Civic Duty - or - Why DO I ALWAYS Want to Help?

Since moving into our neighborhood in 2004, I've been attempting to be more involved with the governance of it. After all, we have a Homeowners' Association, a volunteer organization, that manages our dues, expenses, management of the community center, pool including the kids' swim team, tennis courts and common land and organizes community events. Sounds great, right? People from the neighborhood, who have a vested interest in what goes on here, are the ones making sure everything runs smoothly. There are committees for Land and Facilities Management, Architectural Control, Community Event, Civic Affairs and Swim Team; all staffed by volunteers as well. Scrreeech. Over the past two to three years that whole idea of volunteering seems to have hit a pocket of overwhelming apathy. A bunch of things have not been happening, from missed community events to architectural reviews. You probably see where this is going.

My downward spiral to full involvement started at a board meeting a couple of months ago. The call went out to have volunteers to be on a committee to look at some long-term financial difficulties that our community will have unless we can find a way to raise homeowners' dues past the infinitesimal amount that it is allowed to increase each year. The community by-laws are very restrictive and are written in a way to make changing things, regardless of need, very difficult. A corollary with that is the fact that, because of new laws that the state of Virginia passed regulating Homeowners' Associations, there are things of which we, as volunteers, are woefully ignorant. That could be a huge potential problem for us. So we're also looking for a management firm that could handle these things for us. That will also cost money. So I joined that, figuring that it would be better for me to join something affecting my personal bottom line rather than sit on the sidelines. The committee has had several meetings and I believe that our work is almost complete concerning how we would like to proceed (rather how we can proceed). We're also hindered by a rather difficult challenge to even achieve a quorum of residents.

Two weeks ago we had our annual homeowners' association review meeting. The board had found enough volunteers to staff all of the open (or soon-to-be open) board positions save one. One of my neighbors volunteered for the remaining spot, but also commented that he might not be the best choice due to the amount of travel he has to do for his work. That's when my conscience went to work on me. I raised my hand and heard my self saying something like, "I'll volunteer for the spot so that he doesn't have to be obligated to a position that he might not be able to do. Heaven help me." That got some laughs and my neighbor thanked me for stepping up to take him out of the spotlight. At the end of the meeting the board president requested the suckers, uhhh, volunteers to consider which of the open board positions they would like to fill.

Things being what they are with my life, I didn't in any diligent fashion gather an idea of what the duties of the open board member positions are. I knew that the secretary was leaving and that is a position that I've held before, but wasn't completely certain I wanted that one. To make a long story short, that's the position I ended up taking. Quite frankly, it's o.k., if for no other reason than I think it's been a while since anyone took serious interest in official record-keeping in the neighborhood and I would like to fill some of the gaps that I preceive are there. So I'm off on to a two-year mission to seek out and discover old records, meet new neighbors and boldly help my neighborhood like I never have before.