Category Archives: QFCA

The Wonder of Sworn Testimony & Public Records!

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R-E-C-O-R-D-S! Release the Records!

guest blog by Nila Ridings 

Recently, I have talked with HOA members locally and across the country who are frustrated because they cannot see the financial records in their HOA.

One homeowner requested to see ONE financial document and was told by the Associa management operation that a $200 advance payment was required to see it! Others have gotten the same old song and dance about paying to see the HOA records.

Back in 2007, it was discovered after much stalling and excuse making by the board president that Quivira Falls had $10,000,000.00 unaccounted for. Yes, that figure is TEN MILLION DOLLARS!!! And the audits had not been performed for years, as required per the by-laws. A homeowner filed a pro se lawsuit to see records. Five months later, I filed a lawsuit to recall the board and gain access to the records.

At that time, I was fairly new in the neighborhood. But my corporate experience helped me recognize I was dealing with some shysters. Shifty eyes, mumbling and bumbling, couldn’t give me a straight answer, nervous, cocky, stalling, and quickly trying to dismiss my questions always with “we’ll take that under advisement.”

Before the homeowner filed the pro se case he told the board members, “If we find embezzlement somebody is going to jail!” The response was a finger pointed at us and a booming angry voice from the HOA president, “If you think there has been any embezzlement or malfeasance, you’ll never find it!”

This guy had been the Quivira Falls Community Association president for 26 years! Homeowners had made no efforts to question anything he did. One of the board members, Jody Lamping said he put her through “mental masturbation” but never answered questions with legitimate answers.

Ongoing investigation was revealing more and more eye brow raising information. One being this Quivira Falls HOA president was running for the board of an HOA in Carlsbad, California. He had just purchased two places in that community. His bio read like Mr. Magnificent in the world of homeowners associations. Several residents of Quivira Falls contacted the manager of the Carlsbad HOA and his name was immediately pulled from the ballot. Ryan Rader died a few days later.

When Johnson County Judge Thomas Sutherland, ordered the records be turned over to me Rader’s successor, Jody Lamping, under oath, proclaimed, “there are no records!” Judge Sutherland gave her fair warning of perjury charges should records turn up at a later date. That did not deter her one iota, she threw her nose in the air and declared, “there are no records!” The board treasurer, Bill Reavis claimed Quivira Falls Community Association had no bank accounts, either.

I contacted the Johnson County District Attorney’s office and was instructed to file a “suspicion of embezzlement” report with the Overland Park Police. The detective ultimately hit dead ends because current and former board members claimed no knowledge of anything, stating only Ryan Rader knew about the inside workings of the HOA. What he did find was thousands of dollars in cash logged onto the ledgers but not one dime was ever deposited into the numerous bank accounts that Quivira Falls had established around the Kansas City area. The detective had no way to obtain information from a dead man so the case was closed, but he advised me to contact him if anything changed.

A year later, a homeowner that was very familiar with the details walked into the clubhouse and caught Jody Lamping with another board member and a former board member shredding records. I was called and my attorney instructed me to go immediately to the clubhouse with witnesses and cameras which we did. Jody Lamping was so nervous her mandible was flipping back and forth like a pendulum on a one hundred year old grandfather’s clock. The former board member was hiding on the staircase behind a wall, while the other was pretending to be on the phone to the HOA attorney letting him know the HOA records had just been found. Thinking we hit a goldmine, I called the detective. It was no surprise when he said that was not true because two months after the judge ordered the records turned over to me he was given access to those records!

There are more stories to this “new” board that promised Quivira Falls homeowners they could be trusted, but I’ll share those at another time.

For now, it’s best to say, DO NOT HAVE A BLIND FAITH AND TRUST IN YOUR HOA BOARD MEMBERS!

Do not allow anyone to be the president of the HOA for decades. I would suggest limiting that position to 1-2 years.

Do not allow 1 or 2 board members to be signers on HOA checks. Have 3 people and be sure they are all qualified to be bonded and do background and credit checks on them. If they have a criminal history or financial problems they are not good candidates to be handling your HOA funds.

Do not allow the HOA property manager to have exclusive access to bank accounts and checks. If your by-laws require yearly audits, demand they be done!

Do not allow cash payments to be made to the HOA for any reason.

Do not give the HOA president carte blanche to spend thousands of dollars without board approval. A $1,000 limit should be sufficient.

If the HOA operations have been “shaky” and you manage to land a position on the board, insist on a forensic audit during a board meeting and double check to be sure it was recorded in the minutes. If you are a homeowner, submit a written request for a forensic audit. Retain a copy of your request.

If your by-laws allow for more than 5% of your annual budget to be spent by a property manager without board approval, suggest a change to the by-laws. It would be most beneficial to require a vote by the homeowners for any spending that will exceed 5% of the annual budget.

Regarding audits: The statement has been made on many occasions that honest board members don’t need audits. I strongly disagree. Audits work both ways; keeping thieves from stealing from an easy target and protecting honest people from being accused of stealing.

Never forget that people who have nothing to hide, hide nothing!

70 Years Ago Today…Far Far Away in Normandy

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guest blog by Nila Ridings

It’s with deep emotions and a heavy heart that I write this blog about D-Day.

On that beach, dressed in the United States Army military fatigues with a rifle and a helmet was the man that ten years later would become the most influential person in my life. He was six feet tall, slender, beautiful blue eyes, thick dark brown hair with a wave on the side, a grin that melted everybody’s heart, and a sense of humor that could turn the toughest situations into one that made me laugh. Mom’s girlfriends said he was so dreamy looking he could have been a movie star. By the grace of God, I was one of three lucky girls that got to call him Dad.

He wasn’t a war hero, he was my hero. From my earliest memories in life, he was always my best friend. He was a very successful businessman, but first and foremost he was a loving husband, father, grandfather, son, brother, uncle, friend, and employer. He never missed my dance recitals, or a chance to make latrines for my Girl Scout camp. He was at every event I was a part of in school even when he was sitting in the freezing cold on concrete bleachers while I was cheering for our team until I lost my voice. He taught me about life, people, money management, construction, honesty, integrity, motivation, ambition, problem-solving, decision-making, project management, and taking good care of customers. He lived by his motto of “Work hard and play hard but never do too much of either one!”

We went to air shows and boat shows, car races and rodeos, the circus and ice skating performances. We went to Disneyland and Fairy Land, and coast to coast in the family station wagon. We ate well and lived comfortably in a beautiful HOA-FREE neighborhood. We had nice cars, boats, clothes, and a vacation home.

I’ve been extremely fortunate. And, my Dad told me to never buy a home with an HOA. I didn’t listen to his advice and I’ve paid the price. I fight every day to educate others about the horrors of HOAs and try to protect them from this misery. My Dad is my driving force, the wind beneath my wings, and the angel on my shoulder. He knew this HOA battle would grow ugly and brutal and I fight it to honor him.

He fought for our country to protect our freedoms from being destroyed by our enemies. When WWII was over, he returned to Kansas and never shared a word about what he saw on June 6, 1944. I just always knew we would take no vacations where we slept in a tent or away from American soil. And rice was never served on our dinner table. I did not know where my Dad was on D-Day until after both of my parents were gone and a family friend told me. I cried for hours.

Many men lost their lives. Wives lost their husbands, children lost their dads, mothers and fathers lost their sons, and brothers and sisters lost their brothers, and families lost loved ones seventy years ago on this fateful day. May we pause to remember each of them. And, pray that the citizens of our country and especially those of us in HOAs will recognize they did not make the ultimate sacrifice so we could turn against and battle each other on American soil today.

Beyond words…I love you and miss you, Dad.

Thank you for your service to our great country.

Elmer L. Ridings, 1922-1988

$100,000-Love Scores Zero With Quivira Falls Homeowners

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guest blog by Nila Ridings

Tennis anyone?  Well, not for the past several years because the courts have been bolted shut.  The surface is broken and the weeds are growing wild up through the cracks.  When the courts were open they were enjoyed once in a blue moon by non-residents with Missouri plates on their cars.

On October 22, 2007 six of the board members signed and mailed a letter to every homeowner to defend their position against the petitions that had been signed by over 240 homeowners to recall the board.  In that letter they state, “They say we are also frivolous to buy wind screens for the tennis courts.”  And, then they go on to say that due to the foreclosures that would impact their revenue they voted “for,” but decided “against,” buying the wind screens and new nets.

Warning

You bet there were homeowners opposing that ridiculous and unnecessary purchase because our townhouses were rotten to the point of having frame damage.  As a matter of fact, just four months after that letter was written the electric meters fell off my house because the siding and the structural frame was so rotten it just completely gave way.  This happened during a torrential rain storm and ripped two holes about the size of five gallon buckets in the back of my house.  Water was literally spraying out the electrical breakers on the wall downstairs and the water was gushing in under my new wood flooring, all over my new basement ceiling, down the walls, and running like a river across my brand new white berber carpeting and on across the basement to the drain in the utility room!  And there was absolutely nothing I could do to stop it.  My work order had been in for over two years for wood rot repair and it was met with nothing but totally goofy childish excuses.  When I told a board member I was going to hire my own contractor to repair the exterior of my house and apply the stucco, she told me…get ready now readers… brace yourselves………………..“If you hire your own contractors we are going to sue you and make you take the stucco off and put the wood rot back on!”  To this day, that is one of the most stupid things anybody has ever said to me in my entire life!

Back to the tennis courts.  One of the homeowners got ticked at the HOA and decided to report the tennis courts as abandoned property to the City of Overland Park.  Of course, I was notified of this because any time people are upset…I hear about it.  

Nobody wants to raise hell with this HOA board because if you dare do it, there is hell to pay. Sheer hell.  Ugly hell. Hate-filled hell.  That treatment silences 99.999% of the homeowners.  They haven’t been blind to the treatment I’ve gotten by the board and their cronies so they are not marching down the “Nila Ridings Road.”  No sir, they value their quality of life and bank accounts far more than speaking out…thus, this HOA is a horrible nightmare!

Quite by accident I found the property manager on my driveway right after hearing of this report.  I decided since she was right here within two feet of me, I’d ask about the status of the tennis courts.  She told me it was CITY CODE that Quivira Falls had to have these tennis courts resurfaced or totally removed, including the asphalt.  The cost to remove the fencing and asphalt for both courts was going to be $100,000.00 and 1/3 that amount if they were resurfaced.  I was skeptical….my gut instinct and intuition was saying this “smells” rotten.  My call to the City revealed it is not City code for Quivira Falls to have tennis courts.  A plan can be submitted for something new in their place, OR they can be removed. BUT THE ASPHALT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE REMOVED!

I’m 99% sure I could find somebody that would take those fences down for free and haul them off and reuse them.  I know a few loads of dirt and some grass seed can be purchased for far less then $100,000.00.  And, in the end the HOA would save money by not having to maintain the courts, buy nets, or those wind screens that were voted on in 2007, the lights could be removed as well and probably sold, but certainly there would be no electricity burning and there would be no expense of changing the bulbs when they burn out.  

I sent emails to the property manager and the board demanding this project be stopped so further discussion could take place before another $35,000 is wasted.  For those of you who don’t know this, my HOA borrowed $1M and most definitely it makes more sense to pay down debt then it does to resurface unused tennis courts! Nope, this CAI property manager is going forward with this project no matter what!  

Did I fail to mention just a couple of years ago they built a fancy handrail down the steps to the tennis courts?  That’s right, it’s been the “staircase to nowhere” because once you walked down there you were “welcomed” with the padlock!

Homeowners are putting protest plans together.  It looks like ANOTHER war is about to begin in Quivira Falls!

Here’s the kicker…”Arizona Dave” just had the tennis courts at his condo complex resurfaced.  They are larger than the ones in Quivira Falls.  Dave’s association is managed by him, not a CAI property management company.  He emailed me the paid invoice….$12,000.  

Like I said, something “smells” rotten!