Urges Sudden Valley to OK dues increase

I read with interest the article on Oct. 26 titled “Sudden Valley residents split over big dues increase.” It clearly expressed the concerns of Mitch Waterman, Sudden Valley Community Association’s managing director about the group’s financial instability. This instability stems from its long history of voting for dues that are inadequate to support its operations, much less build the capital reserves needed for long term maintenance.

As a prior Sudden Valley Community Association board member, I can attest this board is facing virtually identical financial constraints as we faced eight years ago. And, they are facing similar “head-in-the-sand” resistance from a vocal minority. This minority would have everyone believe only they can be trusted and only they know how to run the association.

This minority claims there is “widespread distrust” of the operations staff and board. I do not believe this is true. I believe this minority has never demonstrated the skills or wisdom needed to effectively run Sudden Valley Community Association. In fact, I believe we are still recovering from their costly failed experiment in 2013 to out-source our operations.

Our board and operations staff have performed with outstanding integrity and amazing competence. They deserve our support. Voting yes on the proposed dues measures does mean a big increase in dues. But remember, there is no free lunch.

We need to contribute our fair share to have any hope of financial stability in Sudden Valley. If you are member of community, I urge you to vote yes for financial stability on Nov 7.

Bellingham

This story was originally published November 1, 2015 at 4:01 PM with the headline "Urges Sudden Valley to OK dues increase."