Chaska Herald - Jonathan residents ready to fight for association's future - Comments

It may be of interest to

sfwug — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:57:03 -0600

It may be of interest to note that as of today, February 28, 2008, there are still no minutes to this "Special Meeting" on the Jonathan website; nor were they discussed at the next Board Meeting.

One homeowner asked the board at the beginning of the Q & A session, "Is somebody taking minutes?" The response from the President, Tom Davis was, "We're being filmed". After some protest from audience members, the actual board Secretary (as we learned at the Annual Meeting in 2008), Cal Kuhlman responded, "Minutes are being taken as appropriate."

Here we are almost five (5) months later and there are no minutes. I guess the board and Mr. Kuhlman didn't deem what many consider the most important meeting in the history of the Association, "appropriate".

Maybe it was the fact that most of those who spoke didn't support the boards position to proceed with legal action. Or, was it as one homeowner said during the meeting, that the meeting was a charade because the board didn't care what the Membership wanted and they were going to continue to use the Association's money to serve their own needs?

For a board to continually say their method of communication to the Members was through the meeting minutes, the fact there are no minutes for this "Special Meeting" certainly raises questions.

I'm very angry at the fact

jennyjean4 — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 16:13:12 -0500

I'm very angry at the fact that $51,000 has already been spent on legal fees. I think that money would have been better spent cleaning up Lake Grace and making it usable again. It's so frustrating to know that a few dissatisfied people can spend so much of the association's money and there seems to be nothing we can do about it.

The actual meeting will

Mollee Francisco — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 12:17:41 -0500

The actual meeting will start at 7 p.m. according to the Jonathan Association Web site. There will be a half hour workshop on the 2008 budget at 6:30 p.m.
Here is the agenda for tonight's meeting: http://www.jonathaninchaska.com/docs/2007/agendas/Agenda%2010-09-07.pdf

(Mollee Francisco is a staff writer for the Chaska Herald. She can be reached at mfrancisco@swpub.com.)

I saw most of the meeting on

zzfamily — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:21:39 -0500

I saw most of the meeting on TV and was once again unimpressed with the majority of board. They provided little or no information to the lawyers for accurate research yet have spent a LOT of our money to fund their personal goal. They are definately not holding up their responsiblity to maintain our association. I agree with everything that Katie Tierney stated. Townhome owners should understand that the townhome fees are completely seperate from Jonathan fees.- they pay for completly diferent things. I orginally purchased in Jonathan a townhome - and understood the purpose of the seperate dues. I now own a single family home in the same area because I enjoyed Jonathan so much. As it now stands I wish I had gotten out of Jonathan - the board seems taking us into a deep well without any chance of a rope or pail to pull us out! They have destroyed the community that was once Jonathan - the clean up days of getting together with neighbors, picking up around our neighboorhood. The availablity to use the beach - without life guards there is no bathroom available for even picnics. The 4th of July party and bands..

I would like to see all that returned.

Lynn Zorn & John Zurn
Chaska & Jonathan Residents

Has anyone else watched the

txaggie94 — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 14:48:15 -0500

Has anyone else watched the replay of the Jonathan Meeting yet? If not, go to the City of Chaska's Video-on-Demand service and take a look (http://www.chaskacommunitycenter.com/vod/jon10-2-07.htm).

I guess what's really bothering me, now that I can look back at the proceedings, is that the attorneys would not answer a very, very simple question, posed by a number of Jonathan residents: How much is all this going to cost?

The attorneys had done very little due diligence in this process. Here are some examples, brought up by our neighbors during the meeting:
* The attorneys had failed to contact ANYONE from the original developer, the Jonathan Development Corporation, even though such people are still alive and well in Minnesota.
* The attorneys misleadingly called the Aeon Homes (formerly Central Community Housing Trust) project on the corner of Hundertmark and Clover Ridge Drive a "neighborhood," when, in fact, it is a retail and apartment complex.
* The attorneys had not spoken to former Executive Directors of the Jonathan Association, including Gayle Kincannon.
* The attorneys had not spoken with the former legal counsel to the Association, Marsh Hallberg.

I was also frustrated by the representatives of the townhome complexes. These representatives said time and time again that they are being "double charged," and that they don't use the Jonathan amenities. This requires two answers:

First, townhome associations do not just pay for the upkeep of common property. For their monthly sub-association dues, townhome owners receive:

* all of their exterior landscaping, including lawn mowing, tree maintenance, and bush trimming
* all of their snow removal, from their sidewalks and driveways
* an escrow account to be used to replace and repair exterior portions of their homes, including roofs, siding, personal walkways, and shared sidewalks.

It is simply incorrect to say that because a townhome owner pays sub-association dues to cover those costs, that they should somehow be exempt from paying dues to provide maintenance to the common property outside their windows.

Second, many of the townhome owners from the Traditions at Clover Ridge Townhome Association claim that they don't use the Jonathan common property. However, I see them several times a day running their dogs, off-leash, on the Jonathan common property next to my home. There are at least 7 townhome owners who are there DAILY, so claiming that they receive no benefit from their Jonathan Association dues is disingenuous, at best. Plus, some of them like to leave "presents" from their dogs for the kids who play football on that same piece of property.

Finally, I should point out what one of the Realtors mentioned during the meeting on Tuesday... If you're living in Jonathan, and are thinking of selling your house in the next few years, I wish you GOOD LUCK. Your Realtor is obligated by law to inform any potential buyers that there is pending litigation that can affect your property. Since the Jonathan Association Board of Directors continues to fail to provide property owners with any idea of what this legal action may cost, the chances that someone is going to buy your home are small - they don't know what they could be signing up for by buying your property. They'll go to Points West, or Chevalle, or somewhere where the Board of Directors isn't trying to tear apart the community.

Oh, and hiding the litigation from potential buyers wouldn't be smart, either. What happens if you don't mention this pending litigation to the potential buyer, and the Jonathan Association problems cause them to owe $15,000 to cover the costs of this legal action? The buyers can sue you for not disclosing material information about the property prior to the sale.

So, Jonathan neighbors, I urge you to take a good, hard look at the facts here. No matter what you WANT to believe, this is your money, your property value, and your community and the Jonathan Association Board of Directors is trying to take it all from you.

Think about how much you have to lose if this litigation succeeds, and how very little you can possibly gain.

-Katie Tierney
Traditions at Clover Ridge (Single-family)

The next Jonathan

Mollee Francisco — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 11:27:36 -0500

The next Jonathan Association Board of Directors meeting will be held Tuesday, October 9 at 6:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers, One City Hall Plaza.

(Mollee Francisco is a staff writer for the Chaska Herald. She can be reached at mfrancisco@swpub.com.)

Jonathan residents ready to fight for association's future

Mollee Francisco — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 11:29:07 -0500

By Mollee Francisco