By Rich Orr, President
The Board meets twice a year, in July and October. Most of the meeting is routine reports; here are few things to note from the Fall meeting, held on October 6th this year.
Lake Health
The Lakes Environmental Association (LEA) monitors Keoka’s water quality during the summer. A formal water quality report will be generated over the winter. But the preliminary finding is that although the heavy rains had an adverse effect on water quality, the negative impact was less than expected.
KLA has volunteer plant patrollers who monitor the entire shoreline for invasive species. KLA also hired divers from LEA to survey the areas of Keoka most at risk for invasives. We are pleased to report that no invasive species were found.
Membership
The Board addressed an inconsistency between our practice and the KLA bylaws. The bylaws provide that “active members” entitled to vote at membership meetings are those individuals who have paid the annual dues. Our past practice, however, has been to recognize couples as a single membership. The Board determined that the best approach was to conform our practices to the bylaws by making all memberships individual.
Very few people will be affected by the change. Of the approximately 120 memberships, more than 100 are individuals or couples who are already being treated as two individual members. Because dues are $25 per person, any couple paying dues and/or making a donation in a total amount of $50 or more are treated as two dues paying individuals at no additional cost. About a dozen couples currently pay only $25. These couples can elect to remain at $25 by having one person in the couple register as a dues-paying, voting member. Or they can both be individual members by each paying $25 dues.
The Board recognizes that some members may want to be recognized as being affiliated with other members (e.g., spouses/parents-children/siblings sharing a property). The Board endorsed the idea of trying to develop a payment system and membership database that will allow individuals to be identified as part of a couple or other affinity group if they so desire.
Online Dues Payment
The Board recognizes that many people prefer to pay bills online rather than writing and mailing a paper check. Brenda Hambleton is leading the effort to make online dues payments available in the not-too-distant future.
Dues Reminder
Although we request that dues for the calendar year be paid by July 1, 2023 dues can be paid any time up to December 31. If you are not sure whether you have paid your dues for 2023, email Paige Nalipinski, membership chair, at paigepinski@gmail.com.
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