July 28, 2003
Announcing
the
C.I.A.
Services Seminar Series
We
are very pleased to announce a series of seminars that we will be presenting
throughout the year for all of the Board members and volunteers in our
communities. Our goal is to provide
timely and convenient educational opportunities to help you with your duties. Here’s the line-up.
v
New Board Member
Orientation
v
Advanced Topics
for Board Members
v
Understanding
Collections & Financial Reports
v
Practical Deed
Restriction Management
v
Facilities,
Contracts & Maintenance
v
The
Super-Budgeting Process
v
Community Website
Administrator Training
Descriptions
of each seminar along with the seminar schedules are given on the following
pages (and posted on the Library page of our web site). Each seminar will last either 2 or 3 hours
and you’ll receive an excellent training notebook with copies of all slides and
lots of reference materials. And the
first seven people to complete all seven seminars will get a really nice
graduation gift from us!
The
“New Board Member Orientation” and “Community Website Administrator Training”
sessions are free! The others will have
a $25 fee to defray the cost of training materials, refreshments and our
instructor’s time. The knowledge and
insight you will gain will be well worth your time.
Space
is limited and advance registration is required. To register, please call Ms. Pat Kirk at
713-981-9000 at least one week in advance or send an email to kirk@ciaservices.com. For your convenience, we’ll just invoice your
Association for the seminar fee, if any, when you register.
We’re excited about offering this new training
opportunity and hope you are able to attend some of the upcoming seminars. Please feel free to call me at our Southwest
Office if you have any questions, comments or suggestions.
Ralph A. Troiano
President
C.I.A.
Services Seminar Series
Seminar
Descriptions
v
New Board Member Orientation
(3 hours – free – April & October)
This
seminar is a must for all new Board members and a great refresher for seasoned
veterans. It will help you get up to speed
quickly by understanding your responsibilities and authorities. We’ll review each of the documents that
govern the way you do business. We’ll
give you an overview of collections, deed restrictions, architectural control,
contracts, facilities, insurance, conduct of meetings, elections,
communications and many other important topics.
v
Advanced Topics for Board Members
(2
hours – $25 – June)
After
you’ve been on the Board a few months or a few years, you realize that some
things are pretty complicated. This
seminar has a heavy legal and legislative orientation. We’ll dissect the lawsuit process, review the
foreclosures and discuss significant portions of the Texas Property Code and
federal law. After all the legal stuff,
we’ll touch on aspects of “risk management” which includes insurance, reserves
and budgeting concepts.
v
Understanding Collections & Financial Reports
(2 hours – $25 – February)
The
first half of this seminar will cover all the steps involved in successful assessment
collections. Since not everyone pays on
time, we’ll get into late fees, liens, payment plans, bankruptcy and all the
legal remedies. The second half of the
seminar deals with reading and understanding your financial reports. We’ll trace the flow of money throughout the
reports so you’ll never be in the dark when staring at all those numbers.
v
Practical Deed Restriction Management
(2 hours – $25 – March)
Deed
restriction management is one of the most difficult tasks handled by homeowners
associations because it involves emotions, judgments and homeowner’s
property. This seminar covers the steps
in deed restriction management and how a process can contain “intelligence” and
common sense. We discuss the relation
between deed restrictions and guidelines and give you examples of well crafted
guidelines. We’ll clarify any confusion
over whether something is a DR or an ACC issue.
Practical deed restriction management requires clear communications and
reasonable requirements.
v
Facilities, Contracts & Maintenance
(2 hours – $25 – November)
If
you don’t know the difference between a vacuum breaker and a vacuum head and
you’re not comfortable wandering around a swimming pool pump room, then this
seminar is for you. We’ll review your
major facilities and equipment including irrigation systems, pool mechanical
and gate operators and explain how they work (and fail). We’ll move onto the essentials of bidding
major contracts. After that we’ll move
to ongoing maintenance of landscaping, pools, tennis courts, buildings, fences
and other common assets. When we’re
finished, you’ll be talking like a skilled contractor!
v
The Super-Budgeting Process
(2 hours – $25 – August & September)
“Super-Budgeting”
is our term for preparing a comprehensive long term budget and business
plan. This isn’t something you do on the
back of an envelope an hour before the budget meeting. We’ll break the process down into
understandable components and show you how assets and reserves fit in the
picture. We’ll start with a simple
question that very few people can answer correctly: “How much money should our
Association have in the bank?” By the end
of the seminar, you’ll know the correct answer for your Association. This is a critical seminar to take before you
start looking at budgets.
v
Community Website Administrator Training
(3 hours – free – January, April, July & October)
This
is the required training course for certification as a Community Website
Administrator (CWSA) on the C.I.A Services web site (www.ciaservices.com). As a CWSA you’ll be able to maintain the
pages for your community. You’ll be able
to create news flashes, update key personnel, add community information,
display photos, conduct surveys and much more.
At the end of the seminar we’ll give you a taste of HTML – the web
language that will allow you to do some pretty advanced things if you like. Being a website administrator is very easy on
www.ciaservices.com and you can do it
from anywhere you have an internet connection.
C.I.A.
Services Seminar Series
2003/2004
Schedule
|
Seminar |
Date |
Time |
Location |
1 |
The
Super-Budgeting Process |
08/14/03
– Thursday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
2 |
The
Super-Budgeting Process |
08/19/03
– Tuesday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
3 |
The
Super-Budgeting Process |
09/09/03
– Tuesday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
4 |
The
Super-Budgeting Process |
09/18/03
– Thursday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
5 |
Community
Website Administrator Training |
10/09/03
– Thursday |
6 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
6 |
New
Board Member Orientation |
10/20/03
– Monday |
6 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
7 |
New
Board Member Orientation |
10/30/03
– Thursday |
6 – 9 pm |
North |
8 |
Facilities,
Contracts & Maintenance |
11/06/03
– Thursday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
9 |
Facilities,
Contracts & Maintenance |
11/17/03
– Monday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
10 |
Community
Website Administrator Training |
01/23/04
– Friday |
10 am – 1 pm |
North |
11 |
Understanding
Collections & Financial Reports |
02/09/04
– Monday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
12 |
Understanding
Collections & Financial Reports |
02/12/04
– Thursday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
13 |
Practical
Deed Restriction Management |
03/15/04
– Monday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
14 |
Practical
Deed Restriction Management |
03/30/04
– Tuesday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
15 |
New
Board Member Orientation |
04/05/04
– Monday |
6 – 9 pm |
North |
16 |
Community
Website Administrator Training |
04/06/04
– Tuesday |
6 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
17 |
New
Board Member Orientation |
04/28/04
– Wednesday |
6 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
18 |
Advanced
Topics for Board Members |
06/08/04
– Tuesday |
7 – 9 pm |
Southwest |
19 |
Advanced
Topics for Board Members |
06/10/04
– Thursday |
7 – 9 pm |
North |
20 |
Community
Website Administrator Training |
07/23/04
– Friday |
6 – 9 pm |
North |
Please
register at least one week in advance by calling Ms. Pat Kirk at 713-981-9000
or by email at kirk@ciaservices.com. Space is limited. Refreshments and training materials provided
at each seminar.