AGM Meeting Minutes 2024

ESPOA Annual General Meeting September 1st, 2024

Meeting called to order at 0920. Chris Petrow spoke first. 

Chris states that he is not seeking re-election. He feels the board has met the goal of creating a Constitution and Bylaws. It took many hours, but created an important framework for the association. The improvement in the North End was very successful. Barry and his team where absolutely fantastic. Many thanks to Ryan Sanders, Troy Austen, Greg Ellis and Bryce Richardson. They raised $80,000 which was spent on the road. 

Also thanks to the board. Creating Change is difficult especially with a change in membership.  Expectations also change as the membership changes and grows. Chris encouraged people to volunteer. 

Don Rea spoke next: Here are his notes:

• During the winter we were in conversation with Rodco numerous times keeping abreast of the winter road conditions and concerns. 

• The Board has been getting together since mid February roughly every 2-4 weeks for online meetings.

• Numerous conversations with Barry Boice and BSG over road conditions and potential course of action for maintaining the road. 

• Attended the RLCA meeting on behalf of the board in July.

  • Bell Fibre – hopes to have the whole lake connected by the end of 2025.

§  Some areas are already online. More will be this fall.

§  Haliburton Forest – focussing on tourism: Hired a fulltime marketing person.

§  Forest experience, new trails, X-Country skiing, concerts. 

§  Partnered with Murray Bros and are now one of the largest lumber producers in Canada

§  Forest Management: Invasive species effecting Beech, hemlock

§  Remind people to please wash their ATV’s/UTV’s and Watercraft (Boats/Sea Doo’s/Kayaks, Canoes/Paddle Boards) to prevent the spread of organisms to other areas

·       If you notice strange insects please report them – take a picture and send it in. ag.info.omafra@ontario.ca

·       Don’t move firewood

§  Haliburton Forest made a huge donation to the Haliburton Hospital towards funding a CT scan unit

                    Barry Boice and Walt McKecknie spoke on topics; They are present and can go into more detail.

·        Shoreline Bylaw, 

·        Short Term Rentals, 

·        Garbage Incineration, 

·        (and the Leafs)

                    Clara Steele from Abbey Gardens spoke about shoreline restoration and Algae blooms

·        For those concerned about property values (-30% in Property values)

                    Coalition for Equitable Water Flows CEWF.ca – Live water levels and Draw Down forecasts        

                    Jess Kidd – Lake Steward- Lake health is determined by many factors:

·        Roads, 

·        landscaping, 

·        septic systems, 

·        boats, 

·        acid rain,

·        climate change, 

·        Algae blooms, 

·        invasive species. 

Overall Redstone is not in bad shape.

·        Get the lead out. – We need to remind people who fish/hunt in/over these waters to not use lead weights on their lines or lead shot gun pellets. 

o   This year there is a sad story about a small loon who passed due to lead poisoning and lead pellets/weights were found in its stomach during an autopsy. 

·        Early summer we installed the second one-way sign at the one-way hill. Very clear now which way you travel.

·        Norinne and myself set up a new bank account in July for the Association in Haliburton at BMO. 

o   Moving the account from RBC in Burlington. 

o   Easier for the Association to manage in the future.

·        Spent about 13hrs this summer physically working on the road clearing culverts and grading, sign installation with other members 

·        Would like to thank others who have gone out and filled potholes, graded the road, repaired the road after our many rainstorms, cut down problem trees, cleaned out culverts fixed the roadway behind or across their property. I have noticed and so have others and it is appreciated. 

Doug Bell spoke next: Signs are ordered and coming for each end of the road. (Road Narrows, speed limits and Private Road for ESPOA members only and guests)

Walt McKechnie spoke next:

He addressed Short-term Rentals first: No matter what we do as a municipality people are unhappy.  The municipality requires a license starting the first week of October 2024. He promises to relook at it after 6 months. Some people have renters for 4 to 6 months at a time and he personally feels they do not have to have a license. Everyone has a viewpoint and a concern. 

Shoreline policy is working great. Our council wants to work with the people. We can’t totally enforce it as the municipality is very vast. However, the municipality is doing a tremendous job with making subdivisions, and following up on septic inspections, shore-line restoration and restricting clear cutting trees and having an arborist attending the building site and advising what trees can be cut and what must be left. 

Walt is very passionate about No fertilizer used on grass. That goes into our lakes and is the worst thing that can ruin the water quality, kill fish, wildlife and threaten our clean lakes in Haliburton County. Gazebos and fire pits are not as concerning as fertilizer. 

Walt welcomes questions and concerns and offered the members to reach out through Don Rea, who will relay the information. 

He then talked about Garbage Incineration. He has done his homework. Land fill sites are full and closing down. Trucking garbage is very, very expensive. We have to stop. Incinerators are environmentally safe. He would really like to see Dysart to invest in one. 

He closed his talk by saying “We have to stop condemning people. There are always people who do idiotic things, but we are in a good position. No Clear Cutting and we have a shoreline policy in place.”

Steve Harris Secretary from the Redstone Lake Association spoke next. 

The mandate of the Redstone Lake Cottagers Association (RLCA) is the lake; water quality, preserving the shoreline, etc. Redstone, Little Redstone, Bitter, Burdock, Coleman, Long and Pelaw Lake are the lakes that are covered by the Association. The RCLA belongs to the Coalition of the Federation of Ontario Cottagers’ Association. Besides the quality of the lake water, they look after the buoys in the lake. They offered a chain saw safety course this year which was well attended. 

Looking at water quality, most metrics are improving as time goes by. The lake is in pretty good shape. He reiterated about not using fertilizer and people are upgrading their septic systems which all contributes to water quality. He discussed blue/green algae blooms. This is what we don’t want. If the lake were to get blue/green algae blooms real-estate goes down 30 percent, no drinking, no swimming or pets in the water. 

There is equipment to measure water quality that costs about $6000. If the RLCA was to purchase the equipment, they could save themselves sending out water for testing which takes a lot of time. This is something he would like to see.

An invasive species called Fragmities has been noticed on the west side of Redstone on the rocks. This is something the RLCA monitors. They grow where bull rushes grow.  Luckily, Redstone does not have a lot of bull rushes growing. Fragmities is very invasive with 60 percent of the plant growing below the soil. It is pictured below. It is very dense and hard to get rid of as pulling it encourages more to grow. It chokes out other life forms. Cutting back is the only way to control it and the patch on the west side rocks is smaller than last year. Came over from Europe likely on boats, so please think about your boats when you bring them out of the water for winter and ensuring they are cleaned. Please clean, drain and dry your boat.

The meeting move

Next on the agenda the meeting moved to an approval of the minutes from the AGM 2023. 

One change to the minutes from 2023. Ian Anhorn said the minutes listed John from Merganser to Craig from Merganser. ACTION ITEM (This has been completed by M Ackerman)

With the change the minutes were approved by Bill McArthur and seconded by Dave Summers both from Merganser. 

Treasurer’s Report: Norinne Gratopp:  120 cottagers on our list of names, but there are 124 cottagers. Peter Waisanen noted there is a container on Spider Lake Rd, but not cottage. They do use the road to access the container and their property, so they should pay dues. 

There is a $20,000 opening balance, but she has collected some of 2024 dues so will have to separate the years. She has work sheets which break it down, but not at the meeting. It is broken down in the new budget which you will all be receiving. ACTION ITEM send out Budget from Stephanie Pollard

Income of the Association is just Road Dues. We had 9 plows this past year with 7 Sandings. Sandings is the bigger expense. We are working with Rodco to come up with a plan to reduce Sandings. ACTION ITEM Doug Bell? Or Don Rea or the Board in general?

Insurance costs are up a tiny bit this year. Preacher’s Lane paid us back their portion. Rodco will separate the contracts this year so it will no longer include the Preachers Lane portion. Preachers Lane shares the cost from the County Road to Preachers Lane. 

Blair Smith asked if Preachers pays anything more than just plowing/sanding? Barry thought they were supposed to and we need to ask them to contribute to upgrades on that part of the road. ACTION ITEM: Finding out if Preachers is supposed to be contributing? There is a conveyance which Troy Austen will send to the Board. 

Barry Boice looks after the front end to the Pit. It is not an agreement, he just does it. Lots of grading with no charge. 

Barry will help Norinne find out the names through the township for the 4 properties that we don’t have names for. 3 or 4 people have never paid. ACTION ITEM

Steffan Cepin of Boice Bradley brought up that 35 to 45 years ago they would tack a little sign on the road outside the late payer’s cottage stating ‘Road Dues not Paid’. He is wondering why we can’t do something similar. Stephanie Pollard addressed the question explaining we cannot public shame people without the risk of being sued for slander. The Board is looking to have the ESPOA incorporated so we can seek retribution through small claims court for non-payment of road dues. ACTION ITEM Steffan went onto state that people who rent should pay more than others who don’t. That was addressed by asking ‘what is the difference between someone who rents their cottage vs those who live on the lake year round’. Each party would use the road potentially just as much. 

Adrienne McKenzie from Fisherman’s trail asked if the Dues were changing this year. Dues are to remain at $750. Doug Bell explained that snow plowing has gone up 3 percent, but dues will remain the same, as there has been significant increases in the last 3 years. Rodco has offered a contract for 2 years, so other than not knowing how much snow is in store for us, we do have some idea of what we will be spending. Again it was highlighted that sanding is the higher cost and we are trying to come up with guidelines in collaboration with Rodco on this. ACTION ITEM

Norinne went onto discuss 7 people don’t pay the full amount of road dues. 7 people pay $450 instead of $700. There was a discussion over this. Linda Hilpold spoke up for those who pay less than the full amount. She stated the reason is they do not want the extra money to go to plowing. They want to be assured that all their money goes to road maintenance. Don Rea made it clear that we cannot promise it won’t go to plowing. We have to be all for one and one for all. 

Stephanie Pollard spoke up stating she also doesn’t come up in the winter, either, but she pays the full dues.  We are all volunteers and we cannot manage a tiered system. We would have to take people at their word as to whether or not they come or don’t come in the winter. Maybe some just come up to check snow on their roof for example. How would we charge that? $750 was decided as a democracy and none of want to spend money on snow plowing. Barry has given us a deal and now we don’t have that. Everything has gone up in price; the cost of maintenance, the cost of investment in the road, fix culverts, gravel etc. etc. We as a board are responsible and accountable with everyone’s money.   

Don Rea spoke of being equitable. We need to spend money where the road need attention. It is a busy road. Google maps sends people down the Boice Bradley as it is 10 minutes shorter than going from the north to Haliburton Forest for example. The north end has invested and the Association will take over equitable maintenance. 

Kim Dedonato from Fisherman’s Trail spoke up stating the Blind One Way hill is still an issue with people using it the wrong way instead of using the bypass. She agrees that traffic on the road has doubled. In March and April the road is very soft and the volume of large trucks are very high at this vulnerable time. For example: people want their landscaping done for summer so big trucks of armour stone is travelling on our soft roads. We can’t control it. Doug Bell is hopeful the news signs he has ordered will help with the traffic and speed. Further, the signage saying for ESPOA members and their guests hopefully will help stop increased traffic. 

The discussion continued with Bob asking whether or not we have asked the municipality for money as Boice Bradley connects two municipal roads. Barry Boice stated that the municipality won’t pay for something they don’t own.

Ian Anhorn from Gracas Trail discussed the Bell and Hydro Trucks damaging the roads. He asked what was being done about that? They are providing a service so the membership encouraged Ian to call Bell and Hydro with complaints to see if they will do something about the areas he has noticed damaged.

Troy Austen spoke up saying he wanted to thank Barry and Rodco for their work. Barry has done a lot of extra grading for no cost.

Don Rea spoke about wanting to have some of the money set aside for a contingency fund if we have extra money after maintenance and snow plowing. No set amount for contingency as per Norinne Gratopp. Greg Ellis stated we should look at the road section by section and complete improvements. Doug Bell said it was about managing expectations.

Stephanie Pollard stated $750 only really covers basic maintenance. She lives on Baybreeze Lane and the residents have been talking about doing an independent initiative like the north end.

Adrienne McKenzie approved the Treasurer’s Report. Bill McArthur seconded it.

Adrienne McKenzie stated the board was tasked 2 summers ago with outlining specifics in the Budget maintenance vs capital projects. When we send out the Budget can that be done was her ask. ACTION ITEM

Constitution and Bylaws: The board worked on them for several meetings over the winter. Stephanie Pollard attempted to get them out earlier. Doug Bell spoke of the importance of the Document. Wendy Hallam Martin asked if there was reference in the document about maintaining your own piece of the road? Don Rea gave the example of having a Crane brought for your build, and it damages the road you are responsible to grade the road where it is damaged. Doug Bell acknowledged that we are limited in what we can do if someone damages the road. Gary Martin wanted to know who wrote it and if a Lawyer has reviewed it. He suggested this was a good idea. The board said we did not have a lawyer review it. Steve Harris agreed it was a good idea to have it reviewed by a lawyer and not too expensive. Greg Ellis of Ocean Lane said it is approximately $1500 on average to have a lawyer review. ACTION ITEM for the Board.

Adrienne McKenzie suggested a Question and Answer period for the Bylaws and Constitution where people could take their time to read it. ACTION ITEM Stephanie Pollard almost has the new website up and running and will put the Q&A on there.

Website will be ESPOA.ca       

Date for Questions was decided to be September 15th and Answers submitted by the 29th. Vote on the Bylaws by the 16th of October. ACTION ITEM by the Board.

Constitution and Bylaws calls for 7 Board Members to hold a 2 year term. This Board will continue for the next year. We are at 6 members so there is an opening for a Vice President with Chris Petrow resigning. ACTION ITEM Please submit your name if interested in Vice President.

Members can put forward their names for the 2025 AGM for other Board positions and it will be put to a vote at the AGM.

North End Initiative:

Greg Ellis of Ocean Lane said the north end joined together for a tremendous project. Collected approximately $80,000 privately and got a quote from Barry. The north enders do not want to contribute spend anymore on a capital project. He thinks that the Board needs to upkeep the road in the north for the next 4 years. The north end has submitted a quote from Barry which speaks to 10 to 12 loads of gravel and several gradings at a price of $13200 per year which is what Greg is referring to for the next 4 years.

Bruce Vaillancourt from the North End which includes 49 cottagers would like their $300 of their $750 spent on this each year to maintain the ditching and the gravel.

Ryan Sanders said the north end project has made the road safer and better. He stated it was very simple to do. He was tasked with sending out the emails and quite quickly they were able to get a very high percentage of people to pledge money. The north end has a lot of pride in what they were able to do. Ryan would like to encourage the Board to ask for the money from the south members to improve the road. We need to look at the bigger picture as per Ryan.

Blair Smith said you need to put forth a motion for Boice Bradley. States it is very simple to send out an email asking for $1000 per person from the members on the south end. He would like to put forth a motion to ask for money from the south end, not the north as they have already paid for improvements.  

Barry Boice agreed we could send out an email asking who would be interested in contributing.

Don Rea reiterated that the majority of people use the south end, not everyone uses the north. The Board does not want to divide the north against the south.  We are a group of volunteers. We need to look at Capital projects vs maintenance. It is more complicated. He would like to table to motion for now.

Stephanie Pollard suggested a survey monkey to ask members what their priorities are. One cottager, one survey response. Preferably the owner of the cottage. She states her road Baybreeze is in bad shape, but like the north end not everyone uses it.

Noel Chase wants to be informed when decisions are made. Tell us what you are doing.

Adrienne McKenzie put forward a motion to table the discussion until after the vote on the Constitution and bylaws. Debbie Bannister passed the motion by seconding it.

Stephanie Pollard stated once the bylaws are in place then the Blair Smith motion can go forward. ACTION ITEM

New Business:   

Noel Chase has minutes from 1958 that his father saved. 1958 is the year the ESPOA started. He will forward those minutes to Stephanie Pollard who will post them on the website.

Linda Hilpold had 2 fishing lures to show the members. They were found in the water out front of their cottage on Gracas Trail. She is asking that Fisherman please stay out further, not fishing close to the shoreline.

Peter Waisanen discussed people swimming out in the bay. Have a watercraft with you if swimming across. You are not visible. Swim buddies are another idea. They are inflatable and make you visible.

 New Business from Don Rea’s notes:

·        For those who wish to participate in maintaining our roads, we have an opportunity on the Thanksgiving weekend, cottagers on East Bay will be getting together and spend a couple of hours Saturday morning clearing culverts and brushing back the road sides. Removing problematic trees in preparation for winter and eventual spring runoff. 

o   We meet 10am at the sign boards. 

§  Bring hip waders, tree pruners, chainsaws, shovels and rakes. 

§  If you have any tractors those are also very welcome.

          Would like to thank Barry Boice and BSG for all the work that they have done to the road by adding material to the road, and extra grading that we haven’t had to pay for. 

Meeting Adjourned:

Bill McArthur wanted to thank the Board.

Thank you to Peter and Barb Waisanen for letting us use the boat house for the meeting and making the coffee.

Motion to adjourn put forward by Allison Rea. Seconded by Ian Anhorn.