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| 2018 LSPOA Annual Meeting January 20th at Sarasota Yacht Club |
The day dawned bright — and cool and windy. LSPOA members gathered at the Sarasota Yacht Club on Sunday, January 20th, for the Association’s Annual Meeting and Dinner. January’s yo-yo weather didn’t disappoint in keeping us guessing until the last minute.
Fortunately, plans to be out on the terrace for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres were scuttled in favor of remaining indoors to admire the beautiful views of the marina. Sixty members had RSVP’d to attend, but last-minute additions to the Lido Shores “DL” (see sidebar below) kept six-of our members home and on the bench.
LSPOA Membership “DL” List
Bob Lifeso - hip replacement
Diane Cook – dental problem
Bob Thill – retina surgery
Soon to be added: Lee Edstrom – hip replacement (Monday, Jan. 28th)
I arrived early — but I wasn’t the first. I found several members (not to be named — you know who you are!) already at the bar and enjoying their complimentary wine and cocktails. High spirits were exhibited as members greeted one another with cries of “Happy New Year."
As always, Ken McMillan and Ron Stanish were sartorially splendid (particularly Ken, who was sporting a jaunty silk scarf around his neck) and Miriam Cassell modelled a coat (of her own creation) made of a patchwork of tee shirts — including one from the Umbrella House. (Thanks for the publicity, Miriam!) Miriam was escorted by her husband — and soon-to-be new board member — Stuart. Other newly-elected board members also were in attendance, including Katie Best (flanked by her proud aunt and uncle, Carrie and Ken Cox); Lois Trotochou (with husband, David); Denis Bischoff (with outgoing board member, wife Mary Lee). Andrew Vac, newly elected after finishing out retired board member Peggy Shannon’s term, was his usual jovial self. He and Ramona Glanz worked the room with style!
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| LSPOA Centerpieces |
We welcomed Jeff and Karen Heath, who are no strangers to LSPOA social events, but were attending their first annual meeting as true residents, having only moved into their new home on Morningside Drive in December. Fred Fiala, just returned from having run a half-marathon in Naples that morning, looked as fresh as can be and had no trouble keeping up with exuberant wife, Judy. And long-time members, such as Howard Rooks, Carol and Tom Williams, board member Bernard Melanson, Terry Nugent and Christina Landry, also made their way from neighbor to neighbor.
Our meeting began promptly at 6:30 PM, with Madame President Lynn Carvel on a mission to bring all of our members up to speed on what’s been happening in the ‘hood' since last year’s meeting. Lynn gave us a warm up by showing Bob Thill’s annual gift to the neighborhood, “The 2018 Year in Review.” I only wish that Bob could have been in attendance to hear the applause!
In addition to great pix from potlucks and other LSPOA events, Bob captured the activism of our members in dealing with issues of beach erosion and short-term house rentals. Lynn’s spirited account of what matters to our members was well-received. (Click on YouTube link below, or copy and paste link in your browser to play 2018 Year ind Review Video)
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| Mary Lee Bischoff, Lynn Carvel and Anne Essner |
The meeting was adjourned promptly by 7:15 pm and members dined on their choices of Tuscan Flounder and Petit Osso Buco. The meal was closed out by a perennial favorite Florida dessert... Key Lime Pie. And while the evening was officially over as of 8:00 pm, a few of us lingered over after-dinner drinks, marveling on our good fortune for having found the wonderful neighborhood in which we live.
Looking ahead: Hoping to see everyone at the Spring Potluck, to be held at Jean and Kent Williams house, on Sunday, March 17th. And yes, we will celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with some special theme touches! Mark your calendars now!
— Anne Essner
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| LSPOA President Lynn Carvel |
Editors Note: We've also included some excerpts from President Lynn Carvel's "State of Lido Shores" address to the membership:
- LSPOA remains in great shape financially. We have 101 owners with 112 properties in the association.
- Bob Thill created this awesome video but is not here with us because he had emergency eye surgery today. He wanted me to tell everyone that he is fine, he just can’t see out of his right eye right now, because he had an emergency repair a retinal tear.
- Bob Thill and Elliott Himelfarb are the LSPOA Communication liaisons. Without these two at the helm, we wouldn’t get informative emails, party announcements, or urgent notifications. They are available at a moment’s notice to get the word to everyone (whatever it may be),
- I want to thank Gail and Stuart Barzman and Ashley and Alan Wildstein for opening up their beautiful homes and hosting our potluck dinners this past year... as well as Anne Essner and her entire Social Committee for the incredible job you do to make these events happen.
Now for a Communication Update:
Just over a year ago, we introduced a communication system called One Call Now that instantly sends out text messages and emails to the entire neighborhood with the press of a button.
But, it is reserved for truly urgent matters. I am happy to report that by having this system in place, we were able to notified everyone when the following situations occurred:
Moving on to Old Business
Beach Erosion As you saw in the video, this board has been hard at work.
After losing our beach (literally overnight), we jumped into action to try to do something about it. With your show of support and willingness to speak up, LSPOA and our little strip of beach finally got the attention of our city officials.
While you all know that we haven’t gotten any sand added to our beach from the current dredging, OR any type of barrier to protect our pavilion from further erosion, you probably don’t know that the city officials supported it.
We had negotiated a deal with a company to install their new ecofriendly, beach re-nourishment system (free of charge) in front of our pavilion. And by partnering with Mote, we would have served as a test site for this new system. The company willing to supply the barrier was on board with the project, Mote was onboard, and so were the city officials.
But unfortunately, we weren’t able to go forward because FDEP said they would override the city’s approval. However, what we gained is still valuable. Tom Barwin and the other officials that have a say in who gets sand in the future, can no longer claim they don’t know about Lido Shores or our beach erosion problem. Now, we stand a better chance to be included in the city’s next beach re-nourishment project.
Nightly Rentals Then, the city got to know us even better this fall when our neighborhood singlehandedly stopped Sarasota Commissioner Hagen Brody from advancing his plan to allow nightly, host-occupied rentals in residential neighborhoods throughout Sarasota.
While the LSPOA Board of Directors and its liaisons were instrumental in pulling it all together, we would have never succeeded without all of you! Everyone coming together to support one another and protect our neighborhood is the reason we were successful. And I want everyone to give themselves a big round of applause because that was quite an accomplishment.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid our battle with Airbnb type short term rentals has just begun. The spark that ignited the flame in everyone is the house at 1406 Westway Drive which was purchased by a real estate development company this summer and promptly advertised as a short-term rental (for 17 guests in beds).
With this, we were forced to confront the problem of commercialization of residential property and how to stop it in our private neighborhood. Lois and David Troutechau live next door to and are the most affected by the “Party House” as it’s now unaffectionately called. So, the first call came from Lois, but it was quickly followed by numerous phone calls from many members.
Everyone expressed the same concerns and fears:
Just over a year ago, we introduced a communication system called One Call Now that instantly sends out text messages and emails to the entire neighborhood with the press of a button.
But, it is reserved for truly urgent matters. I am happy to report that by having this system in place, we were able to notified everyone when the following situations occurred:
- we returned a life-saving medical device that had been left behind at a potluck to its owner
- we alerted everyone about the shooting in downtown Sarasota on May 5th prior to the shooter being apprehended, so that a potentially dangerous situation could be avoided
- and, just a few days ago, we returned a lost, black cat with green eyes to its rightful owner.
Moving on to Old Business
Beach Erosion As you saw in the video, this board has been hard at work.
After losing our beach (literally overnight), we jumped into action to try to do something about it. With your show of support and willingness to speak up, LSPOA and our little strip of beach finally got the attention of our city officials.
While you all know that we haven’t gotten any sand added to our beach from the current dredging, OR any type of barrier to protect our pavilion from further erosion, you probably don’t know that the city officials supported it.
We had negotiated a deal with a company to install their new ecofriendly, beach re-nourishment system (free of charge) in front of our pavilion. And by partnering with Mote, we would have served as a test site for this new system. The company willing to supply the barrier was on board with the project, Mote was onboard, and so were the city officials.
But unfortunately, we weren’t able to go forward because FDEP said they would override the city’s approval. However, what we gained is still valuable. Tom Barwin and the other officials that have a say in who gets sand in the future, can no longer claim they don’t know about Lido Shores or our beach erosion problem. Now, we stand a better chance to be included in the city’s next beach re-nourishment project.
Nightly Rentals Then, the city got to know us even better this fall when our neighborhood singlehandedly stopped Sarasota Commissioner Hagen Brody from advancing his plan to allow nightly, host-occupied rentals in residential neighborhoods throughout Sarasota.
While the LSPOA Board of Directors and its liaisons were instrumental in pulling it all together, we would have never succeeded without all of you! Everyone coming together to support one another and protect our neighborhood is the reason we were successful. And I want everyone to give themselves a big round of applause because that was quite an accomplishment.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid our battle with Airbnb type short term rentals has just begun. The spark that ignited the flame in everyone is the house at 1406 Westway Drive which was purchased by a real estate development company this summer and promptly advertised as a short-term rental (for 17 guests in beds).
With this, we were forced to confront the problem of commercialization of residential property and how to stop it in our private neighborhood. Lois and David Troutechau live next door to and are the most affected by the “Party House” as it’s now unaffectionately called. So, the first call came from Lois, but it was quickly followed by numerous phone calls from many members.
Everyone expressed the same concerns and fears:
- “I don’t want Lido Shores turning into another Anna Maria Island”
- “I didn’t buy in this neighborhood expecting to have to live next to vacation rentals”
- “I’m worried that if we don’t stop this, it’s going to hurt our property values.”
Transient people constantly in our neighborhood, security issues, noise, and cars parked everywhere are all major concerns and reasons for wanting something to be done to prevent these short-term rentals in our neighborhood.
The Board of Directors listened to the outcry and took action. They passed a bylaw prohibiting LSPOA membership and its privileges (such as private access to the beach) to those owners who rent their houses for less than 30-days, one month, or whichever is less.
Other than the party house, the new rule has not affected any other owners. The board is still working on an overall plan on how to deal with enforcing the bylaw and we will publicize it to everyone when complete.
But any type of enforcement at this point will be initiated by one of you who calls a board member to report a nuisance situation created by a short-term rental (just as Lois did). I can assure you action isn’t being initiated by board members prowling around the neighborhood looking for people to kick out of our association.
While our new bylaw limits membership and denies private beach access to short-term rentals less than one month, unfortunately, it does nothing to stop the 7-day weekly rentals allowed by Sarasota’s city ordinance. For most of you, the 30-day restriction isn’t enough.
HOA Research The LSPOA Board has heard from numerous members requesting that more be done. For that reason, we have retained an attorney who specializes in helping home owner associations. Not only is he well versed in the state statues that govern HOA’s, but he helped draft some of them prior starting his private practice. His name is Dan Lobeck. Board member Roberto Arguedas and I have meet with Lobeck twice since December 11, 2018.
It looks like we may be able to reinstate the 1948 Declarations that were established for our neighborhood, but make them less restrictive and more appropriate to our current wants and needs are as it relates to protecting our neighborhood. This is all very preliminary and once we have all the details and options available to us, we will be reaching out to everyone in the neighborhood. You will all be fully informed and will have a say in the direction we need to go to protect our neighborhood.
A majority vote of the entire membership will be required, so don’t worry about something being passed that you didn’t know anything about. You have an incredible board whose purpose is to serve the entire Lido Shores community, so you will be included once we’ve received all the information back from the attorney.
Speaking of Boards…
I want to thank Carol Bowen, Lee Edstrom, Mary Lee Bischoff and Ken Abt (our board members who are rotating off) and welcome Katie Best, Denis Bischoff, Stuart Cassell, Louis Troutochau and Andrew Vac to the board. While we are losing Mary Lee as a board member, she won’t be going far because she was recently named the Chair of our Neighborhood Welcome Committee.
The Board of Directors listened to the outcry and took action. They passed a bylaw prohibiting LSPOA membership and its privileges (such as private access to the beach) to those owners who rent their houses for less than 30-days, one month, or whichever is less.
Other than the party house, the new rule has not affected any other owners. The board is still working on an overall plan on how to deal with enforcing the bylaw and we will publicize it to everyone when complete.
But any type of enforcement at this point will be initiated by one of you who calls a board member to report a nuisance situation created by a short-term rental (just as Lois did). I can assure you action isn’t being initiated by board members prowling around the neighborhood looking for people to kick out of our association.
While our new bylaw limits membership and denies private beach access to short-term rentals less than one month, unfortunately, it does nothing to stop the 7-day weekly rentals allowed by Sarasota’s city ordinance. For most of you, the 30-day restriction isn’t enough.
HOA Research The LSPOA Board has heard from numerous members requesting that more be done. For that reason, we have retained an attorney who specializes in helping home owner associations. Not only is he well versed in the state statues that govern HOA’s, but he helped draft some of them prior starting his private practice. His name is Dan Lobeck. Board member Roberto Arguedas and I have meet with Lobeck twice since December 11, 2018.
It looks like we may be able to reinstate the 1948 Declarations that were established for our neighborhood, but make them less restrictive and more appropriate to our current wants and needs are as it relates to protecting our neighborhood. This is all very preliminary and once we have all the details and options available to us, we will be reaching out to everyone in the neighborhood. You will all be fully informed and will have a say in the direction we need to go to protect our neighborhood.
A majority vote of the entire membership will be required, so don’t worry about something being passed that you didn’t know anything about. You have an incredible board whose purpose is to serve the entire Lido Shores community, so you will be included once we’ve received all the information back from the attorney.
Speaking of Boards…
I want to thank Carol Bowen, Lee Edstrom, Mary Lee Bischoff and Ken Abt (our board members who are rotating off) and welcome Katie Best, Denis Bischoff, Stuart Cassell, Louis Troutochau and Andrew Vac to the board. While we are losing Mary Lee as a board member, she won’t be going far because she was recently named the Chair of our Neighborhood Welcome Committee.
~Lynn Carvel
LSPOA President
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