Huntsville - Lake of Bays Lakes Council

1. Background

In the longer-term, a lake association, run effectively, successfully protects and maintains water quality, natural beauty, land value and other vital interests of the lake. It also ensures that a comprehensive and ongoing lake management effort is established. Lake residents may wish to form an association solely to meet these goals. However, many associations only come into being when there is an issue on the lake that worries a number of lake residents. Your first step is to talk to those lakeside property owners who have expressed an interest in forming a lake association. If the impetus for this is on the basis of one specific issue, call a meeting and look at the nature of the issue, what members of the group know or don't know about the issue and what resources are available to resolve it. At the same time, outline the longer-term benefits of a lake association and decide if there is a desire to go this route. If so, call another meeting to start this process.

2. A Steering Committee or Founding Committee

At this meeting,

• Discuss the role a lake association would play in longer-term as well as more immediate priorities
• Identify potential leaders for the association. In leadership look for strong organizational skills, respect of others and time to give to the association.
• Select a chair and a secretary to at least get the ball rolling.
• Ask for volunteers to serve on a committee to draft a constitution and by-laws for the group and to nominate officers and directors.
• If there is a significant lake issue that is time-sensitive, it may be necessary for another committee to be formed to look further into the issue.
• End the meeting by establishing a timetable and plan for future meetings.

Note: The most efficient approach in organizing the lake association may be for the steering committee to adopt a constitution and by-laws, elect itself as the first board of directors and then find other owners as members. (Decide if your association wishes to include backlot owners as well as lakeside owners.) The most democratic way to form an association is to leave adoption of a constitution and by-laws to an open meeting of all interested owners. Lake associations have been successfully formed by both of these methods.

3. The Charter Meeting

The first meeting of owners is the charter meeting.

• Schedule at a time convenient for most people on the lake
• Use municipal voters lists and tax rolls to obtain property owners and addresses
• Invite every property owner on the lake outlining the purpose of the meeting
• (If a draft constitution and by-laws are ready, copies may be provided so people have a chance to review them prior to the meeting.)

The first agenda

• outline the benefits of forming a lake association and to obtain a majority vote to proceed.
• Then the drafted constitution and by-laws can be adopted after discussion and revision. (Further work may be required on these. Don't worry, go ahead and just reschedule the vote on these for a future meeting.)
• Officers and others who wish to sit as directors on the board should be elected by majority vote.
• Look at current lake issues, prioritize these and form committee(s) to manage the issues (long and short-term).
• A membership committee may need to be formed to increase interest in the association.
• Set date for the next general meeting as well as dates for each committee to meet.

Notes:

Speakers

• Don't to overload this first organized meeting with speakers.
• If there is a need for advice, choose the speaker carefully; a representative from another lake

association or FOCA can provide valuable information on forming & operating a lake association

• Technical experts may help define the lake's issue or answer questions.
• Other resource speakers are your Reeve or Alderman, NMR, MOE, OPP District Offices, etc.

Constitution and By-laws

• Keep it simple! Use samples of by-laws from other lake associations, HLC and FOCA.
• Pick procedures that seem to fit your needs most efficiently.

Dues

• Don't freeze amount of annual dues into the by-laws - it's better to leave this to the board or for discussion at a general meeting.
• Dues can be set or can be based on the projected needs of the association or can be left as a volunteer donation.
• Establish a Treasurer
  • to maintain accurate accounting procedures including issuing receipts
  • to set up banking policies
  • to provide financial reports at board and general meetings
  • to establish an annual budget and policies with respect to annual reports and audits.

Quorum:

• Don't fix quorums too high.
• For general meetings, 10% of membership might be set as quorum
• If the quorum for the board is set at 51% of directors, this will allow a small group to meet at any time in person or by phone or e-mail to take action in the name of the association on urgent matters.
• Alternatively, an executive committee of directors may be established in the constitution or by-laws to manage urgent matters.

4. Committees

Membership

A large membership gives an association clout.

Keep in touch with members and non-members about dues and objectives of the association by.

• Newsletters throughout the year
• House to house membership drives
• Keep accurate up to date records using a database allows many different reports, mailing labels, etc

Newsletter

• Newsletters throughout the year keep membership informed and interested
• Cost efficient when sent by email.
• Produced at least twice a year.

Issues:

These committees will set out action plans to meet the lake's needs.

This may require deciding to develop a lake plan. This step not only provides the background to define lake issues but, in some jurisdictions (like Huntsville) allows for incorporation of a lake plan into the Official Plan of the local area.

i) short-term: This committee will be needed if there are one or more significant issues that have brought the association into being.

ii) long-term: To manage the longer-term goals set out in the background section above, a committee will need to look at how to most effectively develop plans to meet these goals. In lieu of developing a full-blown lake plan, members may decide to just focus the association's efforts on such areas as a program of water quality monitoring and/or education of lakeshore/watershed inhabitants on environmental facts of life and/or setting guidelines and enforcement procedures to ensure compliance to water quality measures.

5. Incorporation:

• Your association may wish to derive the benefits provided by incorporation. The HLC has developed a Flow Chart to Incorporate a Not-for-Profit Organization, which is attached to this article for download. It outlines the pros and cons of incorporation, costs, outside help needed and the steps to follow in the process

6. Memberships to other organizations

FOCA

Huntsville Lakes Council

HLC Jan. 2006