Ballots will be mailed out on July 1st. All ballots must be returned – or post marked no latter than July 31st. The ballots will be tabulated and / or counted prior to the Annual Meeting, which will be on August 21st at 7:30pm.
The board members going off this year are Frank Pohlkamp, Tom Wright, and Charles Wood. Three of the following five candidates will be filling these vacancies:
1. Byron Efird
2. JoAnn Rhodes
3. Clinton Norwood
4. Jack Watson
5. Charles Wood
The candidates will appear in this order on the Ballot.
Jack Watson was not present. However, a statement was read by Jim Hannon, and requested to be posted in The Diamondhead Committee Report.
Each candidate was previously given 5 questions to prepare for the evening’s event. Jim allowed the candidates to randomly pick a question to answer, and offered an opportunity to respond to the remaining questions.
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Byron Efird
“Hi, I’m Byron Efird …..my wife Cindy. I met her up in Cutter, Arkansas. I was managing a Western Sizzlin' over there at that time….I opened my own restraunt for a short time.
After we had our first kid, I told her..’we’ve got to get back to my home town’. I’ve loved it down here. I grew up down here…..went to school in Magnet Cove, which is right across the lake. My grandparents lived in Diamondhead, at the time. ( he described grandparents’ love for golf. His family visited Diamondhead many times through the years) I picked up golf when I was 40.
We’ve lived out here a little over a year. We live at 117 Diamondhead Drive. I’ve got 2 boys, one is 21, one is 20. They just bought their own house, so, I don’t know how long they will be living with us, now. In the time that we’ve been here – It could be better.
When you are driving down the highway, the first presentation you get of Diamondhead….is not like you want it to be. When you drive through the entrance, you see pot holes, unkept ground, stuff like that….It bothers me, and I think that ..it can be better.
Yes, we need money to do it, though, and I think the Family Fun Center is a good thing. It is going to help us get the money that we need to do all these projects around here. I know there are a couple of people that don’t particularly like the Family Fun Center…but, keep in mind, it is a Family Fun Center. It is not a beer tavern, or anything. I don’t think it is going to disrupt our life style at all. Hopefully, I can answer some questions later on, you all can get to know me. That is all I’ve got for right now.”
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JoAnn Rhodes
"Okay, for the ones who don’t know me, I’m JoAnn Rhodes. I’ve been here about 8 years, and I have absolutely had nightmares the last two nights! Some of you have said, ‘Oh, JoAnn, you are never lost for words’, and that is probably true.
I grew up in Little Rock. I’m a city girl, married a country boy ….and we tried to find something in between.
I was working for Blue Cross (22 years). Some people over there told me, I didn’t want to go to Diamondhead, and ‘think about that before you ever buy out there. The Board of Directors and the POA members do not get along’. That was 8 years ago, and nothing’s changed.
I’ve met a lot of nice people out here. Frank & Tom are going out this year, and during that time (when Frank Pohlkamp was Board President in 2004) they let Mike and I run the country club. We did that for 18 months. We kept the country club open. We met a lot of people.
I’ve enjoyed Diamondhead. I don’t particularly like what is going on now…..the conflict that we have.
I do like getting the messages from the Blog. Now, I know a lot of people don’t like that, but we were in Arizona for 3 months and we’d never known what was going on in Diamondhead, if we had not of gotten that. Some people say, ‘well, it wasn’t truth’. Well, it might not have been the truth, but at least a little bit of it was. So, you have to do that.
Anyway, that is about all I have to say. I’ll answer any questions later on. Thank you."
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Clinton Norwood
"I’m Doc Norwood, I don’t know many of you, because I’ve kept such a low profile. (laughter at his remark…many people know Doc!) Now, I’ve been here 22 years and I’ve seen an awful lot of good times, and times that are not quite as good. I’d like to see ‘em get back to the good times. I can’t tell you if I’m for something or against something. ….all the members here. I’m for US….the POA members. Like I said, I’ve been a property owner here 22 years. I’ve paid dues for 22 years, and I like everybody. And there are a whole lot of people here I’d like to meet. I’d like to see us get together. I know there are two groups. There’s the golfing people and than the people that don’t golf. I’d like to see something happen to get us together. Hopefully we can work toward that.
I don’t have much else to tell you.
I was born and raised in Malvern. I’ve spent most of my life in Sacramento. I came back here, and I like it here.
So, hopefully we can get things going in a better direction. Thank you."
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Charles Wood
"I really didn’t plan to be here tonight. I didn’t plan to run for re-election, but, some of my friends, actually both of ‘em, (laughter !) ask me to (laughter) because they did not think they were getting their views recognized. I decided I’d try it one more time.
I don’t have a prepared speech, so, I’m just going to sit down."
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Jack Watson
Jim Hannon read Jack’s comments and sent this letter to be posted.
From Jack Watson
I have 2 daughters, one lives in Maryland and the other near Malvern. My wife, Helen, and I retired and moved here about 3 years ago from Maryland. My career was in manufacturing in the quality control and inspection fields.
I began attending Board meetings and felt there were areas that some improvements could be made. This comes from my quality control background where “continuous improvement’ is a way of life. I became involved with some committees and currently serve on the ACC, Financial, Golf and Community Standards committees.
I decided to become a Board candidate because we are facing some challenges and feel I could provide some beneficial input. We are approaching the time when we will have some financial challenges. We must take steps now to meet these challenges. The overall economy has not helped as evidenced by the large increase in POA fee delinquencies. We hear about this every month. The collections using Carlton have been somewhat successful. The auctions were a bust. These are the only attempts I am aware of to address this problem. I would welcome any suggestions and we should at least brainstorm some ideas.
The proposed Fun Center promises some financial relief but this is not a solution for the immediate future. We must watch our situation now and explore possible short term solutions. The budget for this year made attempts to address this. A 10% increase in golf membership fees was recommended by the Finance Committee but a 5% increase was approved without any budget cut to offset the lost revenue. $4,500.00 for fireworks was removed from the budget. The Security budget was reduced by eliminating 20 man-hours per week however to my knowledge this has not been done. I believe a statement was made that no reduction be made at this time and it was to be sent back to the Finance Committee for reconsideration. To date this has not been done.
The Golf Revenue group made some recommendations which have been adopted which hopefully will help increase the revenue from the golf course. I do not believe we will see a time when POA fees do not subsidize the golf budget to some extent but we should continually work to reduce that amount. I would like to see the Golf Committee take a more proactive effort in reviewing the monthly golf course financial statements.
The Country Club budget not including the 19th Hole and the depreciation expense had a loss of $3,511.00 as opposed to the $11,000.00 noted in a submitted question. The Country Club is an expense we must bear to have a facility for a community center. We do have a rental policy and perhaps if rental use is increased we will see a reduction in the cost the community will have to bear.
Regarding the maintenance of common property, the Board must explore ways to care for these areas but we have to realize that a golf course does require intensive care to maintain its stability. A loss of balance here would be very costly to repair.
I know an increase in POA fees is a sore point but perhaps a one-time assessment should be considered when earmarked for a specific project such as the entrance drainage problem. Let your Board members know your feelings.
I would like to thank each of you here this evening for showing your interest in our community. I know you will vote for the candidates which you feel will best serve the interests of Diamondhead. I urge you to talk to your friends and neighbors who could not be here and encourage them to review the candidates and vote. I would appreciate the opportunity to be a part of the next Board of Directors. I have established an email account [ diamhdjwats@hotmail.com ] should you wish to ask me any questions. Mr. Hannon has labels with the email address. I will be asking for a copy of this intro to be placed on the Diamondhead Committee Report blog site.
Thank you,
Jack Watson
