End of the year sale on RCSC Motions!!

So similar increases will probably happen every year for three years? I must have missed that on the documents.

 

No, not the case as the raises in the coming years are 50 cents each year and by then they can adjust scales and classifications to reflect the increases.

 

Hello everyone. It's been a while. I was curious what the TOSC community might be saying about the proposed increases in fees. I'm not disappointed as there have been lots of thought provoking comments. I would only offer a couple of observations.

The RCSC emails that have been sent are over-the-top in their political tone. They have a vindictive feel to them. Does anyone know who authors them?

Some quick math using the numbers in today's email calculates to 533,100 affected man hours. That equates to over 13,000 forty hour weeks. Now, let's just assume that half the added expense goes to related taxes, medical, etc., that still leaves us with 6,500 affected employees. It could be more as my numbers assume they're all making the current minimum and working full time. Is this possible? Since the increase only affects 55% of current employees, is it possible we employee over 10,000 people? What am I missing?

 

Hey Mick, hope all is well. I think your point was the "blame" on the increases was due the liberals having voted for prop 206. We could debate the tone, but for anyone at the last two member exchange, the chair allowed outright smack being laid down regarding Prop 206 and then at the last meeting one of the speakers thought it fun to add in an Obama joke. I thought both were in poor taste, but maybe that's just me.

In the blast email we got today from the RCSC, they quoted VP Hoffer from the exchange when he said this (or something similar):“I am as sick about having to raise these fees as you are. I do not want to vote for these increases but when Arizona voters passed Proposition 206 they gave me no choice. The thing that we need to learn from this vote is there are consequences to actions. Currently 55% of RCSC’s employees are making less than the new minimum wage as of January 1, 2017, and a full 65% are also Sun City residents. Every other active retirement community in the state is in the same position we are.”

While it's easy to play the blame game and lay it all at the feet of the voters and they "need to know there are consequences," i'm struggling more to figure out when there is accountability for one's actions.

To me they go hand in glove and the board and management appears to feel they are above accountability. What do i mean? Simple really, let me list them:

1). The board earlier this year spent $750,000 out of the general operating account to buy the property on Grand Ave. It should have been bought using PIF at which point, two/thirds of this increase would have been covered, leaving raise in fees a third of what they are.

2). IMHO, the reason they did that was because they have earmarked 40 million dollars (and growing on golf course renovations and out buildings at the courses and they didn't want to slow down that spending.

3). With these enormous golf course investments, we've watched as golfers have become increasingly frustrated with playing conditions and play-ability.

4). As previous and current boards have removed safeguards and set-up themselves as the sole arbiters, blame can only be laid in one place.

Those things said, what we hear from the board is the rhetoric blaming the voters for the problems they are facing. Curious when the RCSC is having the best PIF collection year they have ever had (over 8 million dollars in 2016) and yet they have done some really, really foolish things with virtually no accountability.

There's so much to say and i want to respond to Emily's comments, but i will do that another time.

PS: The RCSC has a little over 400 employees Mick with approximately half of them under the the $10 wage rate.

 

I completely agree Bill – bad taste and a turnoff to many. They don't care. SC, overall, is incredibly politically charged in a partisan sense. It permeates the clubs and board/management, as does racial bias, cliques, etc. I get that it's human nature for people of similar backgrounds, beliefs, etc to tend to group together. But it is a turnoff when they criticize, discriminate, and exclude others as a result. For me it detracts greatly from the potential RCSC experience. It's not a politically correct thing for me, rather it's my disgust for the complete lack of respect and civility they show toward members who are "not like them". We're retired -- we need to relax, chill a little, and enjoy our remain years.

IMHO prop 206 was certainly not a surprise and there was a good chance it would pass. A competent Corporation would have prepared two budgets – one if206 failed, one if it passed. A competent Corporation would have minimized the budget impact if 206 passed, knowing that there would be a one year delay in SS income having any ability to compensate an assessment increase. A competent Corporation would not have approved a budget one week prior to an event which could cause a million dollar (~7%?) variance in the operating expense budget. The implication that there was insufficient time to adjust the budget so the increase was the only alternative is a blatant attempt to bully the membership and is a revelation of lack of good planning/budgeting skills within the RCSC. How can you conclude otherwise? What I've just said isn't armchair quarterbacking -- budgeting isn't rocket science. The membership should revolt!

I agree that no employee should be on a treadmill and stressed to the limit. I also agree that most employees “project” a positive image, but I disagree that even close to all of them are happy. Many only appear to be because they know they'll lose their job if they criticize management or suggest a better way of doing things or upset a member who isn't being honest or reasonable. Sometimes those things need to happen for the good of everyone. I get the feeling a large portion of the community thinks the minimum wage employees who live in SC are "just working to have a little extra beer money". Many of the employees I've gotten to know are working because they need the income to make ends meet. My observation is that RCSC management is pretty autocratic and top heavy. There's significant reluctance to employ new ideas/automation to reduce the cost of routine tasks – if this wasn't the case we would be swiping our Rec Cards instead of signing in and being quizzed about what we are going to do at the facility. Our movements would be centrally monitored and assistance dispatched as needed. Cost savings might actually occur if Jim Wellman and facility managers listened to/considered what others suggest -- far to often they just cut the member or employee short and tell them what they decided to in the vacuum of their office. I can tell you how frustrating that is to club officers, and I've listened to employees expound on the money they see wasted. Anyone with open eyes has observed shoot from the hip decisions which became an over-budget situation which management swept under the rug or blamed on a member or vendor. No one is perfect, mistakes and bad decisions will always be present. The question is when is what's going on too much, when has what's going on become a habit instead of an exception and those responsible don't see the difference. When has the balance of power between management, the board, and the membership become so tilted that there must be a revolt?

 

Simply brilliant assessment IC. You will not see a revolt any time soon; hopefully the 4 new board members will bring a new energy to the equation.