n an effort to build consensus over the proposed changes to Reston Association’s Governing Documents, RA Board of Directors President Rick Beyer met with a room full of Reston Republicans last Friday, several of whom have been the review’s most vociferous critics over the past two months.
Beyer, pledging to remove anything overtly controversial from the referendum, said the community must come together for the documents to be updated.
“It’s only when you get people together to flesh some of this stuff out that you can really start getting things done,” he said.
RA’s governing documents — specifically its Deed, Bylaws and Articles of Incorporation — provide the legal framework under which the organization operates. The last time Reston’s homeowners association overhauled the documents was in December, 1984.
Most of the proposed changes would merely update obsolete language or clarify points of murkiness, but a handful of the provisions are proving divisive. Included among these major policy changes are plans to:
* Raise the assessment cap from $430 to $496, change the index used to compute increases in the cap.
* Change the index used to compute increases in the cap to a labor-based index.
* Create a new category of RA membership for new residents along the Dulles Corridor.
* Allow the organization to replace current capital assets with comparable assets without a referendum.
At the forum Friday, Beyer said the referendum must be approved by RA members if Reston’s quality of life is to be maintained. The proposed changes are intended to give RA more financial flexibility and the ability to continue providing existing services.
George Kain, a former RA treasurer and president of the Reston Homeowners Coalition, told Beyer that some of the proposed changes could create irreparable harm if not carefully vetted.
“We may find ourselves, as members, up a tree if we’re not careful,” Kain said.
Kain presented a list of specific objections to the governing documents review, saying that the proposed changes are difficult to understand, give RA’s Board of Directors too much authority, and have not had sufficient input from the public.
REGARDING THE INCREASE in the assessment cap, Kain and others said the additional $66 could be a burden for senior citizens and others on fixed incomes, especially at a time when gas and food prices have skyrocketed.
The cap increase is intended to address a $50 fee that was rolled into the overall assessment for pool usage in 1991. Raising the cap would give RA more flexibility to increase dues as needed, Beyer said.
Beyer and several of the Republicans also disagreed that RA should replace its index with a labor-centric model.
On most points, however, Beyer agreed with the people voicing concerns at Friday’s forum.
Amendments to the proposed changes should be forthcoming, Beyer said, in an attempt to bring people together. Some of these new changes could include plain language statements regarding the intent of each major change and a clarified policy regarding the replacement of single capital assets.
Also, Beyer said RA is studying the Category D issue, and is taking stock of its capital assets — two questions crucial to the debate over whether the community should approve the changes.
“I look at Rick as a partner in crime here, in terms of getting this job done,” Kain said.
Mary Buff, vice president of the Republic Club of Greater Reston, said she felt significantly better about the governing documents review after Beyer spoke to the group.
“It seemed like he wants the same thing as us,” she said. “We don’t want them to change this community that we love.”