Email from Member:
Good Afternoon
In reading the newspaper today there seems to be a little bit of light occuring with regards to the MOU. Before I sign or agree to anything, can I have the following answered:
1. what happens to those individuals still in arrears with their condo fees?
2. Individuals who are in arrears with city taxes, will this have any impact on getting the MOU approved?
3. once the city does take over, that will mean Condo 8 will no longer exist, correct? It will be one monthly payment of approximately $358 and no condo fee, right.
Thank you,
Board Response:
Dear Member,
Persons in arrears for their condo fees will still be subject to collections until all arrears are paid. Arrears of city taxes will not interfere with the local improvement tax proposed by the MOU agreement.
If the city does take over Northlands there is no need for Condo 8 but condo owners need to agree and follow a process to dissolve the condo. The goal is to have only the payment for the local improvement tax when that tax is charged. As we understand it, the idea is to have only condo fees until the infrastructure is fixed, then condo fees will end and the local improvement charge of $358 will commence from there.
Thank you for your time and questions.
Sincerely,
Your Board
Condo Member wrote:
Hi there,
Just to clarify. If we get the loan from the City are those fees on top of what we pay in condo fees right now? For example, 3% interest over 25 years is $331 + $220 in condo fees = $551?
Thanks,
Member
Board's response:
Dear Member,
Good question. As it stands right now, we will be paying our condo fees until the the replacement of the infrastructure is complete. Once this has been done and our infrastructure is up to City standards, the City of Yellowknife will take over responsibility for our infrastructure and we will begin paying for the new infrastructure through a local improvement charge (LIC) which we will pay monthly to the City.
The property improvement tax will take the place of the Condo fee. We will continue to pay the monthly $220 condo fee to the condo corp to maintain our existing infrastructure until the replacement is complete. The new local improvement charge, to be paid to the City, will kick in once the work is complete. At this point we cannot speculate what the final monthly amount we will be paying to the City will be. The figures of $331 a month for 25 years (based on 3% interest rate on our individual portions of the loan) is an estimation. The factors that will affect what our final individual monthly costs will be are the interest at the time of borrowing the money and how much the actual cost of the project turns out to be. The figures we are working with include a contingency fee to cover any unforseen expenses. So our final cost will be affected by how much of the contingency amount is actually used.
At the time when we sign the MOU, we will be agreeing to pay the monthly amount named on the MOU. If the contingency amount is not used, or if there are other savings during the project, those will reduce the monthly amount we will have to pay. If there are unforeseen cost over-runs encountered during the replacement, we will not have to pay any more than the amount we agreed to by signing the MOU. That figure will be the maximum figure, it can only go down, not up. The amount will also be reduced by any funds the Condo Corp has which can be used to pay down the cost - this includes things like the sale of any of our common properties and the amount of the condo fees which the condo corp has collected and not used to maintain the infrastructure or manage the trailer park.
At this point there has been no decision made yet about whether the condo will be dissolved after the infrastructure replacment has been completed. One reason for not dissolving the condo corp would be to maintain the property lines as they now stand. Before the condo corp could be dissolved the property lines would need to be re-surveyed. If the condo corp is not dissolved, the condo fees would be very small as there would be no infrastructure to maintain.
The condo board is striving for the lowest possible cost to replace the infrastructure so that the members will have only a single monthly amount to pay the City - something in the mid to low $300 range.
Thank you for your inquiry. Hope this answers your question,
Your Board
An email from a Member:Please remind me again what bylaws we are trying to change as It has slipped my mind.
Board Response:We are in the final part of the process of changing our bylaws to allow us to take advantage of the changes in the Condo Act. When the condo was formed, the original Condo Act then in place wasn't properly 'fleshed out'. There were lots of things which were not in place, such as how condo boards can penalize people who do not pay their condo fees. When the Condo Act was changed a couple of years ago, the Northlands Condo was still not able to do the things which the new Condo Act allowed, because our bylaws did not allow them. The condo bylaws we had were put in place by the developer who converted Northlands Trailer Park into a condominium. He didn't care much about the power a condo board would need because at the beginning he owned all the units and so had all of the votes. Over the years since that developer sold all the units he held, the condo board has tried to make amendments to the condo's bylaws but was unable to because two thirds of the total member of owners of the condo (66 .66%) had to vote to change them.
The most significant amendments made to our bylaws last year, when we finally had enough members present (and proxies) to pass them, have to do with the ability of the condo board to collect condo fees and ways of penalizing members who break the bylaws. The amended bylaws include penalties for people who do not keep their yards tidy, who allow their dogs to disturb their neighbours, who leave vehicles parked on the streets for months at a time, etc. The amended bylaws also will allow the board to place a lien on the units owned by people who do not pay their condo fees. This means that the condo board will be able to collect what is owed when a trailer is sold, BEFORE the bank takes its share (which usually means there is nothing left for the condo after the bank gets its money out of the sale). However, this will ONLY be something the condo can do with owners who buy into the condo AFTER these amended bylaws are registered with the court.The condo will not be able to get its money before the banks with units that were bought before the amended bylaws are registered. Another amendment will allow the condo to collect any condo fees owed by an owner of a trailer which he/she is renting out from the TENANT. This means the tenant will pay a portion of his/her rent to the condo board instead of to the owner until the unpaid condo fees are all paid.
An email from a Member:
It has been almost a month since my 2nd request, and there has been no written response Please provide an update on when we will be receiving the copies (of minutes) requested below.
and...
We have been to the website and would like a current copy of the by-laws with amendments as opposed to the one posted as it states it is the OLD copy.
Board Response:
Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. At this point in time the new bylaws have not been registered as approved by the membership. It is a complicated process to get the bylaws registered. The amended bylaws have to be registered on each owners title individually. We are having a difficult time tracking down some owners. This has been in process for almost a year and we are almost finished. We still need 4 more titles. They are presently not distributable until fully registered.
We acknowledge that we have said that we would post the minutes on our website. We discussed your email at the most recent board meeting. We ran into an issue regarding condo member's confidentiality. We are trying to find the middle ground between making the minutes as complete with details as possible without divulging too much personal information about the members of the condo corp. This is to protect everyone's interests. Some of the information shared at the Board meetings is sensitive. Both the secretary and another member have agreed to take a look at the minutes in the near future. We will start with the most recent approved minutes. We also want to get them out to the membership.Thank you for your concern and we appreciate your patience.
Kevin Laframboise
on behalf of the board.
Response from member:
It's a concern that you do not have proper accounting of who owns what here in Northlands and are having difficulties of such a long time in finding out so.Thirdly, if there are such privacy issues being faced at board meetings, there is a process you can use called "in camera sessions" to discuss individual tenants that cause concern for privacy. Members of any corporation or association are entitled to minutes to be provided within a timely manner upon request. The lack of transparency is cause for concern ~ and rightfully so.
Board response:Each Condo Member owns his/her own individual unit in the Condo Corp (their trailer and the land it sits on and their one-two hundred and fity eighth share of the common property (roads, parks, water and sewer lines). As it is the individual members who own their units, they keep their own titles and other records and paper work. That is not the responsibility of the condo board (and I don't think anyone would want the condo board to keep the legal paperwork about their unit). I certainly do not want the condo to keep my important legal documents about my unit.
I am presently in the process of moving the YK condo8 website to a new web host. I have made it a priority tonight to get the minutes up before I do anything else so that they can be viewedby the members. While it is not yet a complete list, it is all that we have ready to be posted to the website. As we process the rest we will be sure to post them as soon as they are done. It has been a work in progress as we format the minutes for the website. We have begun to use "in-camera" sessions starting in October so that the minutes are administratively easier to post on the website. You should find that minutes will be posted in a more timely manner now that we have worked out the kinks. Please note that minutes need to be approved at the next meeting of the board before they can be posted thus the most recent minutes won't be posted for approximately 6 weeks.
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