Reminder: CSA Board Meeting on May 28th @ 10 AM
Happy Memorial Day! I hope you have enjoyed Memorial Day in a much more vibrant Sea Pines Community than anyone might have anticipated even just a month ago. The weather has been ideal to honor and remember so many men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice serving in the armed forces for our country. And it is also hard not to notice the many “friends and guests” who have arrived in our community to enjoy some “freedom” from the many weeks (and months) of isolation they have suffered in other States.
Your CSA Board will meet on Thursday, May 28th, at 10 am with several very important matters to discuss. Consistent with CDC guidelines, we will again conduct the meeting through Zoom, and we will be live streaming the meeting for public viewing. Members of the community will again be able to pose questions to the Board, to be answered immediately following the meeting adjournment. We had record attendance at our April Board meeting using this process, and I hope that many of you will again view and participate through this live-stream approach. Instructions for obtaining the live stream are posted below.
Our meeting agenda is posted on our SeaPinesLiving.com website and can also be viewed
here. We will hear from the Committee Chairs of the several CSA Board Committees which have met this month. Our President, Sam Bennett, will also have his senior Staff report on their activities during the month, so I expect this to be a very informative meeting.
I also want to highlight a few of the other important matters we will be discussing at this meeting. You may recall that I appointed a “CSA Revenue Task Force” last month and charged its members with charting a path for commencing major capital projects this year that have been deferred too long for lack of community funding. I pledged that this Board would not ignore the mandate to attack our critical infrastructure needs provided by the supermajority support for last year’s Referendum. The Task Force will provide its first proposal for meeting that mandate, and I am hopeful that the Board will accept the path they propose.
The return of tourism to our community amidst COVID-19, has also created the need for the Board to determine a way to provide mass transportation for our guests and property owners during the summer months –a good problem to have given the importance of tourism for our community. The lack of a trolley service during our “peak” season months has the potential to create significant traffic issues for our community. However, providing “mass transportation” during the continuing pandemic creates additional challenges to assure that our drivers and passengers are not subject to increased risk of exposure to the virus. Our Staff will be presenting alternatives for providing these transportation services for Board consideration.
In addition, I have asked Steve Wilmot, the President of the Heritage Classic Foundation, to provide a report to the community on the steps that the Foundation and the PGA Tour are taking to assure that the influx of expected guests associated with the rescheduled Heritage Classic will not increase the risk of COVID-19 spread to our Sea Pines community. Safety of participants, residents, and visitors is the highest priority for the Tour and the Foundation, and I am sure that Steve will be able to provide the community a level of assurance during his report.
Finally, as I noted above, it would be hard not to recognize the significant increase in “guests” who have arrived in Sea Pines and on Hilton Head over the last few weeks. Reports from local rental companies and property owners who manage rentals indicate that the summer months will likely be very busy again. We recognize that the increase in tourism impacts the daily lives of our property owners. And tourists and residents alike will have a range of approaches to protecting themselves and others from the spread of the virus. So many Sea Pines property owners once arrived in Sea Pines as renters or tourists ourselves, so may I suggest a simple rule of thumb for dealing with any uncomfortable situations “Patience, Understanding or Avoidance”!!
Sea Pines remains the premier community on the South Carolina coast, so let’s enjoy it in the safest way each of us can.
Best regards,
