Annual Meeting Wednesday

The annual meeting for the St. Charles Place HOA happens Wednesday, October 19. Your annual meeting notice should have come in the mail a couple of weeks ago. If you cannot attend, it's important for you to return your proxy form. For the meeting to happen at least 30% of all eligible homeowners must either attend the meeting in person or return a proxy form, which basically says that you consent for the meeting to happen without you.

This is important. The annual meeting is where we elect a new board of directors. If we cannot elect a new board, the HOA could go into something called receivership and we'd pay lawyers boatloads of money to do what our fellow owners currently do for free.

That would likely mean a big hike in HOA fees. At this point, it's too late to mail your proxy form in. But you can fax a completed form to (813) 349-5865 or scan an email it to board@stcharlesplace.us any time before 3 p.m. Wednesday. The meeting happens at the usual meeting place, 6554 Krycul Avenue, in the Krycul Business Center.

Besides passing the budget and electing the new board, the current board has held off on action on two major issues so that homeowners at the meeting could weigh in on them.

First is assigning parking spaces. Each unit that does not have a garage would have one space close to its front door labeled for that unit. Other spaces would be marked "Resident/Guest". This would do two things: one, is that every unit in the community would have at least guaranteed one parking space. Two, it would make clear that any space not assigned to a particular unit is fair game for any resident or visitor.

As someone without a garage, I have mixed feelings. It would be great to know that I could always park near my home. (At least in theory. Whether people respect the markings and whether it's worth the hassle to try to get an offending car moved in reality is another matter.) On the other hand, it will make official a disparity between homes with garages and ones without. Those with garages have two spaces already - one inside the garage and a second one in the driveway - while those without would have just one guaranteed spot.

The board wanted to hear what more owners thought before deciding anything.

The other matter that the board wanted more owner feedback about was how to stop cars speeding in the community. If you live here, you have heard the engines rev as cars accelerate and get to pretty amazing speeds on such narrow roads. It is one of the issues that residents have consistently expressed concern about in our community's history.

One possible solution is installing speed humps, like the ones on Hackney Drive, the east-west road just south of us. That would mean a pretty large capital expense, and - according to our property manager - a possible increase in our insurance rates. (I'm not sure why that would be, but that's the contention so I thought I'd mention it.)

Another thing would be to hire either a sheriff's deputy or a private company to enforce speeds by stopping offenders and writing tickets. We'd have to post speed limit signs, and warnings about enforcement, and it would cost a lot in labor to do it.

Neither solution would come cheap, and that's why the board wanted owners' thoughts on them.