Idea's on how to keep the momentum going...

Instead of building a puppy palace, let’s upgrade our system to something useful. Let’s get smart on how we spend our money for a change.

 

Larry, I am in 100% agreement! A master plan would point out those items that are worthy of investment based on an ROI concept.

 

Have you ever looked into joining a private golf country club folks? Try getting an entry fee of $50,0000, and a lot more. Not unheard of in many parts of the country. The money it takes to maintain and operate a course has always beyond what regular folks could ever afford. We also need to be realistic here. Our courses were built in the 1960's. They are not the engineered PGA courses of today, not even close. The idea for us here is to maintain well our simple courses, and keep them for members only as much as possible. I am not a golfer, but think we do need some professional help to keep our courses alive for the future.

 

I'll try and keep politics out of this discourse, but after what we saw yesterday and the resulting impact on our stock markets and worse yet, the projections for massive price increases across the board, every decision the RCSC will be making must be well thought out using exact numbers and data. If we (this country) continues down the path we are currently on, we (those of us living here in Sun City) have any hope of maintaining the quality of life we enjoy, we best get our shit together quickly.

I'm not a doom and gloom kind of guy; i am a realist. We have huge expenditures projected out over the next ten years (via PIF). We know many of those projects will include items purchased overseas and they will be far more expensive. While we can pretend this country will respond by building plants and factories, nothing will be built any time soon. We have to factor those increases into any projects we have on the books...and then decide can we actually do them?

This is going to be a period where we carefully separate our needs from our wants, to our must-haves.

 

How about rescinding the motion to build a 1.5 million dollar air conditioned dog training facility and allocate those PIF dollars to some other project, perhaps like Mountain View?

 

So the events of one day (yesterday) is the problem for SC. I did a search for "2006" posted by BPearson. It returned 161 posts, all pertaining to 2006 being the year where things changed for the worse in Sun City. So 19 years of mismanagement is now being blamed on one day and Bill using some kind of crystal ball or tarot cards to predict the future.

The decision made in 2006 to give the general manager authority beyond running the day to day operations was at least limited by bylaws and committees with actual impact on preventing a power grab. Sadly, as years passed boards relinquished more and more power and control. Committees were reduced to show and our language gutted.
BPearson, Dec 6, 2024

If we were to go back to our documents, which i have done, those before 2006 compared to after 2006 are wholly different. For 45 years the gm was given the duties and authority of managing the day to day operations. After 2006, the grab for more control, more duties and less oversight was the norm and she was allowed to write them with virtually no push back by or from the board.

It wasn't an accident, it was intentional. During that same time we saw the role of committees either greatly diminished or in some cases, removed completely. The board not only allowed it, but had to vote to approve it happening. It is exactly how we got to where we are today.

Now the only questions are who becomes the officers, and more importantly, will they start to hold the gm accountable for his actions?
BPearson, Jan 3, 2025

All of which begs the question for me, and all of you. The decision made after 2006 to reinvent Sun City was huge. It changed everything that those who came before us had built into the community. We're not talking about which fitness machines were right or wrong, we are talking about abandoning the very texture and fabric Sun City was founded under.

Maybe it was a good choice to try and become like all the other age restricted communities (only cheaper), maybe it was bad one. What i do know is it is one that should have been decided by the member/owners and not the GM and a handful of board members. Hopefully we are headed in that direction. We'll see.
BPearson, Mar 22, 2023

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Every project needs to be re-evaluated Tom. Every dollar wisely spent. We've for far too long thought of PIF as the endless piggy bank that keeps on giving. There was a time when projecting costs wasn't rocket science, since the Pandemic, everything has changed from supply chain disruptions to unstable home sales across the country.

The good news is we have money in the bank for the Mountain View remodel, the bad news is we won't be able to buy as much with the monies we have available as we once could. Like i said, just being realistic about what is happening around us. It may all change tomorrow, but for right now, we aren't in a very stable place.

 

Hopefully the PIF money has been invested in a safe place, yet earning money as the interest rates were higher the last two or three years.

 

Janet,

RCSC has a very strict and conservative investment policy. And, if anyone tries to change that I will be at the podium. I agree with Bill, construction inflation has been a bear over the last decade so our money does not go as far. I like Will Rodgers investment philosophy: I am more interested in a return of my investment than I am in a return on my investment.

John

 

If memory serves me, they relaxed their investment policy a few years back, albeit still a truly conservative approach; as it should be. My fear John is the inflation we saw coming out of the pandemic will be child's play compared to the tariff wars. I've read any number of articles today that tell me these increases are going to hit us hard and leave us with a lot less buying power.

One of the more interesting aspects to watch from the GM leaving will be to see how they address the slew of employees overseeing "safety." No arguing that safety shouldn't be a concern, but the 5 or 6 person department certainly looked like overkill. Rumor was there had been hundreds and hundreds of "reports" filed, an uptick far removed from the normal course of business. And, can someone please remove, rewrite and rehang those God awful signs threatening arrest? I have to believe as a community we are better than that.

 

I agree with Bill's observation which may be analogous to Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz's observation - Toto I don't think we are in Kansas anymore. Perhaps by coincidence, the current president of the Board has a deep economics background. While the president and I are both enigmas to one another, I take strange comfort in knowing RCSC has someone who understands economics running the show. There are huge challenges ahead for both RCSC and its members. Each of those challenges present opportunities to strengthen or weaken the community. Which will it be?

 

Let us remain focused on the MV remodel! Get ‘er done!

 

No argument there Tom. For those who aren't aware or have not looked at it, here's the Oct 31, 2024 PIF approved numbers:

2025
Arizona Dept. of Water Resources (Quail Run) $6,050,000
Riverview Maintenance Building 1,500,000
Mountain View Renovation 1,000,000
Best Friends Dog Club 500,000
Bell Indoor Spa Repair 1,000,000
Lakeview Lanes Counter/Restrooms 500,000
Security Enhancements 500,000
Contingency (5%) 552,500
Total 2025 $11,602,500

2026
Arizona Dept. of Water Resources (North) $2,500,000
Riverview Maintenance Building 2,500,000
North Bunker Redesign 776,250
Willow Bop Golf 1,000,000
Mountain View Renovation 9,000,000
Performing Arts Center 1,000,000
Best Friends Dog Club 1,000,000
Security Enhancements 500,000
Contingency (5%) 913,813
Total 2026 $19,190,063

2027
North Maintenance Cart Barn $500,000
Mountain View Renovation 4,000,000
Performing Arts Center 9,000,000
Security Enhancements 500,000
Contingency (5%) 700,000
Total 2027 $14,700,000

2028
North Maintenance Cart Barn $3,000,000
Performing Arts Center 4,000,000
Lakeview Renovation initial Design 1,000,000
Security Enhancements 500,000
Contingency (5%) 425,000
Total 2028 $8,925,000

That 4 year total (2025-2028) comes in just under $55,000,000. The total for MV is $28,000,000 with a 5% contingency (inflation?) added each year (roughly 2.5 million dollars). My concern is with the newly imposed tariffs that 5% is way below the true market value of any work to be performed and has to be carefully calculated to include those higher costs. It's doable, we have the money in the bank, but from a realistic perspective, beyond the Mountain View renovation, every other project has to be weighed for both need and value to the community at large.

It's interesting to note there's been no change made regarding the RCSC having to move the South course 2025 mandate from ADWR to the totals. I know the one LRPC meeting i attended earlier this year we were told that had to be done sooner rather than later. If you go through the plan you will see the south course was slated for 2033/2034 and the projected costs were approaching 18 million dollars. If that has to be bumped into 2025/2026, everything changes. That would put the 4 year totals invested in golf courses and golf maintenance buildings in the 36 million dollar projected costs which begs the question of the real cost?

I know for most of us (myself included), these huge numbers are larger than life and hard to get our heads around. We know home sales were soft last year which has a dramatic impact on our yearly PIF collections. We also knowing a marketing strategy/program can be effective in drawing more buyers to the community so hopefully the board acts quickly to find ways to reach potential buyers as they search for their place in the sun.

Data/information is good to know eh?

 

Bill, as I have said ad nausem before, those are somebody’s numbers which are probably not based reality. The long sordid tale MV is a perfect example. The only numbers that count are the architect’s numbers and specs in the RFB, anything else as you would like to say are, SWAG. John may disagree with me on this but I spent a career poring over these things down to the minutiae.

Critics o me on this topic tread lightly here.

 

Be careful all, sounds like a threat.

 

Hello Bill and Readers, Please take a moment to go on SCHOA website and fill out the Maricopa West Valley survey. It was very comprehensive, and you have your chance to weigh in on how the development in our surrounding west valley is going. I would encourage everyone to take the survey. It takes about 10 minutes, but you can have the opportunity to express your opinion on what you would like to see in this part of town, here. Thanks so much!

 

Framework2040.com Here is the survey link. Have a good day! Eileen

 

Thanks for posting the link Eileen. I took it and my comment at the end was i would love to see the difference in answers between those of living in a senior communities against those living in mixed age communities. I found many of the questions challenging, only because i seldom leave these white walls.

 

Hi Bill, Yes, it was very in depth. I am almost a native and have lived here for over 50 years. I was able to weigh in on many things that you are seeing like warehouses all around. An over abundance of rental apartments and the dumbing down of Westgate area. I have concerns here. I am sad to see all the open vistas leaving. I feel it is important to let them know what your thoughts are on current development. Thanks

 

In that case, John has threatened me but I ignore it.