HSVPOA CMPAC Meeting 12/13/19

By Cheryl Dowden, December 17, 2019

Meeting Attendees

The Comprehensive Master Plan Advisory Committee (CMPAC) held a meeting on December 13, 2019. Committee members in attendance were Chairperson, Nikki Choyce; Secretary, Tom Heau; President of Cooper Homes AND Cooper Land, Jody Latham; Pam Avila, Rolland White, Murray Claasen and Clint Blackman. Also in attendance were Buddy Dixon, Board of Director Liaison and Stephanie Heffer, Staff Liaison (HSVPOA Director of Placemaking and Development).

The audience consisted of Renee Haugen, Director of Real Estate Acquisitions; Lloyd Sherman, 2020 HSVPOA Board Candidate; Diane Bielanski, newly chosen CMPAC member; and Ray Lehman, newly chosen CMPAC member. Both Bielanski and Lehman are scheduled to be appointed to CMPAC at the December 18, 2019 Board Meeting.

Also present at the meeting was the Village Voice.

What follows is not a complete transcription of the meeting but accuracy was attempted. The link to the video is located at the end of this article.

Chairperson comments

Choyce sent out a survey to the committee members regarding satisfaction on meeting days/time and format. The members were in agreement with those items. The only issue some of the members had is that they did not feel there was enough engagement. Choyce said she is, “Happy to help you on that one.”

CMPAC candidate search update and new CMPAC liaison appointments to committees

The committee has two vacancies due to former Chairperson, Keith Keck’s resignation and the death of Patricia McCarthy.

Heffer, Dixon, and Choyce interviewed and chose two new members:

Diane Bielanski

Ray Lehman

Tom Heau will be the new CMPAC Trails Committee liaison. Rolland White will be the new CMPAC Recreation Committee liaison. Diane Bielanski is interested in the CMPAC Lakes Committee liaison, after her appointment by the BOD.

O and M tables discussion

Heffer: “I want to make sure everybody knows where to find the tables.” They are located in the 2020 Budget on the ‘Explore the Village‘ website. This can be found in the Members’ section. Click the Governance tab. Click the Financial Reports tab.

Replatting of Pacifica

Heau: “I have two questions for you. In reading my favorite newspaper, The [Hot Springs] Village Voice, one thing that was mentioned was something about replatting Pacifica.”

Heffer: “Jody [Latham] can probably answer that better than I.”

Latham: “Basically Pacifica was originally set up to be what we call a ‘Villa Subdivision’ – kind of like Maderas or Isabella, where they have yard maintenance or some type of other maintenance.”

Latham: “Due to the fact that there are only five houses in that subdivision, they decided that they would rather not participate in this – do their own maintenance and do their own irrigation and kind of separate.”

Latham: “In order to do that, we had to replat the limited common property to the owner as a lot and then have them take possession of the whole lot.”

Latham: “It will just be a lot like any other lot…”

Heau: So the replatting was an issue of responsibility and not lot lines.”

Latham: “Not lot lines.” The owners wanted to do their own maintenance.

Coronado Center Community Engagement process

Heau: “The second issue was, it’s not really an issue. You’re heading up this Coronado Center Engagement process where you are kind of looking at possibilities for what you might be able to do.”

Heffer: “I am actually not heading it up. Stacy [Hoover] is, but I am participating with her in her [indecipherable]. But yes, what really what it is, is to get community input, basically, for the future of that particular Cornado Center building.”

Heffer: “Utilization has really declined over the last five or seven years and just trying to figure out what’s the best use for it. Let’s re-engage people with that space. Does it remain a rental center?”

Heffer: “Basically talking to the shoreliners that live near there, the people that use it today as well as the townhouse area there. The people that kind of surround it.”

Heffer: “So kind of taking in steps to engage people in different points of view.”

Heau: “Okay. Because the CMP, itself, kind of hit the Coronado Center fairly hard in terms of future development. Is there any connection between?”

Heffer: “There is. The CMP very much focuses on the Coronado Center building, itself.”

Heffer: “My role in it would be to focus on the area-at-large. So really basically from the fuel stop, from Baleric, all the way back.”

Heffer: “So starting some of that is what I’ve dealt with. I’ve dealt with some of the property owners there, church leadership and some of the commercial business owners there to just talk about what does the POA do. What would help them in their business ventures?”

Heau: “I was kind of thinking in terms of, we were trying to find a project to be subject to a project management process and I was just wondering if that was a possible candidate.”

Heffer: “Good idea…it really, truly is the heart of, like you said, the Comprehensive Master Plan, that particular project. And you are right, that was what the [indecipherable] team called out as priority number one.”

Heffer: “Basically look at the existing neighborhood centers and what is good about them. What is not so good? What is making them thrive or [indecipherable] declining?”

Rolland White asked how other members (not people living in the vicinity) could find out about this. The Recreation Committee said they would send a notice out to everybody who has a library card.

White: “But how about to the general public? Are you publishing that?”

Heffer: “They haven’t gotten to the public-at-large, yet. They were really focusing, again, on small groups. Small sessions. So that it wasn’t a giant big townhall. Little roundtable sessions. Thirty to forty people in a room, instead of three to four hundred in a room. Try to get a little more one-on-one input.”

Heffer: “So yes, it will end up going out to the public-at-large. But right now it is just the people that are most closely associated with that building.”

Election of new Vice-chairperson

Buddy Dixon opened the nominations for Vice-chair. Murray Claasen nominated Roland White. This was seconded and unanimously passed.

Old business

CMP Implementation Tables and O & M tables update

The CMP Implementation Tables is the Excel spreadsheet document in the CMP that helps to keep track of the implementation of the CMP. Staff has been working hard on this project. The format of the Excel document is being revised. (See page 257 [located below] of the Comprehensive Master Plan to view the original document.)

HSVPOA CMP Implementation Tables Budget and Finance pages 257 to 261

CMP-Implementation-Tables-Budget-and-Finance-pages-257-to-261

Staff added the four Enterprise Goals.

Heffer: “We thought it would be a good idea to map each recommendation back to the Enterprise Goal and sort of get a sense of, ‘does it support?’ Does this work that we are going to attempt to do support our four goals.”

Heffer: “We didn’t have that as a mechanism in the original document. So we’ve added that.” They have added drop-down boxes so they can state whether the recommendation is strongly, moderately or lightly aligned or it doesn’t align at all.”

They can run reports off of this spreadsheet and sort them by relevance to the Enterprise Goals.

The spreadsheet is also being updated to include a place for the responsible party, committee involved, targeted start date, targeted completion date, and actual completion date.

There is a “dependency” column which shows if accomplishing a certain goal is dependent on something else happening first.

Several terms to be used in the status column are:

• Postpone,
• Ongoing, and
• No longer applicable.

The CMP will be continually reviewed and updated. The frequency of the implementation spreadsheet update has not been decided yet. (An annual update was mentioned.)

Heffer asked, “How many of the recommendations have a strong alignment to our goals?”

Heffer: “These are just tools to help us better plan our work program, budgeting, where we need to focus our attention on and those kinds of things.”

Village Voice: “Is this just an internal document or is this available to members?”

Heffer: “It is absolutely available to members. It is a part of the Comprehensive Master Plan.”

Choyce: This updated spreadsheet will not fit on an 8 1/2 by 11-inch sheet of paper. It will be digital.

CMP Advisory Committee will receive an updated copy of the CMP Implementation Tables sometime early next year (2020), probably January or February so it hits Board approval by April. April starts the budget cycle every year.

Heffer: “The next step, and we are working on that as well, is the actual new information that will be incorporated. All we are talking about right now is updating what is existing. But things that come up, new work plans, new whatever, things that we can’t even imagine today. How will those be incorporated into the tables…”

Heau: “One of the issues that mystified us was in the timeline, what discussions did you people have, conclusions did you come to?”

Heffer: “That we are not going to use that.” [They are not going to use the timeline.]

White: “I don’t think that was the meaning of that. You may disagree. The meaning was that you are going to do it continuously.”

Heffer: “It is a never-ending process?”

White: “…keep track of how many houses have been sold. That’s probably not one of those tasks, but that is something that is ongoing. You are going to do it continuously. At least that is the way I interpreted a lot of those tasks.”

Heau: “Well, a lot of the ongoing things also, you do nothing until the trigger-event occurs and then that notifies you that you should look at that one box.”

Heau: “I don’t see how you went from the trigger event occurring to somebody saying, ‘you have to look at line 292.’

Haugen: “Tom, I can help a little bit because several of the tasks that are under my purview, they are ongoing. So if I have something that is a five-year, in a suspension strategy, or something like that, it is ongoing through that entire five years. That’s not meaning that until the fifth year, I’m not doing anything. There’s constant work on it through all of those years. So yes, it is in progress all of the time.”

Choyce: “But there are some things that are listed as ongoing, for example, Golf. They are always having something that is [indecipherable] related to it. But if you think about it from a budget point of view, we want to do X this year. So we would want to change it and make it more specific and the wording to say, ‘X is in this year, Y is in next year so that we could go and do the mapping to the budget. At the highest level, it is ongoing, but this year we plan to do this.'”

White: “I want to give you an example of an ongoing task. This is in Governance, 1.5.1, page 255. And it just says, ‘Regularly audit ACC and more decisions to ensure they are in line with policies.'”

White said this is a perpetual task.

Choyce: “Philosophically though, we are talking about the CMP being a 25, 30-year plan. Do you really want something as a recommendation that is not only now, but going to go on? How does that play into how we’re going to change from where we are now to where we are going to be in the future? Does something like that actually belong as a recommendation?”

White: “And another one is to ‘Encourage higher density housing development, such as within the town center.'”

Heffer: “Well, you’re right. Those are just kind of [indecipherable], always….always doing it.”

Heau: “It should be part of your DNA, I would think.”

Terminology such as ongoing and perpetual was discussed.

Heau: “Of the 271 recommendations, 90 of them were ongoing. A huge number.”

CMPAC Marketing Sub-committee report

Pam Avilla: Today I am going to submit the Summary of Findings that the Marketing Sub-committee has created after many, many months of data gathering, researching, whatever. I’m going to submit that to you, the Chair. That’s how the process goes.”

Avila: The Chair provided a modified, edited version of the Marketing Sub-committee’s Summary of Findings, which you indicated would be the acceptable version. That our version would not be acceptable. The Marketing Sub-committee has unanimously agreed that the modified version just doesn’t reflect either the body of work of the committee nor a true picture of the marketing as it existed until July 2019. We feel that this document is really important as a bench-mark for the village marketing going forward. So we are going to submit our version, as we wrote it. As we all agreed was appropriate. And then it is up to you.”

Choyce: “Okay, I’m a little confused because there are two documents. There are the recommendations not included and then there are the findings.”

Avila: “Right. This is the findings.”

Choyce: “That’s the findings.”

Avila indicates it is the findings.

Choyce: “Alright. Well go ahead and submit it to me…”

White said he was going to email the Chairpersons of some of the committees about items he thinks need to be in their bailiwick. He said this would not affect the spreadsheet as he was referring to sub-committees.

Blackman: “This is an addition to the CMP or does it modify the CMP or…?”

Heffer: “It replaces what you are looking at, in it.” So that Section 8, just like the O and M Tables are in that and we’ve got a new version now, the 2020 version. This will be the 2020 Version of the Implementation Tables. Every single year it will change.”

Blackman: “Have we, have we confirmed how, let’s say this committee were to add something to the CMP. Has that been addressed yet?”

Heffer: “No. That’s what we’re getting ready to talk about.”

CMP revision process

Choyce has been working with Heffer to determine the revision process. They are working on a CMP Change Process Flow spreadsheet. (It is my understanding this is a work in progress and this is not the final spreadsheet.)

Choyce: “A possible request for a change to the CMP could come from anywhere.”

1. Identification stage

• Possible requests could come from the Board, committees and staff. We need to document these requests with some type of a “Change Request Form.”

• After the form is submitted the first determination would be, “Is it CMP?” Some things requestion may not have anything to do with the CMP. There will be criteria used to determine if the request is something that should be changed in the CMP.
  • If the request is CMP related, they will move forward.
  • If the request is not CMP related, it will be referred to the appropriate party, probably a staff member.

• Utilize a tracking mechanism for the requests.

• Refer to staff liaison or Board liaison to take a look at the request.
  • A decision is made by staff liaison or Board liaison on whether to pursue the request.
    • If it is decided to not pursue the request, the tracking will be updated and the item closed.
    • If it is decided to pursue the request then the process moves to the next stage, which is “Business case development.”

2. Business case development stage

• Submission proposal drafted.

• Create a milestone schedule for tracking purposes. Determine which of the following is needed:
  • Research,
  • Survey,
  • Data collection, and/or
  • Interview.

• Depending on the topic, public forums may be necessary.

• Determine if the submission proposal is complete.
  • Item is submitted to CMPAC liaison.
  • Item goes back to the CMP Advisory Committee for review.
    • Motion to request approval.
      • Close item if the motion fails.

3. Reviews

• Review by Governance Committee/CEO (whichever is appropriate).
  • Board approval.
    • If not approved – then returned to liaison for corrections.
    • If approved – add item to annual CMP revision list.

4. CMP revisions

• Draft CMP content
  • Draft CMP recommendations
    • Is the timeline 3 years or less?
      • If yes, obtain cost estimates for O & M tables.
      • If no, determine if revision is complete.
        • Conduct final edit and review.

5. Board approvals

• Prepare for publication review.
  • Once preparation is complete:
    • Submit to Board for approval
      • If not approved, close the item.
      • If approved, prepare for CMP publication.
        • Publish

CMP revision process is ongoing

Blackman: “Do we have any idea on how long this process would take?”

This will be an ongoing process.

Avila: “Are you asking if A revision comes in, from start to finish, how long would it take to get over this process?”

Blackman: “Yeah. I am thinking if, as with the Lakes Committee, as an example. There were a couple of things that we saw that I thought ought to be added to the CMP, simply so that we all know that yes, they are going to do this and it’s approved in the…It’s something simple. It adds income to the POA. Just something that we all know, ‘yes we are doing this’ kind of thing.”

Blackman said he was concerned that as “long as this is or as it sounds. It is a beautiful job. That is how someone would think through it, but how long…can that be done in three or four weeks or is…?”

Choyce: “It could be days if it is a little thing. It could be a lot longer if we…”

Blackman: “So we think there would be a way that small things get inserted pretty quick.”

Choyce: “Well, yes and no. I think the process of coming through and checking all the boxes could be relatively small. But I don’t think we are going to update. I don’t think anybody thinks the CMP will be updated anytime there is one little change.”

Choyce: “We’ll just, we’ll do a batch load. We’ll collect all those…put it aside and put it in the bucket…Once a year we will open the bucket. Put all those together and then say, ‘here Board. This is what we believe needs to go into the next version.'”

Blackman: “The reason why I bring this up is because I think our public needs to know what we’re doing. That the CMP is changeable and that we are making changes. And I think, again, one of my things that I’ve been after all along is, I think, better communication will develop.”

Blackman: “We need to show them that this is a living, breathing document. It’s not our plan. And that we are doing what has been envisioned, which is for neighbors, citizens, us, that we’re involved and doing our jobs.”

Heffer said she thought about including a charette-type project each year. “To reopen that door so the community has opportunity to stay engaged in the document.”

Dixon: “Clint, not knowing what it is you are talking about for the Lakes. In a lot of cases, the committees, if you mention financial advantage to the POA, in a lot of cases, if you bring that up in that meeting and the chairman takes it to the staff, that goes on, works out pretty quick.”

Dixon: “But if you are talking about something changes the CMP, then that’s a different process.”

Blackman: “It’s not so much, I’m not talking about things that change the CMP, but things that need to be included, I think, so that it shows it’s a more inclusive document. And also, there again, back to the education of the public, that they see that [indecipherable due to background noise] people who are interested in lakes or golf or whatever. They want to see that we are recognizing those needs and that those needs are being implemented. And that’s the thing that I think will help answer some of these folks who are out there, who, they don’t like the CMP. They are against it and you know…that they say, ‘wait a minute, this is a good thing.’ That’s the thing I’m getting at.”

Blackman: “And I think the faster that we can communicate to them, the better we all are, more likely we all come together as a team.”

Heffer: “Do you think we could spend some time defining the criteria?”

Blackman: “Yeah. I…it puts…”

Heffer: “You mean to help understand those are the types of things that we should be thinking…yeah, that makes sense to go into the CMP, or?”

Blackman: “Everything we can do to educate people, where is, I mean, we all know. How many people have read this, outside of this room? Very little.”

Blackman: “And there are some people who said this is awful and they beat it up and they do all of those things. And they never read it. But if we’re coming to them and we’re saying, ‘look, we are doing things. These are the good things that are happening. We’re making the changes. We listen to the public. And we realize, nah, that’s not, we’re not really ready for that just yet.’ Or here is another way to handle it that’s better and then it gets publicized and they don’t have to read the CMP. They hear about it. That’s what I think is important. More communication.”

Heau: “I am not sure I am going to say this right. But the CMP to me lives two lives. It’s a book with really big ideas with a thirty-year time horizon. And buried in this book are these Implementation Tables, which are very granular and have very short time frames.”

Heau: “Now when you are talking about these small ideas, they are just kind of line items in the Implementation Tables, which they are in the CMP, but they are really at that point, beyond this group, they are in the hands of staff to execute. So when we say update the Implementation every year, the Implementation Tables every year, I don’t know yet what this group’s role is in controlling what goes in and what doesn’t go in that because we haven’t done it yet.”

Heau: “Now fooling around with the big ideas of the CMP, we haven’t crossed that bridge yet. But the Implementation Tables, themselves, are hugely active. I mean things are being worked on right now. We don’t have a process yet for inserting things or you know monitoring them, but I think that’s what you’re talking about.”

Blackman: “Absolutely.”

Heau: “Many of the small items you are talking about might just go straight to staff. We might just look at it and say, ‘that’s really an operational thing.'”

Blackman: “But what I’m getting at is, I think that’s the kind of…Yes, I call it, ‘what are the adds and subtractions?’ And what I’m getting at is, is that we need, I feel, we need this committee needs to communicate that to the public so that the public knows there are changes to the CMP. These changes…the CMP is a living document. That their input to us is having an effect.”

Blackman: “Just so we can communicate what we are doing and that helps us, too.”

Choyce said that the tracking mechanism (spreadsheet) will give the committee the ability to keep track of what is in progress or closed.

Blackman: “And I hope that’s what the Voice would notice. That they would see, we’re doing our job. And hopefully, encourage more people to come to be a part of this committee and be a part of the sub-committees.”

Blackman: “The beauty of this place is that we have so many committees, so many sub-committees, people who are involved, care about golf, lakes, tennis, all these things. And that’s what makes the Village great. And we’ve got to continue that. But we’ve got to educate in order to make sure everybody’s onboard.”

Heffer said she thought the draft should be sent to the committee members so they have time to review it.

Blackman said we should give credit to our committee members, who work so well with staff and they have great ideas.

There was a discussion on reprinting the revised CMP. Due to the fact that it is a governing document when the changes are made, a new hard copy will need to be printed.

Haugen: “It is an actual governing document so reprinting with any change you make, will always be done at least once for the public copy that is available at the office. Because it is a governing document.”

This process document will be studied by the committee members and gone over next month.

Growth Prioritization Tool Evaluation

Background

Heau stated there are three tools buried within the CMP.

• Growth Prioritization Tool
• Amenities Prioritization Tool
• Qualifying Value Tool

Heau: “Our overall goal is to be a resource to staff and the Board and to see if by using these tools whether we can just make the best possible decisions at all times.”

Heau: “The Growth Prioritization Tool seems to be a single-purpose tool. It really focused on if we have a new housing development, what are sort of a checklist of ideas? What are the things that could be looked at in order to evaluate the value of this project?”

Heau: “It is clearly focused on a new housing development. As such, it is not clear if it’s ever been applied to a project or when the next time it will be applied. I personally am not terribly aware of a housing development, as envisioned by this CMP, occurring.”

Heau: “In particular, if you look at page 301, where it says, ‘Stage 2. Fills a Market Gap,’ it all talks about what I term, ‘high-density housing’ and I think there are a lot of barriers right now to high-density housing that would make this tool probably not applicable.”

Heau: “The tool itself, seems to evaluate whether a project is consistent with the CMP. To me, it does not try to evaluate what I would consider being an overall global, ‘is this a good business idea?’ To me, it’s definitely not a substitute for a fully-developed business proposal. So, it’s very narrow and very pointed in its focus.”

Growth Prioritization tool uses point system

Using the tool is simple. There are line items criteria and you mark ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Points are assigned to your answer. You add up the points. The total maximum points value is 70.

• 56 points or more – high priority
• 42 points or more – medium priority
• 41 points or less – low priority

Four general criteria

• Project location
• Filling a market gap
• Quality of life
• Profit and costs

Strengths and weakness of Growth Prioritization Tool

This tool could be helpful, especially in the long-term because it encourages consistency.

The biggest weakness of the tool is it is not clear when this tool will be used.

There is a set of inherent biases in the tool, itself. Some of the line items aren’t clear and whoever is filling this out may have biases.

Recommendations

• It is not clear when it is going to be used.
• It is not clear when the process of evaluating a project, when it will be used.
• The line items need to be clarified. There are some duplications.
• Recommendations were also made about how to make the tool more efficient.

Heau wants the committee to study the report before discussion ensues at the next meeting.

Blackman asks if staff intends to use these tools.

Heffer answered yes they would use the tools when an opportunity arises.

Heau said staff has already used the Amenity Prioritization Tool. With respect to Balboa, the tool is active. It is in progress.

Heau said a third-party review would eliminate bias.

Blackman: “Stephanie, if I may. This tool is just for housing. Right?”

Heffer: “The Growth Prioritization Tool is pretty much for new development.”

Blackman: “If you feel comfortable, what is a brief…As I understand it, a developer comes to you and says, ‘we want to buy ten lots.’ Do they sit down with you and say we are going to build…What is that process?”

Heffer: “Honestly, that is part of what [indecipherable]. As it stands today, our hands are very much tied in terms of any kind of new, different development. I mean, the entire community is developed with lots that are single-family detached, other than the townhomes [indecipherable] or whatever reserve property that they have. Cooper could sell a piece of reserve property to a group who then, depending, I mean I don’t even know 100% how it works. They could sell 30 acres, for example, and somebody comes in and subdivide that. Right?

Latham: “Sure.”

Heffer: “Then you would have a scenario like this where you know, there would be a new development, but it wouldn’t necessarily be, I mean that’s not our development.” An apartment complex could be built on this land.

Blackman stated he is trying to see if the tool would help staff.

Heffer: “I think, tentatively, you know one of the things that we would love to be able to do is to [indecipherable] and this is in a relationship with Cooper to learn how to do it. If we were able to take lots and break them, larger, it might be a larger lot and turn that one lot into two lots or three lots. You have slightly more dense neighborhoods. You are multiplying your assessments. You are generating more money and you have this slightly different mix of housing. Still single-family, still detached. Maybe a slightly smaller lot, parcel of property, something like that. That’s where we would be able to take something like this and make it come into play. So when you really kind of talk about, I guess, a little cottage quarter of true pocket neighborhoods. That would be a scenario where you would come in and try to use it. You have to, regardless, you’ve got to go to Cooper.”

Blackman: “Those have been very successful, by the way, right?”

Heffer: “They are very successful all over the country. I mean, they’re, it’s a product. I mean, it works for some people. Some people love it and some people don’t. There’s a buyer for that, just like there is a buyer for [indecipherable].

Blackman: “Where I am going with this is to say, Is this something you want this committee to focus on because you really think it would be a help to you? Yes or no?”

Heffer: “Yes, but do I think it is a high priority? No.”

Blackman: “Okay.”

Heau: “Not at this time.”

Heffer feels the Amenity Prioritization Tool is a higher priority.

HSVPOA CMPAC Growth Prioritization Tool pg 300 to 311

growth-prioritization-tool-pg-300-to-311

New Business

The CMP Advisory Committee has started going through the CMP. They divided into three discussion groups of three people and discussed Pages ten to nineteen of the CMP for ten minutes. One member from each group reported back their thoughts at the end of the ten minutes.

The three groups were:

• Heffer, Heau and White
• Dixon, Latham, and Blackman
• Choyce, Avilla, and Claasen

Below is the Discussion Guide they used.

CMP Discussion Guide

cmp-discussion-guide-1

Audience comments

I asked about the SWOT Analysis and was told there was no time to do it at this meeting but it will be done in the future.

Click here to view CMPAC Meeting 12/13/19 Video

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