December 14, 2014
Keith,
Phyllis asked me to put together my thoughts prior to your meeting with her and Gus this afternoon.
I put together some detail, but won't go into it now , but will say that there are many factual errors in RR's affidavit related to the original owners of lots, date of filing of original map, timing of H L Scott survey.
RR's rhetoric related to the Annex fails to mention that two of the current deeds (Dixon & Ferrone) for parcels in the Annex grant the owner 1/10 interest in common property within the Annex. I don't know about the other two property owners in the Annex — haven't pulled their deeds.
Most importantly, he fails to mention that as a matter of practice, annexed members are allowed to withdraw from the PVPA at any time – in fact, the Dixons withdrew about 2005 or 2006 (I'm not sure of the exact date), and when the Ferrones purchased their property in the summer of 2013, they chose not to join the PVPA. And R. Randall was a member of the Board of Trustees when the Dixons withdrew, and President of the PVPA in 2013, so he is well aware of the practice. Also, upon the respective recommendations of the Board of Trustees, the PVPA members voted to allow both the Dixons and the Ferrones to pay a prorated fee for use of the dumpster. If, in fact, the owners in the Annex hold an ownership interest in the common property, why then are they allowed to withdraw and not continue to pay toward property taxes and upkeep of the common property??
As a practical matter, members within the original surveyed area can't withdraw because the only access to their property is over the roadways within that area, (in which each owner holds a fractional interest) and for which they pay maintenance, repair and property tax costs as a part of the annual dues assessment. Dues also include costs of maintenance and repair of the Pavilion and Dockhouse, upkeep of common grounds, and taxes on the main Park area as well as other smaller pieces of common property.
When he gets into all the complications related to fractional portions of lots, the fact remains that there were originally 40 lot – several of which were subdivided almost immediately following the original sale, one (Lot #1) which was subdivided many years later. Some owners have more than one lot, but for those owners with more than one adjacent lot on the same deed, generally the deed only shows only a 1/40th fractional interest for the main cottage lot, although the other lots would still carry the 1/40th unless the proportionate interest was transferred to another party, and we couldn't find any deeds so stating.
Also, when some of these properties have come down through families by inheritance over several generations, the transfer deeds were fairly simple, abstracts were not prepared, and the original language regarding fractional interest disappeared, but, again, we could not find any deeds transferring that fractional interest to the PVPA or any other party. If that is the case, does the fractional interest disappear into thin air or is it assumed that it remains a part of the original parcel?????
In the end, it is mathematically fairly simple to add up half lots, 1/3rd lots, 1/6th lots, full lots and come out with 40. Although the tax assessor and the tax mappers may have combined multiple adjacent lots with the same owner for ease of assessment purposes, the fact remains that the original 40 lots still exist. A review of the tax assessment rolls will show that in the majority of cases, the Assessor includes the original Lot numbers in the description of the parcels.
Lastly, I think it might be very worthwhile to have Brownell do a search to see what document R Rodenhurst filed in 1884 — was it a deed or was it the PVPA membership incorporation agreement???
The only other comment I have is that R Randall keeps coming up with new information from old minutes, financial records, etc. that support his argument and conveniently ignoring others.
Somehow, we have to bring the focus back to the original question: Who owns the common property, the owners with a deeded interest, or the PVPA?? And can a simple 2/3rds of the membership force the other 1/3 to relinquish their ownership interest by voting to sell, transfer or grant an easement to any piece of the common property??? Such a vote might result in some income to the PVPA, but would have a serious detrimental effect on the value of those parcels that adjoin the main common areas.
That's all I have for now - call me if you need me when you meet.
Barbara
PS – I haven't attempted to wade through T. Bennett's affidavit and the Notice of Cross-complaint yet, and the Memorandum of Law is your department.
December 31, 2014
Am adding these details, some more historic info here — don't know if this will help you draft a response, just use anything (or nothing) if you think it will be helpful.
We have learned that RR sent all other PVPA members copies of the most recent cross-complaint that we received on December . Of course, this contains a lot of misinformation that I am addressing here. It's my understanding that he did not include the attachments, so anyone receiving this, would have no way of checking out the accuracy of his claims. Also, we have been very careful to be "gentlemanly" throughout this whole dispute, and therefore haven't communicated with other members about the ongoing litigation, while at the same time, R Randall is distributing his "spin" version of the facts (as set forth in this affidavit and at least one previous PVPA set of affidavits)– therefore, no one has all of the actual information available on which to make a decision.
This means that if the Court decides to send the letter that you drafted and included as an attachment in your last answer to the PVPA, members would make a decision on whether or not to join the action based only on the information RR just fed them, and not on the actual facts. To me, this seems highly unfair. Is there anything we can do to correct/stop this????
DETAILS:
Before I go into the details, I have to rant for a moment.
We would probably not be arguing about this in Court right now if R Randall, as President of the PVPA and self-appointed PVPA Historian, had done the necessary research on the History of the PVPA in the first place. The information's out there - on the Internet, in the Jefferson County Clerk's office and at the NYS Dept. of State Div. of Corporations – true, it takes time, but I'm sure he could have gotten volunteers to help research.
History: R Randall has the timeline and the facts on this all mixed-up. The original survey map that that shows the 40 lots and common area was drawn by H L Scott, Engineer and signed by him on October ?? 1877, several weeks before the deed between William and Miranda Houghton (Grantors) and George and Eunice lvers (Grantees) was signed (November 24 , 1877). That deed was filed with the Jefferson County Clerk on December 1, 1877. Therefore, it's reasonable to assume that the Ivers had a copy of the survey map before they closed the purchase. The map on file in the County Clerk's office has hand-written notes in the lower right-hand side, listing the potential purchasers of the 40 lots. Interestingly, these are the same names that RR claims were the original purchasers, although I don't recall that those hand-written notes appear on the 1882 version. I'm assuming he got this information from the Louise Cooke "History of Point Vivian", which she wrote in the 1970's.
The original survey map was filed with the Jefferson County Clerk on February 21, 1880. I have seen another rendering of the 1877 map that, as I recall, was produced in 1882, but to my knowledge that was never filed with the County Clerk (will double-check that in the next few days). As I recall, the 1882 map shows lot numbers, but doesn't show the hand-written notes on potential purchasers, which again is understandable, since by 1882 it was clear that the actual purchases were, in some instances, made by others than the original plan indicated. Did the PVPA include a copy of the 1882 map in any of their answers to our complaint????
ACTUAL TIMELINE
1877
September 6, 1877 -
An article in the Watertown Re-union newspaper, pg. 8, reports that Betsey Kinney, of Evans Mills, hosted a group of friends while she was staying at Grinnell Park (formerly Paige's Point). It lists her guests who included the Ivers, Tozers, E 0 Hungerford, Edwin Hungerford, L E Jones, among others. It also goes on to describe Grinnell Park, which was in the Town of Alexandria, "about halfway between Fisher's Landing and Alexandria Bay" and the plans that Mr. Grinnell had for developing the area into a community of cottages and campgrounds. Interestingly, sounds a lot like early descriptions of Point Vivian, although from what I have been able to determine it is probably closerto Clayton, although in the Town of Alexandria. It appears from reading this that either the early investors already had a plan to purchase property and, develop a summer community and were up there scoping out the area, or else copied Mr. Grinnell's idea, and subsequently negotiated to buy Houghton Point.
October ?? H L Scott survey map showing 40 lots on the 7.57 acre parcel
November 24 –Deed signed by Houghton/wife to Ivers/wife
December 1 – Houghton/Ivers Deed filed with Jefferson County Clerk
December 22 - 3 Lots sold to Margaret Wood (27, 29, 37), 1 Lot sold to Eliza Wood (34)
December 24 - 4 Lots sold to Isaac Wood/Isaac Keller (9, 20, 28, 31)
1878
March 11— 4 Lots sold to Leroy Jones (Nos. 2, 3, 5, 8)
May 8 –4 Lots sold to Hungerfords: No. 6 & No. 19 to Edwin; No. 4 to Edwin /Anna; No. 32 to E 0 Hungerford
1879
January 20 - 4 Lots sold to Amelia Davenport/Mary Tozer (11, 13, 18, 25) January 20 - 4 Lots sold to Wayne Stewart ( 10,12, 17, 38) January 24 - 8 Lots sold to Betsey Kinney (7, 15, 23, 24, 30, 35, 39 40) June 20 - 4 Lots sold to Emma Rodenhurst (22, 26, 36, 33)
1880
No Activity
1881
No Activity
1882
October 4 - 1 Lot sold to Abigail Allen (14)
1883
September 7 - A 12 ft by 98 ft strip between Lots No. 21 and No. 22 sold to Richard Rodenhurst- no proportionate share –in 1900 Richard Rodenhurst transferred this to his wife Emma, who had purchased the original Lot 22.
1884
March 27 - 1 Lot to Alexis Whitney/Andrew Kinney (21)
Contrary to R Randall's assertion, no lots were ever owned by Belle Ivers, 0. Barnes never got involved.
Wayne Stewart, who does not appear on R Randall's list of original investors, bought 4 lots.
In many instances, the actual deeded owners were the wives of some of the potential investors. Therefore when the 10 individuals signed the 1884 corporate document, pledging their interest in their cottages and lots, several of them (Tozer, Austin, Taylor, Rodenhurst, Cook) held no interest in a cottage or lot, it was held by their wives.
After the Lots were sold to the original investors, many of them were sold to other parties, so that by 1884, when the dues were paid, there were 28 individual dues-paying owners at Point Vivian. (as shown in Exhibit of R Randall's Affidavit of December, 2014). This was seven+ years after George/Eunice Ivers bought the 7.57 acres and started selling lots. Only 10 of those 28 signed the corporate papers.
Affidavit Items 10 -12: In Item 10, R Randall quotes a 1909 document signed by some members (can't read the signatures –very blurry and faded), but in part it refers to the signers' pledge to abide by resolutions, by-laws etc. In Item 12, only one paragraph later, R Randall states there were no By-Laws until 1925.
