Summit owners seat three directors, and the board takes up what it pays to run the building

The election

Eight owners ran for three seats. Three owners drawn by lot counted the paper ballots, and the office pulled the online votes from the voting portal. Neumann read the results near the end of the meeting.

There were 114 ballots. Frederick Lanier, the interim treasurer appointed in August, had 81 votes and won a two-year term. Sandy Carter, the secretary, was next with 72. She was not seated. Florida law says a director who has served eight straight years can only stay on with two-thirds of the votes cast. “She came in at 63 percent. She needed 67 percent,” Neumann said. Deena Clausen and Megan Shifrin took the other two seats. Shifrin had 52 votes. Clausen’s count was not clearly stated, and the counts for Eric Beeler, Amy Corona, Joel Richardson and Karen Roberts were not read aloud.

A second question on the ballot, whether to roll the 2025 surplus into 2026, passed with 115 yes votes.

Two long-serving directors left the board. Mike McLaren, who could not run again under the same eight-year rule, thanked owners: “I’ve been on the board 15 years. I’ve attended 71 meetings. Obviously, you reelected me six times.” Carter wished the new board luck and hoped “that someone else will take up the activities that I have originated for you all.” John Regan, an owner on Zoom, called the two “unsung heroes.”

The new board and its officers

Right after the owners’ meeting, the seven directors chose officers. Keith Raines stays president, over at least one no vote. Wade Johnson stays vice president. For treasurer, Jim Nolan nominated Clausen and Raines nominated Lanier; Lanier won with five votes. Shifrin is secretary. Nolan asked that this year’s budget be built line by line, and Lanier agreed: “The budget will be line item.”

The board meets again Monday, November 16, at 9 a.m. Central, to adopt the 2027 budget, which must be done by December 1. The 2027 quarterly meeting dates will be set then. The two new directors have 90 days to complete the state board certification course.

The seven directors are Keith Raines, Wade Johnson, Frederick Lanier, Megan Shifrin, Diane Chapman, Deena Clausen and Jim Nolan.

The management contract

The longest discussion of the day was about what the Summit pays Virtuous Management Group, and whether to ask other companies for proposals. The contract expires December 31. If no new contract is signed it goes month to month at a fee 5 percent higher, Lanier said. Talks with Virtuous for 2027 have begun.

Owners heard two sets of numbers. Diane Vescovo, an owner and McLaren’s wife, put the three Virtuous line items at $135,000 for management, $285,000 for the maintenance staff and $20,000 for accounting, $440,000 in all, against about half that in 2022. She asked whether the building needs four maintenance people and offered to spend the next month collecting bids. Lanier gave the five-year budget figures: the management fee went from $64,680 in 2021 to $135,550 in 2026; maintenance staff from $137,000 to $285,000; landscaping from $34,000 to $76,000, “an item that needs to be looked at closely”; and reserves from $276,000 to $594,000 after the state’s new reserve rules. Utilities barely moved.

Nolan said management costs “have doubled in four years,” about $1,200 to $1,400 a year per owner. McLaren said the board had voted in May to review the contract and get competitive bids. Neumann said she had found just over $19,000 in savings this year and had negotiated the cooling tower repair down from about $50,000 to about $32,000. The Summit tried three maintenance employees and went back to four, Raines said.

Lanier said a management company should be chosen through a request for proposals, not a price bid, and that it cannot be done by January 1. At the board meeting he described how he would do it: write the request, call five companies with comparable properties, cut the list to three, check references and compare staffing and accounting systems. Nolan asked that the request require job descriptions for the on-site staff, that the association own all of its records on the company’s servers, and that maintenance staff be back on site within 48 to 72 hours after an evacuation. Vescovo said to start by calling the companies and asked who Grand Villas uses. George Van der Schoor, an owner, asked what the problem with Virtuous is. “In my two months, I have no problems with them at all,” Lanier said. “I think the issue is that the owners want to be assured that we are getting the best service for the best dollar.” Clausen noted the cost of changing companies and retraining staff. No motion was made. Lanier’s commitment: “We will look at getting everything bid as well as best as possible.”

• May 29Nolan asked for competitive bids on the Virtuous contract and asked to see the contract and mark it up before the president signed it. The motion that passed, made by McLaren and seconded by Nolan, was to circulate the contract to every director, read it, and then decide whether to bid it out: “We’re spending 285,000. Everybody should read it.” Two directors abstained, Lorri Webster and Diane Chapman. On Saturday Carter said McLaren had volunteered to do the review.
• After May 29The 2026 Virtuous contract was signed June 2, four days later, on the “Board President/Designate” line. Neither the August 4 nor the August 22 meeting took up the review. No board vote approved the contract or the extension Raines said he signed.

• The recordAt the May 29 meeting the board was told the Virtuous contract had expired December 31, 2025, and the Summit was month to month. On Saturday Lanier said the contract runs to December 31, 2026.
• The recordThe Post’s account of the Summit’s audited spending from 2021 to 2025 is at topslpost.com/summit-money.

The treasurer’s report

Through September 30 the association shows a surplus of about $86,000. About $1.9 million is in reserve and investment accounts, now earning about two percentage points more interest than before. The 2025 audit arrived last week; the law requires it by June 30, and Lanier said the accounting firm has promised in writing that next year’s will be on time.

The 2027 budget “is a work in progress. It looks good,” Lanier said. Payroll will carry a cost-of-living increase. Insurance may come down: the reinsurance market is favorable, and the broker expects a reduction, though nothing is settled. The hurricane deductible is almost $2 million, Raines said, so the storm damage will not be a claim.

After Isaias

Units in the 01 stack, with windows toward the highway, took water, and the north end, including 801 and 901, had leaks whose source has not been found. Raines asked every owner to check their unit.

The generator ran low on diesel by Sunday with three elevators drawing on it, and the fuel contractor did not deliver. Two owners, Eve and Craig Norwood, brought diesel from their farm in a pickup, twice. Nolan said the building should run one elevator on the generator, not three. Neumann said the elevator company’s advice in a larger storm is to shut them all down before the power fails, and that the board, not the manager, should make that call.

Raines thanked the staff who came in during the evacuation and the owners who cleaned the parking lot and pool deck themselves. Among them he named the publisher of this site and his wife, Martin and Amy Corona, who set up a Starlink terminal so the building had internet. Neumann said the landscaper had not yet been back to the property. Raines asked for a bonus for the employees; at Lanier’s request it waits for the November budget meeting.

The building

Johnson listed the work ahead. The cooling tower gets an overhaul this winter. The rusted electrical conduit under the garage will be replaced with PVC one stack at a time, with power off in each stack for one to two days; a schedule is to come. The fire pump control panel will need replacing, and the board is looking for a part that fits so it does not “spend forty thousand dollars we don’t have to.” The building is due to be resealed and repainted in 2028, balconies included.

Balcony floors are the owner’s expense, and tile on them is a problem: water gets under it, rusts the steel and lifts the concrete. The board banned balcony tile about six years ago. Owners asked when the salt-caked windows would be washed; after hurricane season ends November 1, the board said. Nolan asked that the soundproofing layer under new floor tile be checked before it goes down. Johnson said it is part of every remodel application. Nolan suggested a building committee to set standards; it was left for the new board.

The board approved $4,164 to repair the fence beside the cooling tower, damaged in the storm.

The rest of the agenda

• Security cameras. Raines asked for a show of hands on cameras throughout the building and parking lot. “It’s not a majority,” he said, and left it for another day.
• Owner reminders. Pets are for owners only. Service the air conditioner twice a year, install braided stainless supply lines, and carry at least $2,000 of loss-assessment coverage on the unit policy.
• The bylaws. The 1980s bylaws are being rewritten by Townsend under a $7,500 engagement. The review was tabled this year because legal fees were over budget. Lanier: “This is an action item for the newly elected board.” Vescovo asked that the new bylaws set regular meeting dates so owners can plan to attend.
• The Master Association seat. McLaren said the board had voted to look into naming a Summit representative who is not a director, and that an opinion letter from the Master’s attorney says that cannot be done. Raines: the Master’s documents, as its attorney reads them, require the representative to be a Summit director. “You can vote whoever you want. They will not be on the master board.” Vescovo said Raines has held the seat by custom and has never been elected or appointed to it. Van der Schoor said the board the owners elected should choose.
• Report of the Master Association representative. Raines said the Master went to mediation and that he was there about six hours; he said nothing about what happened in it. The Master is having an engineer look at building a restroom at the old tram stop by the circle. Owners pressed him for about ten minutes: why build when nothing is settled, and what the Master’s legal fees are. Vescovo put them at $73,000 through August. “As far as what we’re spending, I’m not really sure,” Raines said. Lanier moved to return to the Summit agenda, and the motion carried.