

Proof of Notice of Meeting

Tim showed the group the mailer that went out. In addition, mailbox signs were posted; an email was sent by Morris Management to all owners; and an Association email was sent to all residents who have signed up to receive them.

Reading and Approval of Minutes from 2020 Annual Meeting

Tim presented for review the meeting minutes from the 2020 Annual Meeting of Homeowners, and shared it on his screen for everyone to read. Tim told the group that these are the Annual Meeting minutes from last year, and if we see anything that we object to, or wish to change, to please speak up. Otherwise this will be approved as written. Everyone took several minutes to read them.

Van Chesnutt moved that we accept the minutes as written from last year, this motion was seconded by Sherri Brown, and approved by unanimous consent.

Reports of Officers and Committee Reports

Landscape Report – Van Chesnutt

In 2020, the company we used for landscaping was Premiere Landscaping. They also take care of our sprinklers and perform miscellaneous landscaping tasks.

Over the year Premiere Landscaping did additional work in addition to just lawn maintenance.  Specifically:

• Sprinkler work including sprinkler head replacement
• Drain issue in front of K building
• Bush replacement behind building F
• Leaf removal

Bodine Construction performed work to address drain issues in and around buildings D, L & M.

Davey Tree trimmed trees and removed a tree behind J and replaced one for Building A.  They also did tree fertilization.

Rains revealed a clogged drain near Bldg. K, which was inspected by Van and Tim.

Innovac came out to clean a drain for building K, and reported that the drain also needs to be roto-rooted.  Bodine did this.

Secretary’s Report – Linda O’Hara

• Responsible for communications to the Association
• Meeting notes, mailbox signs, emails to owners, and Facebook page for residents
  • One of our priorities is having meeting notes come out relatively quickly, so residents are aware of issues and developments in a timely manner;
  • We flag key items at the mailbox to alert all residents, whether renters or owners, whether signed up for HOA emails or not;
  • We always back up mailbox postings with HOA emails to those in the community who have signed up to receive these. Sometimes there is more information than we can post on a mailbox sign;
  • One of our residents set up a Facebook page, and this has proven to be surprisingly popular.  The Facebook discussions are non-official business – chats among neighbors — gardening, items for sale or trade, mis-delivered packages. This has also proven to be useful for noting suspicious activity.
  • We used to post personal notices at the mailbox, items for sale, promoting a business, etc.  Now that we have the Facebook page, we have no resident postings at the mailbox – we post these on Facebook.
• All this year, the Board has met via Zoom. We’ve missed meeting in person and providing the in-person contact with the Board for residents to come and speak in person. We hope to resume these when it is safe.

Treasurer’s Report – Josh Gibson

It’s the Treasurer’s job to essentially make sure we do not run out of money. In Josh’s assessment, we are doing fairly well. We have our reserves up around 50%, better than historically. To avoid a special assessment, we are looking at getting that up higher. MMT homeowners have not missed many monthly dues payments, even in the current pandemic. We raise dues because our vendors are raising prices – money is going out, and money has to come in. After careful evaluation of finances, we had a 2021 dues increase of 6%.

January 2021 month-end balances were as follows: Operating Account (checking) $49,274.69 and Reserve Account (savings) $347,020.68.

Special Projects Report – Jerimiah Willhite

Special projects were largely on hold in 2020. Special projects include new directional signage and new unit address numbers. Many new projects, such as lighting, are on hold because of the pandemic and also because expensive issues like roofing may be on the horizon. If anyone has any special project recommendations, please contact Jerimiah.

President’s Report and Buildings Report – Michael Niksa

Michael reports as both President of the Association and the board member responsible for buildings. This is a big responsibility and we appreciate all he does. We did a lot less than usual on buildings in 2020.  Because the pandemic lockdown occurred during our prime work season — we couldn’t get any contractors out here. In the summer however, Gene the Handyman and Mike did a pass on the property and identified 6-8 more decks to be resurfaced with Trex. In addition, they replaced some posts, identified spot repairs to siding, and replaced a couple of damaged garage door panels. Due to the pandemic lockdown, building repairs were limited.

Last year, again due to the pandemic, we did not do a painting walk-around with Casa Bonita. We hope to do a thorough inspection this year.  In some places our building siding is approaching end of life, and we are doing tactical replacement of areas of damaged siding and repainting to match our standard colors.

There are two big issues facing the Association – Bldg. B foundation and roofing.

Bldg. B foundation – The good news this year is that professional surveys until now have said nothing is moving. We will do one more survey and we know there is still remediation work to be done. This does not mean that nothing will ever happen, but right now and for the past year, nothing has happened. Everything is presumed stable. This is great news – both for the residents of Bldg. B as well as the Association. There is still follow-up remediation to be done for cosmetic fixtures and finishes. This has been delayed in 2020 because it is very difficult to get contractors, due to many home projects being done by many people during the pandemic shutdown. Construction teams are heavily booked in advance. We had a construction crisis before — now it’s worse.

Roofing — According to the Association’s long-term plan, our roofs were supposed to be good for 18 more years. However, we are seeing some roofing issues far in advance of the normal 30-year lifetime. Both Bldgs. E and M have roof issues. We have already determined that we will have to replace roofs on one or both of these buildings in the near future. We are looking at costs very carefully. We believe we have enough money in reserves to cover re-roofing one or two buildings out of on-hand cash with no special assessment. At this point, we think we can safely do only Bldgs. M and E and do not need to do the entire complex-. In addition, to get the most value for our money, we are not going to patch and re-roof a single unit, because re-roofing one unit costs 2/3 as much as doing the whole building. 

Next Steps:  We need two things as a Board:  (1) a more accurate evaluation of the damage, and (2) a solid cost prediction. We will rely on information from our project manager, Jehan Bharucha, and Jim Reilly, professional engineer, as we do not have the expertise. We are very hopeful that we can get more mileage out of many of our roofs – it appears that not all buildings show the same damage. It is possible that a batch of bad shingles made it onto some roofs and not others. Will we safely be able to avoid re-roofing all 14 buildings? We don’t know.  Of the 14 roofs across all of our buildings, 9 buildings show no damage at all – they may be just fine; 3 buildings have some issues but are not a critical issue right now; 2 buildings (E and M) have water related issues that need to be addressed as soon as possible. Our next step is having engineering give us a work plan and detailed cost estimates. We need to get moving on this quickly.

Other Building Items

Looking down the road to the future, whenever we replace an entire building of siding, we will investigate the feasibility of replacing original windows at the same time. To be clear, we have no firm plans to address siding or window replacement at this time. When we do get to that point, we’ll notify the Association and give everyone an opportunity to weigh in with their opinions and discuss it. We do not have any imminent problems with windows or siding. Michael plans to walk around with Gene the Handyman in the spring and do a painting inspection with Casa Bonita. The Association will also replace several deteriorating decks with Trex this year.

President’s Remarks

As for being the president, thank you for everyone coming tonight, thank you to the Board. It has been a hard year for everybody. We have a great community, people who watch out for each other, even though things are hard. Thanks to everybody for hanging in there. Maybe in June we have a big community get-together outside in lawn chairs on the upper lawn?!

Tim thinks that we are a really great Board. He works with 10 associations, and our Board is really top notch. Tim says the Marymoor Trails Board really tries to think through decisions, seek alternatives, see if something is too expensive. Everyone on this Board takes their position seriously.  Makes Tim’s job easier.

Unfinished Business

Nothing at this meeting.

New Business

A motion was made for the Election of officers, Van Chesnutt for Landscaping; and Jerimiah Willhite for Special Projects. Both Van and Jerimiah have agreed to stay on in their present roles. We cannot officially elect them at this meeting since we do not have a quorum. However, the rest of the Board can appoint them at the next Board meeting.  Tim says this is the legal procedure. Tim asks if anyone has a reasonable argument objecting to them to serve on the Board, to please speak now – no objections. Homeowners present unanimously approved Van and Jerimiah serving another two years. The Board will finalize this at the March Board Meeting.

Approval to Sign IRS Form 70-604

The last item needed at this meeting is approval of an IRS form that is used every year. This IRS form allows the Association to roll over unused money from 2020, not be taxed on it, and use the money for expenses in 2021. Tim reads the legal language association with the motion. Moved to approve by Jerimiah, seconded by Van, with all homeowners present voting in favor. Tim will keep this on file.

Questions from Homeowners

Sherri Brown – B106 – re: Bldg. B, minutes said we are good to go, we can repair cracks, and it can be sold without a restriction on selling. The additional notice that was on the packet that Tim generates has been amended to say there is no evidence of change and no belief we will have a special assessment to remediate at this time. We believe there are a couple of cosmetic things outstanding caused by the situation that the HOA will cover to the affected homeowners. We have put foam under slabs and have been advised that we can survey less often.

To be honest, we did not want to put in any numbers because we did not have a concrete plan or bids, but sellers insisted that their buyers wanted hard figures, a range of numbers. The number we came up with is based on a rough estimate of what a project manager thought it COULD cost as an absolute worst case plus additional 10% padding/contingency.

David Webber – B108 – added on to that with an additional question. As far as the “remediation”, how should we proceed along those lines. Michael calls David to come to the next regular board meeting, get a list going, get Jehan out here to see what David describes as significant creaking that has developed after the foaming. Want to make sure we are getting a reasonable number of repairs and within budget. Bringing in Jehan is fine, but he costs a lot of money, too. Michael states we cannot have something that costs $75,000 as it would blow out the budget and require us to special assess the other homeowners, and David says we do not need to redecorate his whole house.

Sherri and David have spoken, and they could probably have the same contractor come out and do the same job on both, patching cracks.

Adjournment

Michael placed a motion to adjourn, seconded and unanimously approved.  Adjourned at 7:20PM.

Next regular Board meeting is Monday March 15, 2021 at 10:00am via Zoom. Tim will send out meeting link information to Board and owners who request it.

Board of Directors Meeting
Monday February 22, 2021
Immediately following Annual Meeting of Homeowners
7:20PM via Zoom

Bldg. B Remediation

The Board will have residents in Building B come to the next meeting with a list of what needs to be done for their unit. The Board can review the list, identify what is in scope for repairs, and determine final action. The Board’s goal is to provide satisfaction to the homeowners in Building B who suffered a loss from the foundational issues while also protecting the assets of the association on behalf of the other homeowners. We will look to keep remediation within a reasonable total cost. Since this does not have a line item in the budget, we look to constrain it within the contingency amounts and not place an undue burden on all other homeowners.

Bldg. K Approvals

Air conditioning request for Unit #K-139 is approved.  Resident also requests approval for patio and landscaping extending very slightly beyond the pony wall, as neighboring units have done. Michael says it is appropriate. Tim does not believe encroachment will be a problem. Resident also requests approval for “Sunsetter”-style patio awning. There are awnings on the back of other units; Board discusses concerns that drilling holes in buildings may introduce siding rot. Michael says it is not a large risk — there are a lot of things drilled into our buildings: furnaces, air conditioning lines, electrical boxes. Board has no complaints or concerns, as long as the color is tasteful and the homeowner accepts risk of it needing to be removed and reinstalled in the future during normal building maintenance activities.

Detailed Roofing Evaluation and Estimate

Board approves $8750 in estimated costs for Jim Reilly, Certa Engineering, to obtain detailed as-built drawings to develop a comprehensive detailed bid. Jehan Bharucha says this price for this work is a very good deal. This covers meetings, time, expense, including City of Redmond. City of Redmond is really awful to deal with, can take a lot of time and expense. They are not friendly at all to deal with. If Jim takes longer, and he has to spend more time with them, it could cost more.

Part of the $8750 will cover $2500 for as-built architectural drawings for Bldgs. E and M. We need these blueprints to address the leaking roofs on Bldgs. E and M. To save money for future work we know is coming up, we will also pay an additional $2000 to get as-built architectural drawings for all the other buildings at the same time. For $2000 more we cover everything — just keep them on hand. This is why we hired Jehan, he is the expert, he says it is an excellent deal and what needs to be done.

We need to get moving on this. Jehan called Tim.  The reason Jehan is concerned, need to get this moving, the closer we get to summer, the harder it is to get contractors.  The closer to summer, the more difficult.  The Board unanimously approved authorization of $8750 to Jim Reilly, and getting the full set of as-built architectural blueprints.

Next meeting is Monday March 15, 2021 at 10:00am via Zoom. Tim will send out meeting link information to board and owners who request it.