[Goldwingnut]

Originally Posted by BrianL99

I tried to check my amenity fee this morning, but without a bill & my PIN, I was stymied. I know I pay +/- $305, when my Irrigation is shut off. I'm fairly certain it's over $200, but not $225. The truth is, the monthly Amenity Fee is a drop in the bucket and doesn't come close to my weekly golf budget, so I don't pay much attention to it.

I don't disagree the overall philosophy of the District, is transparency. They make a solid effort to provide all the information and detail anyone could possibly want. As you point out, it's a quagmire of information and very difficult and complicated to sort through.

The "Gimme" is the wild card in my opinion, but in a different way than you characterize it.

The "spending creep", driven by residents' (IMO) unrealistic expectations of existing services/amenities, produces a "hidden creep". Community Watch being a prime example. Residents expect more and more from Community Watch and spending creeps, without any legitimate way to fund their unrealistic expectations. Golf course maintenance is another one. While I disagree with the way the Executive Courses are maintained, I don't think anyone is stealing money. The District is spending what they say they're spending, but it's not enough to produce conditions acceptable to residents.

Because of the current funding/budget parameters in place to control "fees", the District is in a tenuous position. They need funding to meet Residents' expectations, but they're limited in their ability to raise fees. If you're forced (by artificial restraints) to fund an operating budget without the ability to generate sufficient revenue, you're left with in the unenviable position of needing to borrow (or Bond), to provide the needed financial resources to pay the bills. Which based on the limited budget meetings I've intended, I think is happening. (& if asked 6-8 months ago, I could give specific examples, but I no longer recall the specifics that set me off last year.)

So with respect to: "I do disagree with you on the potential of a "huge monthly increases" coming, there is no mechanism or legal avenue to enable these increases in the governing documents (deed restrictions)."

I respectfully disagree with your contention. The way you spend more money than you have, is you borrow it. Whether you "borrow it" from the Social Security System as the US Congress does, or borrow it in some other way, it's the only way to get it. The structure of the Amenity Fee "guarantees per the governing documents", leave no alternative.

Which means at some point, you have to "pay the piper", in the same way our children & grandchildren will eventually have to address the Federal Deficit (& in no way should that be interpreted as "political". I'm talking economics and certainly don't mean to invite political discourse).

JMO, YMMV.

Each of the CDDs and Amenity divisions has capital reserves and can and has used them to fund funding shortfall from unexpected things that have happened. None of the districts are using bonds as a stopgap funding method. The only bonds that have been issued by the CDDs are for expansion - north of 466 the one I know of are in CDD4 and CDD9 when areas were added to their CDD, each a relatively small number of homes.
Florida law requires each government enitiy to have a ballanced budget (unlike the reckless federal but let's not go there). Using a bond to fund day to day operations is not a balanced budget and doesn't meet the criteria.
The amenity division (SLAD in this case) issued a bond in 2016 for the amenites between 466 and 44, this purchase has a funding provided by the included amentiy fees that came with the purchase. They are going through the same process with the current amenity purchase, with the same funding method.
You are very correct in the expectations of residents for greater services, it is up to the boards to constrain these requests and spending, and they do. The demands can go up all they want, but without the money the answer is NO.

The CDDs and Amenity Divisions are not borrowing money to fund daily operation - not living our a credit card - again like the Federal government (went there again, sorry), so the situation of "paying the piper" is not developing. It results in a lot of belt tightening every year for operating costs - not to be confused with R&R requirements which are funded out of the R&R reserves that have been built up.