July 2023 Wheelwright Cluster HOA Board Meeting Minutes

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Tuesday, July 11th, 2023

7 pm

Virtual via Zoom

Attendees: 

Board: 

Cluster Residents: 

Agenda

Community updates

1)  VCAP project – Adele from DecoFootprint will join us for a short segment of the meeting at 7:15 to answer any questions.

  1. Who is responsible for determining underground utilities?  For HOA common areas, we typically schedule Miss Utility to mark for underground public utilities roughly one week prior to any field work for project design or project build.  If there is concern for marking private utilities, most HOA Boards have their management company schedule this, or for an extra fee we can coordinate this.  
  2. Complaints – is there a time frame where we as a client have time to assess work and have issues addressed?  After our field inventory, site analysis, base mapping, stormwater assessment, VCAP/CAP project concepts and design, we can schedule a design presentation to reveal the proposed project plans before submitting to NVSWCD the project application that includes the plans.  We can discuss any revisions, if needed, and then submit the project application to be considered for rebate approval.
  3. Is this a severable contract?  The reason we present a separate Design Proposal first is to cover our services rendered for planning, design, application submission that includes a preliminary budget, and application approval.  Once your VCAP project application is approved, we present a second Project Proposal that outlines the project site prep, site work, and site restoration.  
  4. Watering of vegetation – responsibility of client or DecoFootprint?  If water access is provided by the private homeowners near the project, we typically like ot water immediately after planting and adding the mulch layer.  This is usually one of the last steps before site restoration.  The HOA is responsible for watering the vegetation after the first watering.   
  5. What condition will jobsite be left after completion of work?  Site restoration is mentioned in our Project Proposal.
  6. Plant guarantee – pests/disease?   This is mentioned in our Project Proposal.
  7. Is travel time billed?  ​​​​No.
  8. Underground obstructions clause?  What happens if there is something that is found that makes the work substantially more difficult?  This is mentioned in our Project Proposal.
  9. Acts of God clause?  Also mentioned in our Project Proposal.
  10. Is work/plants guaranteed for some period of time upon completion?  Also mentioned in our Project Proposal.  Here’s a link to our SAMPLE Project Proposal:  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MvJGK9P4PaepHm-66-agCS3SuJujuhN5/view?usp=sharing
  11. Regarding property plats, many of our homeowners do not have these and when they’ve been necessary for work, homeowners have had to shell out costs to have their land surveyed.  Homeowners have not had luck obtaining these records from the county.  Have you had this issue before?  I have a site planning map of the whole neighborhood – I’m not sure if that would help at all.  Unless a homeowner waived the plat at settlement, the majority of property owners received a property plat with their settlement papers.  If they settled on the property less than 7 years ago, they can contact their settlement company to request a copy if available, contact their realtor to chase it down, or make a trip to the Fairfax County land records department to request a copy.  For townhome property owners in Fairfax County, it’s not available to request a plat online.  Other HOA Boards provide both the community planning map/s (aka grading plans) and the community record plats.  Both sets of plans are extremely helpful.  The record plat is the more important one because it’s the legal recordation of the community property lines, easements, right-of-ways, etc.  If the Board does not have these plans, and they do not wish to pay extra for an engineer or surveyor to prepare new land surveys (expensive!), then a Board member or community volunteer makes a trip to the Fairfax County land records department to request copies of the community recordation plans. 

Clarifications Provided by Board Members in Q&A with Adele from Deco Footprint

  • Rick Fairbank- Shared with Kristina that he doesn’t think it would be standard for most homeowners to have their plats. This didn’t appear to him to be a common theme in closings that he has seen. Rick explained that our entire plat for the community is on file with Fairfax County and because there are such standard delineations for properties, not every mortgage lender feels the need to require a plat, nor does every seller get required to require one in selling. 
  • According to Adele, individual plats are less important for this project than the community plats. However, the issue of roof water and creating appropriate irrigation, might create complexity because the irrigation may need to begin at the site of individual homeowners, but as the focus is on a communal area (the steep hill) and this is a community supported conservation landscaping project, Adele felt okay that we could begin without individual plats.
  • What would it look like if we did need to get individual plats? How would we proceed with that, recognizing that they are not on file with Fairfax County? According to Adele, Deco Footprint would just have to be more cautious with their measurements to ensure they are not missing something that could cause a problem down the road, but they have worked on similar situations working without plats. 
  • At what point does a community submit their application to the Reston Association from Adele’s perspective? After the design plan is finalized or approved by VCAP? Adele recommends doing both simultaneously in case we are approved as her company is largely limited to two planting seasons in Northern Virginia, Spring and Fall, due to weather. This way if approved for the VCAP grant, RHOA is also already approved and Deco Footprint could begin their work as quickly as possible. 
  • Is April the earliest planting? Generally speaking, but as long as the ground is above 40 degrees Farenheit they can begin planting and have begun as early as January.
  • Deco Footprint could send a designer to support the board in the RHOA Design Review board meetings to answer questions about the project, if needed. 
  • Deer deterrent plantings will be prioritized, but Adele did recommend we begin to focus on deer deterrent methods, such as fencing. Fencing is not currently included in the budget for this project so Wheelwright HOA will need to consider how to move forward on the fencing issue afterwards. 
  • 8-10 foot logs with a 10-12 inch diameter that we can save in the neighborhood from fallen trees might be able to be reused on the project. 
  • Deco Footprints does offer a maintenance contract that HOA’s can purchase after the installation if they’d not like to do the initial maintenance, including appropriate watering schedules, themselves, but after the first year or so, the maintenance should be fairly minimal, as planned. 

2)  Reserve Study

  1. Reserve study – final copy received with a few amendments
    1. What is included:
      1. Summary including where we are with funding, what our goal is over a 20 year period, what do we have to do to get there
      2. Condition of areas in our community that fall under capital expenses
        1. Notable findings of common assets:
          1. Parking lot
          2. Concrete
          3. Storm water drainage system (After Action: Kristina will ask for clarity on recommendations here)
      3. Methods of funding over the 20 year period
        1. Cash flow
        2. Component
        3. Hybrid approach
      4. Schedule for capital repairs
  2. Annual contribution to reserve fund – currently $9000, recommend $21,100.
  • Things to keep in mind:
    • All expenses are being covered through the collection of HOA dues. 
    • Some of these expenses will fall under Capital Repair, which could come out of that, instead of the current annual budget. 
    • The purpose of the reserve study is to ensure our HOA can potentially avoid special assessments, thus the increase in dues. (After Action: Kelly will continue to review the numbers to confirm what this year’s quarterly increase will be in preparation for the annual meeting in December.) 
  1. Asked to include repaving of the parking lot in 2024. 
  2. Capital expenses – what qualifies, what doesn’t qualify?
    1. Where does our money come from to take care of capital expenses?
    2. Do we need to make adjustments?
    3. We need to take into account our checking account balance.
    4. What investments do we want to make going forward?
  3. Taking into account interest when investments are made. 

3)  Drainage issue by 2231

  1. Proposals from:
    1. Riverbend Landscaping
    2. Sunrise
    3. Bright Construction Group (Juan)-Pending work to be done.

4)  Update on concrete

  1. Update on walkthrough?  Cyndi is working to finalize a walk through. 
  2. Which are areas of concern?

After Action: Cyndi will focus on an expedited time frame for all of the proposals to ensure we can finalize plans for the work ASAP. 

5)  Repaving the parking lot

  1. Burt with Pavement Design, LLC
  2. Are their services more than we need at this time?
    1. Pavement inspection for cracks/sealant issues
    2. Pavement upkeep plan/schedule
    3. Management of the construction is another component

Decision by Board: 

We do want to have good oversight of the work  that is not from us. However, we not feel we need another assessment or inspection to tell us we need to replace the pavement. We will go back to Pavement Design, LLC, to ask to remove the inspection from their contract as we know we need to replace the parking lot paving ((the base layer as well as a full mill and resurfacing) (After Action: Kristina will take this back to Pavement Design LLC) 

(After Action: Kristina will reach out  VA Asphalt Company and have them come do an estimate for work at recommendation from Cyndi) 

6)  Tree inspection-Delayed pending Joy’s input as the tree lead

  1. Do we have an inspection date scheduled?
    1. 2272 Hemlock tree – this tree trimming was done by TreeSmith USA – still needs to be inspected?
    2. 2246 Elm Tree – trimmed by TreeSmith USA, but will circle back in fall and possibly JL to see about possible removal
    3. Tree hanging over Olde Crafts behind 2201/03

7)  Cookout this Sunday

  1. By the little free library at noon? 

Board Decision: Moved location to lower cluster to avoid parking impacts near Little Free Library. 

  1. Kristina has 3 packages of 10 hotdogs
    1. Other remaining items from Cluster Community Cookout included water and chips, along with condiments, which Cyndi will manage. 

8)  Whose terms are up at the end of year/what are people’s intentions?

Kristina and Sandy were both considering wrapping up, but felt that with so many ongoing projects they are going to hold on they think for now and will be willing to serve on the board for another term of two years. Kelly feels she is also willing to serve on board for the coming year, as does Cyndi. 

Next meeting: 

Tuesday, August 8th

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