Tract 7891 CCRs Renewal Vote Audit.
We were fortunate to obtain a second complete set of ballots, those for tract 7891, and conducted a review of that tract. We found that AWAC did not collect the requisite votes for that tract also. The analysis and result are below.
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Tract 7891 consists of a total of 208 individual lots. AWAC collected a total of 133 ballot sheets throughout a six year period (2005-2010). Many of the property owners who had signed in the early years sold their lots and were no longer property owners in the later years. On December 15, 2010, the President, Vice President and Secretary of AWAC recorded a 3-page document affirming that they had as of that date obtained 55% of the vote in tract 7891 and that it authorized the extension of the CCRs and AWAC’s administration until 2025.
When the signatures of the actual property owners of record on December 15, 2010 were counted those signatures amounted to only 46.6% of the record homeowners in tract 7891; an amount short of the required 55% mandated by the CCRs. Moreover, additional errors were discovered including not only duplicate votes but also insufficient signatures where multiple signatures were required. Therefore the 55% threshold to extend the CCRs and the authority of AWAC in Tract 7891 was not met in 2010.
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We once again strongly encourage all Arrowhead Woods homeowners to obtain the ballots cast for their tracts and perform the same verification process to ensure that a true 55% of the vote was reached for their tract in 2010. It is quite possible that similar errors were made in other tracts. AWAC currently has the 2010 vote tally for each tract. That vote count should be available to each tract owner upon request. Using that information along with the ownership records provided on this site, any tract owner should be able to verify whether AWAC’s vote count in 2010 for their tract was accurate.
Hypothesis.
Did AWAC get the requisite 55% of the record homeowners vote by the end of 2010 to continue their authority over tract 7891? No, they obtained 46.6%.
Methodology Used.
The steps outlined below were designed to ensure 100% accurate determination of the record owner(s) of each LOT in tract 7891 at the time the ballot sheet was signed as well as on December 15, 2010: the date when AWAC recorded the 3-page CCR document with the County of San Bernardino extending their authority and the CCRs. This process also revealed duplicate ballots and incomplete record owners signing.
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The cross referenced data used for verification comes directly from the San Bernardino County Recorders Office ARC Database website. The historical record owner tab, legal description tab and lot size tab were used.
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San Bernardino County Assessor - Recorder - County Clerk
Types of Ballot Errors Discovered
Error 1: Duplicate Ballot Vote Sheet AWAC Counted As Two.
Error 2: Not record property owner on the date of AWAC Filing. New owner by 2010.
Error 3: Not ALL of the record property owners on the date of AWAC Filing. Only 1 signature. 2 record owners.
The information on each ballot sheet of paper was cross referenced with the County of San Bernardino ARC database above. The audit process was performed with the light most favorable to AWAC.
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Each ballot sheet contained 3 key pieces of information - The LOT Number. The Record Owner's Signature. The Date of Signing. We began by recording the LOT Number from each ballot sheet and then confirming the LOT Number with the Legal Description in the County's database. The legal description for each lot contains the LOT number and ensures a positive match.
The legible Record Owner's Signature was then recorded along with the Date of Signing. The name was compared to the County's database on both the date the ballot was signed as well as on December 15, 2010 when AWAC recorded the CCR extensions. A notation was made if the record owner's name did not match the County's database at both points in time. Illegible signatures that could not be read were always counted as a YES vote.
A count was made of duplicate ballots where the record owner had turned in a ballot sheet of paper on more than one occasion for the same LOT. The square footage of the individual lots was computed as a percentage of the entire tract. This process was carried out on all 133 sheets of paper.
A Ballot of Significant Importance.
The single ballot cast for Lot 133 added additional importance to our analysis. In 2006, Paul Meng the President of AWAC owned lot 133 and cast a YES ballot vote dated February 1, 2006. In 2007 that lot was sold to a new record property owner. On December 15, 2010 the ballot for lot 133 was counted as a YES vote even though Paul Meng was not the record property owner of Lot 133 in 2010. The President of AWAC knowingly allowed his YES vote to be included when he was no longer the record property owner in 2010.
Conclusion.
Within Tract 7891, 38 votes were found to be defective due to containing at least 1 of the 3 types of errors listed above. Many signatures were so illegible as to defy easy comparison with the name of the record owner, however due to lack of verifying materials those signatures were given the benefit of the doubt and always counted as a YES vote. Therefore, the remaining 97 signatures were valid “YES” votes cast out of the 208 lots in tract 7891. The CCRs for tract 7891 mandated at least 55% “YES” for passage. Since there were only 97 valid “YES” votes out of a possible 208 that resulted in only 46.6% by head count and 47.2% by square foot tract ownership area and therefore the 55% threshold to extend the CCRs and the authority of AWAC in Tract 7891 was not met in 2010.