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Editorial: Looking for Facts? |
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Written by Greg Hankins, Times Editor
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Thursday, 19 August 2010 |
"Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts."
— Daniel Patrick Moynihan
A fact is a curious thing.
It's kind of like a brick. You can gather it together in an orderly fashion with others of its kind and build a pretty sturdy structure of knowledge on a given subject.
Or you can pick it up and hurl it at your opponent, figuring that's the quickest way to win a debate.
Folks inclined toward the second use of facts start out with a preconceived conclusion and gather up only the facts that support it, hoarding them like brickbats, ready to hurl them when the right opportunity presents itself.
They leave all those other inconvenient facts lying around on the ground — or, if they can get away with it, distract you while they hide them someplace safe, out of sight.
The debate about incorporating Seven Lakes has entered the facts as brickbats stage. We've got plenty of folks gathering up plenty of facts, but few of them seem to be building anything out of them. And we've seen more than a few hurled already.
That's natural and inevitable, because folks are human and humans like to win. But it's not really going to help us better understand the implications of turning this place into a town. And, if we don't understand it, it's going to be real hard to make a good decision about it.
At The Times, we like to use facts to build good solid foundations. And we'd like to invite you to help us — and the community — build a good solid foundation of knowledge that can help folks think more clearly about the proposed incorporation of Seven Lakes.
We're neither for nor against incorporation. But we do think it needs to be discussed in an intelligent, civil manner.
So we've come up with a new way to accomplish that. We've created a Wiki on incorporation . No, a Wiki is not a large, hairy Star Wars character. It is a community-created repository of knowledge that lives on the Internet. The most famous wiki is Wikipedia, an encyclopedia written and edited by volunteers. If you've Googled anything, you've probably wound up in Wikipedia at some point.
Our wiki, which lives at incwiki.sevenlakestimes.net , is a place where we all can bring together the facts we've unearthed about incorporation, combine them with the facts other folks have unearthed, and work through the process of agreeing about how they fit into the puzzle. It's not a place to discuss our opinions about incorporation. It is a place to bring your documented knowledge of any aspect of the subject.
You can become a member of the wiki and add your facts to any of its pages, help edit the material others have brought, or make new pages that deal with any aspect of the incorporation question.
The wiki includes forums where you can discuss with your fellow members various aspects of the page you are creating together — separating opinion from fact and figuring out how the facts fit together. You can have the page you are working on send you an email whenever someone changes it, so you can go see what they have done and fix it, if it needs fixing.
It's a community project, a way of thinking together, a tool for learning together.
Using facts as brickbats, in the end, isn't just bad manners. It's intellectually dishonest. Unethical. Evil.
Using facts to build a common understanding — even if, in the end, we continue to disagree about incorporation — is more than just good manners. It's honest. Virtuous. Good.
It's time to put down the brickbat and pick up your trowel.
Go to incwiki.sevenlakestimes.net, sign up, and let's get to work. |
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Pine Forest Tract Moore County's Last, Best Longleaf Forest |
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Written by Greg Hankins, Editor
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Saturday, 12 December 2009 |
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They say that towns and subdivisions are often named after that which will no longer exist once they are built: Peaceful Valley or Rural Retreat or even Southern Pines.
Or Pine Forest.
 Seven Lakes developer Fred Lawrence didn't fall prey to that titular irony, since he created the lakes after which he named his community.
Botanist Bruce Sorrie, a Whispering Pines-based botanist work works for the state's Natural Heritage Program, identifying plant and animal communities worth preserving, is concerned that the Pine Forest PUD, which will cover nearly 1,700 acres between NC Highways 73 and 211, will fall in to the former category rather than the latter. Once MHK Development is done installing a resort hotel, three golf courses, two gated communities and assorted retail shops, there may not be much pine forest left in Pine Forest.
And that will be particularly tragic in this case, Sorrie told The Times, because the 1,700 acre Pine Forest tract is a particularly fine example of the sort of longleaf pine forest that once dominated not just Moore County, but stretched across the Coastal Plain from Virginia to Texas, covering tens of million of acres when Europeans first explored what they called "The New World." |
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Read more...
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Smaller dues increase could meet needs |
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Written by Jim Barrett, Seven Lakes West
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Monday, 01 March 2010 |
An Open Letter to Members of the Seven Lakes West Landowners Association:
Please vote “No” on the proposed FY2010-2011 budget.
Why? Because of the excessive up-front dues increase, which is not necessary.
A Budget Revision Package was prepared and the results were reviewed in detail with the Association’s Treasurer. The Board reviewed the package in executive session on February 9 and decided to make no changes to the proposed budget. Since the presentation with the Treasurer, the original budget revision package was modified to include the information in the following paragraphs.
This modified Budget Revision Package demonstrates that a twenty-five percent dues increase in FY 2010-2011 and a four percent increase in FY 2011-2012 will satisfy the present and future needs of the Association. This reduces and eases the impact of a dues increase by approximately seven percent over a two year period.
Basic elements of the Budget Revision
– A modest dues increase in the next two years for both improved and unimproved lots.
– Rapid payout of the mortgage on West Side Park.
– Paving needs are covered, as well as culvert remediation.
– Reserves are rebuilt.
Advantages of the Budget Revision
– Solves reaction to excessive dues increase in FY 2010-2011.
– Maintains current dues ratio between improved and unimproved lots.
– Insures funds are available for present/future projected needs.
– Pays out West Side Park mortgage in six years.
– Frees up funds for future needs.
– Keeps members’ faith that the Board listens.
Mortgage: A major budget concern for Seven Lakes West is the $910,000 principle on the present West Side Park mortgage. In organizations such as ours, mortgages are usually based on a 20-year term with a 5-year balloon, with a need for refinancing. The mortgage rate is based on the Prime Rate, presently three percent plus one-half percent (3.5%). Often this rate is negotiated even better to the benefit of the borrower.
The Budget Revision Package included information on a mortgage at three percent with a principal paydown, which would totally eliminate the mortgage in approximately 70 months. A mortgage at four percent would result in a payout of approximately 72 months.
Roads: Analysis of budget information supplied by the Board indicates there are sufficient funds in the reserves to cover paving needs through at least 2014. In the Budget Revision Package, paving reserves can be accumulated on an annual basis to satisfy the needs of the thirty-year paving program.
Culverts: The Budget Revision Package includes funds to insure the culvert crisis (discussed at the February 2 General Meeting, but not included in the budget packet given to members) will be corrected. This activity is necessary prior to any specific road paving projects on roads needing culvert repair.
While there are other value considerations in the Budget Revision Package, the previous paragraphs discuss some of the most significant.
Please do the following:
– If you have not voted on the budget, please vote “No.”
– If you have sent in a proxy, please send a letter to Ed Tuton, Secretary, indicating that he is to vote “No” on the proxy.
– If you have voted “yes,” please request a new ballot to vote no.
A non-vote is actually a “yes” vote for the budget, According to the NC Planned Communities Act (which applies to Seven Lakes West), the budget can be rejected only by a “no” vote by more than fifty percent of the membership.
If you have not voted in the past, it is imperative that you vote this time. Also, please contact at least twelve other members to vote “No.” Please ask them to contact twelve or more and “pass it on.”
The Budget Revision Package and its values seem to be falling on deaf ears. Many of us have served on volunteer Boards. It can be a difficult job. This and previous Boards have done many good things. However, the Budget Revision Package is an attempt to get the present Board to rethink and change their position on this excessive dues increase. This is particularly important in today’s economic climate.
Thanks in advance for your time and efforts in helping this process. Should you have any questions, feel free to contact me.
Jim Barrett
Seven Lakes West
910-673-2527
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Dissenting voices have benefitted community |
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Written by D. Alan Shaw, Seven Lakes South
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Monday, 06 April 2009 |
Dear Editor:
In round numbers, the US Government has bailed out AIG with $182.5 billion dollars. There is a huge uproar about the bonus money paid to a group of executives which amounts to $165 million dollars. Put in perspective, the bonus money is about one-tenth of one percent of the total bailout money.
Now look at the $75,500 gift that our Seven Lakes Landowners Association [SLLA] Board of Directors has bestowed upon our manager in the recently announced consulting contract. Total dues for the SLLA amount to around $1.3 million dollars a year. Dalton Fulcher’s bonus represents almost six percent of the annual dues received by the SLLA.
It is clear to me that Director Sally Kindsvatter should attempt to be a bit more concerned with facts than delivering accolades. Charlie Oliver — yes, one of those disloyal Advocates, if you believe Kindsvatter — found that the dam reports sent to us by the State were largely being filed and ignored. Then through the work of Ron Erskine and others — yes, those same disloyal Advocates — a dam committee which had been essentially in hibernation was brought back to life.
Under Erskine’s leadership, dam reports were sought from engineers, which disclosed essentially what Oliver had suspected. Our dams were in desperate need of proactive policy.
Direcor Don Truesdell, after he was not elected to serve as President for another term, took over the re-activated dam committee. He then proceeded to remove Erskine from the committee. Without advocates Erskine and Oliver, it is likely that all of our dams would have continued to be managed only by state-mandated compliance. While we will never know, it is likely that Echo Dam cost significantly more to repair than it would have had Fulcher brought the importance of the reports to the attention of previous Boards.
It is shameful that Kindsvatter will praise a board member and manager and not acknowledge the contribution of the advocates, who in fact are responsible for the matter being addressed in the first place.
Finally, major issues have been resolved or are in the process of being resolved because interested people have brought them into public view. You can take company police elimination and the dam program as examples. Without the good people of this community who have been willing to stand up and take the abuse from the Rodney King “let’s get along” group, these issues would still be unresolved.
Hopefully, the new board will use the resolution of some problems as an example of why transparency is necessary. Cooperation is a two way street. Quality leadership respects — even requests — dissenting opinions.
D. Alan Shaw
Seven Lakes South | | Click here to comment on this letter |
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Combative? No. Opposed? No. Loyal? Yes. |
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Written by Ron Erskine, Seven Lakes North
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Monday, 06 April 2009 |
Dear Editor:
The Advocates were berated by two Board Members at the Seven Lakes Landowners Association [SLLA] Annual Meeting this past March 22. This was unfortunate.
It is our understanding that the purpose of the Annual Meeting is to summarize the Board’s successes and/or failures of the past year and listen to the various committee reports while the votes are being tabulated. It is not to scold individuals or groups of individuals with whom individual Board members have had differences. If it had not been for the fact that the election results had yet to be announced, many of us would have “walked out.”
Certainly those two Board members have every right to criticize the Advocates. It’s just regrettable that they didn’t choose a different time and place. We’ll offer no rebuttal, but simply remind the Board of the content of the last two paragraphs of the editorial titled “Your Opinion, Not Ours” appearing on page 24 of the March 20 issue of The Times, and hope that this message will be read, reread, and taken to heart.
Toward the end of this editorial, when referring to the manager’s consulting contract, it stated in part, “The fact that the Board intentionally concealed the decision because they were worried about public reaction is, frankly, reprehensible.” The Advocates couldn’t agree more.
And, the final paragraph of this same editorial concluded with the statement, that “we would suggest that they spend a few minutes deciding to conduct their business in full view of the public and provide members with full access to Association records, and to stop worrying about how it will play in The Times.” Once again, we agree and fervently hope that the new Board will “let the sunshine in!”
We are not combative as several Board members have suggested. Neither however, are we apathetic. We are simply dues paying residents who have not and will not “bury our heads in the sand.” We will continue to request that the Board practice transparency and we must repeat, as often as we deem necessary, the fact that each and every dues paying association member has the “right to know.”
We ask that you think of us not as the opposition, but as a group loyal to Seven Lakes North and South and to the welfare of the community in which we reside. We have a common goal. Any differences of opinion can and should be channeled into a positive examination of the issues.
Residents also have a “duty to speak up” when they feel it is for the good of the community. We do so now, and urge the Board to reverse its decision to discontinue the Lakes & Dams Committee.
This committee is proactive, enthusiastic, and dedicated. It has accomplished a great deal in two short years. Rather than abolish it, we would suggest it be made a Standing Committee. It oversees our most precious assets.
Ron Erskine
Seven Lakes North
[on behalf of the Advocates] | | Click here to comment on this letter |
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