Master board takes up the tram, the cable proposals and tables for the Beachwalk

The tram

Director Mike Wade gave the report. “We started the tram operation for reasons everybody understands,” he said. “We agreed to do it through the end of the year, which is really the end of our agreement. So now the question is where do we go next?”

The fee charged to renters has been dropped. “It was so confusing,” Wade said. “We stopped charging. It is free service now for everybody.” Riders book by app or phone, and by his figures the longest wait this year was under ten minutes. Drivers are needed full time from mid-March into September.

The plan for 2027, “not approved yet,” is to run the tram through the resort’s security staff. Wade put a year of service at “under a hundred thousand” dollars, down from an early estimate of $150,000. The discussion was about how to fund the service, not about charging riders by the trip or by the day. Wade suggested that the cost be split between owners and renters, and offered figures as a starting point: $10 added to each owner’s quarterly assessment, and about $10 from each rental. The suggestion was his, not the board’s. How the tram is paid for is a decision for the board. It did not vote on the 2027 plan or on any way of paying for it, and both go to the budget workshop.

Owners asked that guest registration fees cover it instead. Garey said the board has not decided: “We do a budget workshop, and then we finalize the budget.”

A new owner asked what the tram cost before this year. Wade: “We don’t know. We know what we’ve been told, but we don’t know.” In March 2022 the commercial owner’s general manager told owners the tram cost about $140,000 a year, all of it paid by the company.

Garey said Wade has carried this year’s cost himself: “He’s spent seventy, eighty thousand, ninety thousand dollars this year on everything, and he’s going to take that as a loss personally, because he stepped forward at a critical time for this resort as an owner.”

Telecommunication proposals

The association holds the resort’s bulk cable and internet contract with Cox. “We’ve been courted by several telecommunication companies to look at different options,” Willis said. The proposals go to the budget workshop.

Garey told owners the offers are for fiber and streaming in place of cable. “Fiber is only as good as to what extent it gets to your TV,” he said. He asked owners to talk it over in their neighborhoods: “Is this resort ready to go streaming?” For owners who rent, “how are our guests going to accept streaming as the only option, and how many phone calls does that take to resolve?” A renovated unit at the Tides skipped the Cox hookup last year, he said, and had to add it when winter guests arrived.

An owner asked whether there have been complaints about the current service. Garey: “I don’t know of any.” On moving the resort from Cox’s cable service to streaming, he said: “I’m not going to make a decision for this resort” without everybody.

Willis said a switch to fiber would be “probably a year-long project.” Internet and cable are a pass-through of about $500,000 in the Master’s $1.5 million budget, Garey said.

Tables, chairs and umbrellas for the Beachwalk

The agenda called for a vote. The board tabled it by motion. “We’ve looked at one set of chairs and tables or whatever and umbrellas,” Garey said. “We need to look at a few more options.”

The idea is Wade’s: seating along the nine-foot walkway beside the beach shack, where beachgoers leave their shoes. “Someone can sit down there and have a sandwich or something to eat,” he said. An owner asked whether it would take up any of the beach. “Not on the beach,” Wade said.

Owners on Zoom objected. Beach Manor president Rick Bell said tables would send more trash into the dunes. Another owner said the boardwalk is too narrow and asked the board to poll owners first.

A permanent restroom near the beach

“We do not want to do porta potties again next year,” Wade said. The board is looking at a permanent building as close to the beach as plumbing and sewer lines allow. One site is beside the beach walkway, which would need the approval of Beach Manor or the Tides. Another is the old tram stop off the circle, now a bike rack, which has a concrete pad and sits next to the resort’s sewer lift station.

Garey said the board will bring in the architect who designed the owners’ lane and the visitor center. “Our goal is to get something done by spring break of next year.”

Bell said a restroom on Beach Manor property is “an absolute no-go.” Owners offered other sites: the beach-chair hut, the shower area by the boardwalk, and a restroom trailer.

The rest of the agenda

• Insurance. Willis reported the general liability, property and umbrella policies renewed September 28 and paid. Coverage runs to September 28, 2027.
• Office rent with the Summit. The question is whether the Master keeps renting office space at the Summit in 2027. It pays the Summit $2,500 a month, or $30,000 a year. The association’s manager no longer works from that office; a member of the office staff does. Willis said the rent continues through December and the board will decide at the budget workshop, where it has “been requested to look for other ways to decrease the budget.” An owner asked that the on-site office be kept. Willis: “It’s the board’s decision.”
• Tides signage. Approved, unanimous. Four backlit signs: two on the curved walls at the Tides entrance, one over the building’s entry, and a small monument sign between the circle and the building. Garey presented the item as president of the Tides.
• 2027 budget workshop. No date yet.
• Annual meeting. Willis is setting the date and venue with the association’s attorney.
• The dunes. Discussion, no vote. Willis said the Dune Doctors service ended “over four or five years ago” and that he is working with Beach Manor to establish the property lines. “We will take care of the TMA sections of dunes.”
• Minutes. The minutes of the last board meeting were approved.