The Landings Dues Impasse

Executive summary: the whole story in six points

Every three years, Landings owners vote on the maximum annual dues. The rule is strict: 60% of all 4,420 lots must vote, and two-thirds of those voting must say yes.
In 2026 the Board asked twice. The first request (a 30% jump) got 48% yes. The second, smaller request (a 10% jump) got 62%, about 150 votes short of two-thirds, even though 73% of lots voted. So dues for 2027 stay at $2,594, the 2026 level. This is the fourth failed dues vote since 2011: 2011 (64% yes), 2018 (66%, a fraction short), and twice in 2026. After 2018, dues were frozen at $1,850 for three years. After 2011, the Board came back the next spring with a smaller number and it passed.
The outside engineer who studies our roads, drains and bridges says $2,594 is not enough. The repair fund needs about $1,354 per lot each year; the budget puts in $984. On the current path the fund drops from 27% of what it should hold to 3% by 2031.
Residents who voted no were not voting against roads. Many were voting against a Board they do not trust, because the rules give them no other way to express that: removing a director takes a yes from a majority of all 4,420 lots, and every Board candidate is chosen by a committee the Board appoints. There is a second obstacle: one owner household in three is headed by someone 75 or older, and if most of that group votes no, two-thirds is out of reach for everyone else no matter how they vote.
Compared with similar gated communities (Kiawah, Sea Pines, Hilton Head Plantation and others), our dues are in the middle of the pack per home, but low for the amount of road and drainage each home must support. Most of those communities let their board raise dues with inflation automatically; ours does not.
The way out is to fix trust and money together: the Board adopts accountability reforms it can pass on its own, an independent group of respected residents confirms what the infrastructure needs, and a third vote offers a clearer, smaller choice. The short form is just below; the detail is on the Paths tab.

How to use this page: the six tabs above divide the brief into parts, and this first tab is the summary. "The Club" tab is written for the Club's leadership. "Take the one-minute tour" at the top walks through the story, one chart at a time. Words with a dotted underline and a small ? can be clicked for a plain-English explanation. Each chart has an "In plain terms" note under it. The "Larger" button at the top makes all the type bigger.

The situation in six numbers

The problem is not the dollar amount. Residents who voted supported an increase at 48%, far short of the the require, and the give members no practical way to . Deadlock is the designed outcome of those two rules together.

$2,594

2027 maximum, frozen at the 2026 level

Covenants 8.3.1 / 8.4; Budget Book p.49

48% → 62%

Yes share, Vote 1 then Vote 2 (needed 66.7%); turnout 72% and 73%

President's Updates May 27 and Aug 26; GM Update Oct 2026

4 of 11

Dues votes failed since 2002: 2011, 2018 and both 2026 votes

Voting packets and Annual Reports, 2002–2026 (see the timeline)

$1,354

Reserve contribution per lot the independent study requires (current: $984)

Community Advisors Reserve Study, Oct 17 2025

27% → 3%

Reserve percent funded, 2026 → 2031, under the current plan

Reserve Study p.1-4

2,210

Votes needed to remove one director (majority of all 4,420 lots)

Bylaws 3.3

The thesis of this brief. The covenant requires a two-thirds supermajority with a 60% , has no inflation , and no : a failed vote freezes the nominal indefinitely. The Bylaws set director removal at a majority of all members and route every Board candidate through a Board-appointed . Put those rules together and this is what owners can and cannot do. Stopping a dues increase is easy: just over a third of those voting, about 885 people, is enough. Replacing a director is practically impossible: it takes yes votes from 2,210 lots, a majority of every lot on the island whether they vote or not, and even then the Board's own committee picks the replacement. So an owner unhappy with the Board has exactly one place to register it: the dues ballot. The dues vote has become the vote of no confidence. The second 2026 vote is the proof: the Board cut the ask from 30% to 10% and the no vote still came to 27% of all lots, 38% of ballots. Price was not the whole problem. Fixing the money requires fixing the accountability gap first, and the Board can do most of that itself.

The proposed path, in short

Four moves, in this order. Each is within existing authority or has a precedent in the Association's own record. The full version, the deferral design, and the six alternatives with their thresholds are on the Paths tab.

The Board fixes its own rules first. Petition access to the Board ballot, a realistic vote to remove a director, owner-called ballots, an annual independent audit, and an owner-majority committee over the repair fund. Six Board votes, one meeting. These are the concessions that give a "no" voter a reason to become a "yes."
An independent group confirms the numbers. Past presidents and club leaders review the reserve study and the project list and say publicly what the community needs. The Board cannot vouch for itself; this group can.
A third vote in spring 2027 with real choices. An inflation-only option beside a larger step-up; a plain statement that it sets a ceiling for three years; a rule change so future small increases follow inflation automatically; and a deferral so that no owner over 80 living in the home pays more out of pocket while living here. One owner household in three is headed by someone 75 or older; the deferral removes that group's reason to vote no.
Strong candidates in the 2027 election. Three more seats turn over in January 2028, six of nine since this began. The Nominating Committee is appointed by May; applications go in over the summer.

Why this order: the Board is the only party that can act alone, and the one whose credibility is in question, so it goes first. The independent group then confirms the need. The vote comes last, when owners have something to say yes to. The election runs alongside as the backstop if the Board declines.

Board votes needed to adopt every reform in move 1, at a single meeting

Bylaws 7.9: two-thirds of nine directors

≈150

Votes that would have had to switch from no to yes for Vote 2 to pass

62% of about 3,230 ballots, against two-thirds

Spring 2027

A third vote, setting 2028–2030; 2027 stays at $2,594 either way

Precedent: 2012 after 2011, 2020 after 2018

On this tab: What happened, in order · The reserve study · What a frozen cap costs · How TLA compares

What happened, in order

2002–2008Three votes pass: 2003–05 at $920 / $940 / $960 (dues had been $760 in 1997); 2006–08 at $1,225 / $1,250 / $1,300, a 27% first-year jump after the Association "learned that we must put aside more for the future"; 2009–11 at $1,400 / $1,460 / $1,525.
Fall 2011Vote for 2012–2014 fails: $1,600 / $1,675 / $1,750, including $125 a lot for national marketing, meant to replace a real-estate transfer fee approved by owners in 1997 that had lapsed in 2001 "due to a legal technicality." 64% yes. Dues held at $1,525 for 2012. Freeze 1
Spring 2012Re-vote passes for a new three-year period, 2013–2015, at $1,550 / $1,625 / $1,670: marketing dropped, first year lowered by $50. Online voting offered for the first time. The precedent for a vote in the year after a failure. Precedent
2013–2015Owners amend the Covenants three times at the two-thirds-of-all-lots bar (after a first amendment in 2007): the Property Owners' Association Act (2013), modernization (2014), maintenance standards and fines (2015: 78% of lots voted, 2,995 yes to 445 no).
Nov 2015Vote for 2016–2018 passes: $1,730 / $1,790 / $1,850. 68% of owners voted, 74% yes.
Dec 2016$400 hurricane special assessment passes with 87% yes (2,733 to 422) after Hermine and Matthew; $1.25M that had been destined for reserves had gone to cleanup.
Oct 2018Vote for 2019–2021 fails by a fraction: proposed $1,910 / $1,970 / $2,030 (3.1% a year); 66% yes against 66.7% needed; "voter turnout was lower than in the past." Dues stay at $1,850 for 2018–2020. Operating budget cut 4%; recycling center closed, cookouts and off-duty police dropped, median refurbishment cut by a third. Freeze 2
Jan 2020First full reserve study (Community Advisors): replacement cost $47.9M, reserves 30% funded; the $40M storm-drain pipe network carried only as an "allowance" of $275K a year because its life is unpredictable.
Aug–Sep 2020Vote for 2021–2023 passes: $2,070 / $2,170 / $2,270, the first increase in three years. Packet notes a Reserve Specialist had found reserves under-allocated "because the Annual Dues have remained the same since 2018."
Apr 2023Vote for 2024–2026 passes: $2,445 / $2,518 / $2,594 (7.7%, then 3.0% a year). 68% of the first-year increase to reserves; framed as the "Required Annual Dues" to stay "at least 30% funded, the absolute minimum for what is considered adequate," with a national comparison of $2,400–$3,600. First all-electronic vote.
Oct 17 2025Independent Reserve Study (Community Advisors; 834 components, $66.5M replacement cost): required contribution $5.98M a year, $1,354 per lot; the Association's own 2026–2031 funding plan "does not provide for adequate funding without an increase in revenue."
Nov 7 20252026 Budget Book adopts $2,594 ($1,610 operating / $984 reserves) and a Long Range Financial Plan that, absent a vote, holds the total flat through 2031 and shifts allocation from reserves to operations.
Apr 6–May 13 2026Vote 1 fails. Proposed $3,390 / $3,470 / $3,580 (first-year +$796, +30.7%; 96% of the increase to reserves). 72% of lots voted; 48% yes, 52% no of votes cast; 69% voted online. Failed on the two-thirds
Jun–Jul 2026Four randomly selected focus groups, then a community survey with 2,600+ responses.
Aug 10–Sep 15 2026Vote 2 fails. Revised to $2,850 / $3,115 / $3,375 (first-year +$256, +9.9%); Marsh Tower removed, Delegal boardwalk deferred; three-year total cut from $10,440 to $9,340 per lot; proposed capital allocation $1,200 / $1,385 / $1,575, roughly the reserve study's required level. Distributed electronically to save ~$26,000. Result: 73% of lots voted; 62% yes, 38% no (GM Update, Oct 2026). In the President's words: 45% of lots yes, 27% no, 27% did not vote. About 150 votes short. Freeze 3
Sep 22 2026Board drop-in: staff "began identifying budget adjustments"; Board says some affordability options "would require legal review or covenant changes"; vote results can be reviewed by neighborhood.
Sep 28 2026President: 2027 budget to be cut by $1,100,000. "For the 27% who voted against the increase, we will strive to understand the cause of your mistrust and earn your trust." Draft budget within two weeks; 43 residents on committees and the Board to review it.
Nov 3 2026Three new directors elected for 2027–2029 (Phil Redmond, Pam Rogers, Karen Smiley); they take office January 1. The sitting Board elects 2027 officers before then (Bylaws 4.2).
Jan 1 20272027 assessment billed at the frozen $2,594 maximum. Revised 2027 budget in preparation (Oct 27 Board packet).

Dues per lot since 1997, with every vote marked

Dues per lotVote failed (year of vote)Vote passed (first year it set)Frozen year

Dues rose from $760 in 1997 to $2,594 in 2026, about 4.3% a year, with a long pause after 2018 and now another. Green dots are the votes that passed, red dots the four that failed. Every failure has been followed within one to two years by a smaller request that passed, which is the pattern the next ballot should expect to repeat.

Voting packets 2002–2026 and Annual Reports (assessment rate notes). 1998–2002 rates are not in the public library and are shown as a gap. Growth rate is the author's calculation from the endpoints. In consumer-price terms (CPI) the 2026 dues are about 6% above 2018 and 65% above 1997; the shortfall is against what the money buys, shown below.

Every dues vote since 2002

Vote	For	First-year ask	Turnout	Yes	Result
Sep 2002	2003–05	$920 (+12%)	—	—	Passed
Oct 2005	2006–08	$1,225 (+28%)	—	—	Passed
Oct 2008	2009–11	$1,400 (+8%)	—	—	Passed
Oct 2011	2012–14	$1,600 (+5%, incl. $125 marketing)	~70%	64%	Failed
Spring 2012	2013–15	$1,550 (+2%)	—	—	Passed
Nov 2015	2016–18	$1,730 (+4%)	68%	74%	Passed
Dec 2016	Special, $400	one-time	71%	87%	Passed
Oct 2018	2019–21	$1,910 (+3%)	lower	≈66%	Failed
Sep 2020	2021–23	$2,070 (+12%)	—	—	Passed
Apr 2023	2024–26	$2,445 (+7.7%)	—	—	Passed
May 2026	2027–29	$3,390 (+31%)	72%	48%	Failed
Sep 2026	2027–29	$2,850 (+10%)	73%	62%	Failed

Three things stand out. Turnout has never been the problem: it runs around 70% for dues votes, well above the 60% quorum. The two near-misses (2011 at 64%, 2018 at 66%) each carried something extra: a marketing levy in 2011, a list of new projects in 2018. And the 2016 hurricane assessment, a one-time ask tied to visible damage, passed with 87%. Owners here say yes to a specific, visible need and no to a bundle.

Turnout and yes shares as published in Annual Reports, Annual Meeting presentations and 2026 updates; dashes where the Association did not publish a figure. 2011 turnout is inferred from the 2013 packet ("in the last four community-wide elections, about 30% of property owners didn't vote").

The shortfall: what the dues would have to be to buy what they bought in 2018

Dues needed to keep pace with road-building costs since 2018Dues as billedShortfallVote 1 ask for 2027

$3,247

What the 2026 dues would be if they had risen with road-building costs since 2018

$1,850 × (3.135 ÷ 1.786)

$2,594

What the 2026 dues are

Frozen through 2027

$653

Shortfall per lot in 2026; $2.9 million a year across 4,420 lots

20% below keeping pace

$4,100

Cumulative shortfall per lot, 2019–2026; about $18 million island-wide

Sum of each year's gap

Take the $1,850 the island paid in 2018 and raise it each year by exactly what road-building got more expensive, nothing else. By 2026 that bill is $3,247. The real bill is $2,594. The difference, $653 a lot, is how far the dues have fallen behind the cost of the things they exist to pay for. The request that failed in May asked $3,390 for 2027, which is almost exactly this catch-up number. Owners were not being asked to buy more; they were being asked to buy the same roads at today's prices.

Year	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025	2026
Road-building cost index (FHWA, 2003 = 1.00)	1.79	1.93	1.92	2.06	2.60	3.01	3.24	3.23	3.14
Dues needed to keep pace	$1,850	$1,994	$1,990	$2,133	$2,694	$3,122	$3,353	$3,341	$3,247
Dues as billed	$1,850	$1,850	$1,850	$2,070	$2,170	$2,270	$2,445	$2,518	$2,594
Shortfall per lot	—	$144	$140	$63	$524	$852	$908	$823	$653

FHWA National Highway Construction Cost Index (2003 Q1 = 1.000), annual averages of the quarterly unadjusted index from the FHWA dataset on data.transportation.gov; 2026 is the first quarter only. The index is built from prices in actual state highway contracts: asphalt, concrete, grading, drainage pipe and inlets, among others. Two honest caveats. First, 2018 is a defensible base (the last year set by a vote before the first freeze, and the level the 2020 reserve study judged only 30% funded), but a 2021 base gives a smaller gap: $558 a lot, $2.5 million a year, $14.6 million cumulative. Second, only the reserve share of the dues buys construction; the Board has protected that share by shifting dollars out of operations (reserves took 16% of each dollar in 2018 and take 38% in 2026), which is why services were cut after 2018 rather than roads. The independent reserve study measures what remains: $1,354 a lot needed against $984 paid, $370 a lot and $1.6 million a year. The shortfall is therefore between $1.6 million and $2.9 million a year depending on how it is counted; it is not zero on any count. Against ordinary consumer prices the dues have roughly kept pace (about 6% above 2018 in real terms).

The independent evidence: reserves

The strongest case for an increase is not the Board's and not the peer set's. It is the analyst's, commissioned by the Association and dated before either vote.

Dues per lot: actual, proposed, frozen

ActualFrozen path (vote fails)Vote 1 proposal ($3,390 / $3,470 / $3,580)Vote 2 proposal ($2,850 / $3,115 / $3,375)

The solid teal line is what each owner actually paid per year. The two dashed lines are the two proposals owners turned down in 2026: the brass one was the big jump, the violet one the smaller jump. The red dotted line is where dues stay unless a future vote passes. The two shaded blocks are the years dues were frozen after a failed vote, once in 2018 and now again.

Sources: 2019–21, 2021–23, 2024–26 and 2027–29 voting packets; 2026 Budget Book p.49. Dues were frozen at $1,850 for 2018–2020 after the 2018 vote failed.

Reserve percent funded: current plan vs required plan

Current funding plan (frozen dues)Required plan ($1,354 per lot)30% floor set by the Association

Think of the repair fund as a savings account for replacing roads, drains and bridges as they wear out. is how much of the wear-to-date is already covered by cash in that account. The teal line is the outside expert's plan: stay at or above 30%. The red line is where the Association's own plan goes if dues stay frozen: 27% today, 3% in 2031, and the account overdrawn by 2035.

Source: Community Advisors Reserve Study, Oct 17 2025, pp.1-2 and 1-4. Fully funded balance ≈ $38.1M; 2026 opening balance $11.05M. Under the current plan the balance turns negative in 2035.

What the study requires, and why the 30% target is itself the floor

The study's required plan holds reserves "above a 30% fully funded level at the request of the Association." TLA's own 2023 packet called 30% "the absolute minimum for what is considered adequate by industry standards." The common rule of thumb among reserve professionals treats under 30% funded as weak, 30–70% as fair and over 70% as strong. TLA has been managing to the bottom of "fair" for years; the frozen cap takes it to the single digits.

Required vs funded, per lot	Per lot	Total / yr
Reserve study required contribution (2026)	$1,354	$5,983,247
Reserve allocation, 2026 budget	$984	$4,349,280
Reserve allocation, 2030 plan (frozen cap)	$614	$2,713,880
Vote 2 proposed capital allocation 2027 / 2028 / 2029	$1,200 / $1,385 / $1,575	—
Roads + storm drains + paths, 2026–2030 , annualized	$953	$4,212,634

Of each owner's $2,594, $984 goes into the repair fund. The expert says it should be $1,354. The second proposal would have put in $1,200 rising to $1,575, which is about what the expert asked for; owners still said no. If nothing changes, the Association's own plan cuts the repair-fund share to $614 by 2030 to keep daily operations running.

Year-end	Reserve balance	Percent funded	Assets it must cover
2018	$6.4M	—	—
2019	$7.3M	30%	$47.9M
2022	$9.6M	32%	$60.4M
2023	$10.2M	33%	$62.6M
2024	$11.5M	33%	$59.9M
2025	$11.1M	34%	$66.5M
2026 (projected)	$10.2M	27%	$66.5M

The repair fund has nearly doubled since 2018, yet "percent funded" has barely moved and is now falling, because the list of things it must cover keeps growing: $47.9M of assets in the first full inventory (2020), $66.5M in the 2025 update. Part of that is paving and concrete inflation; part is better measurement (storm drains were counted at 47 miles in 2018, 87–89 by 2024). The 2020 study carried the $40M storm-drain pipe network only as an "allowance" of $275,000 a year, so the true liability is larger than the headline.

Sources: Reserve Study p.1-1 and notes; Budget Book pp.5, 48–49, 52; Vote 2 packet p.4; 2024–26 packet FAQ; balances and percent funded as reported at the 2019–2026 Annual Meetings; 2019 from the first full reserve study (Jan 2020 budget workshop, slides 47–49); 2025–26 from the Budget Box of Dec 17 2025 and the Oct 2025 study. Board policy sets a 30% threshold; the 2026 budget drops below it "as a result of Board approval." The 2026–2030 capital plan was revised upward after the study: roads $7.8M → $12.7M, storm drains $4.7M → $6.6M, paths $1.4M → $1.8M; the 2026 budget already draws $0.9M from reserves. Vote 2's capital line was, in effect, the reserve study's number; it still failed.

What a frozen cap costs

Real erosion and the reserve path

At 3% inflation, $2,594 buys 8.5% less by 2029 and 13.7% less by 2031. The LRFP balances operations by cutting the reserve allocation per lot from $984 (2026) to $614 (2030); projected reserve balances fall from $11.2M to $2.8M by 2031 while the capital program grows. Deferred road and drain work does not get cheaper: the 2026 roads budget alone is $2.26M for five roads, and corrugated-metal outfalls installed 50+ years ago are already failing (May 2025 President's Update; Sept 2026 packet).

Budget Book pp.48–52; Reserve Study p.1-4.

The money moves to channels members cannot vote on

Non-assessment revenue is $6.24M of the $13.36M operating budget. The Board may raise fees without a vote (Covenants 8.8(a)(iv)) and borrow for maintenance, repair and restoration without member approval (Bylaws 3.17; the two-thirds member trigger applies only to discretionary capital debt above ~10% of budgeted expenses). It is already happening: 2026 vehicle-registration revenue is up 14% on a fee increase; marina storage rates rose 12%; the LRFP's largest projected revenue gains for 2026–2030 are fee lines (boat rack rental +$1.9M, vehicle registration +$1.0M). A "no" vote does not stop the money; it reroutes it through less transparent, less evenly borne charges, and through deferred maintenance.

Oct 27 2026 Board packet (9-month P&L); Budget Book p.47.

What the last freeze actually did, and what this one is doing

2019–2020, after the 2018 vote failed. The 2020 operating budget was cut 4% below 2018 with "no new or additional services": center-island refurbishment cut from $150,000 to $100,000; mailbox and sign repainting cut from a third of the community a year to a sixth; the recycling center closed; seasonal cookouts, the off-duty police patrol ($60,000) and strategic-plan spending ($95,000) eliminated; Security and Marinas budgeted at 90% and 80% of full staffing. At the same time the reserve share of each $1,850 was pushed from $305 (2018 budget) to $684 (2019 actual) by squeezing operations, and the operating fund ran a $1.7M deficit in 2019. Capital projects were deferred: dry-stack refurbishment, playground, athletic-field lighting, sign lighting, perimeter security, flood mitigation.

2027, after the 2026 votes failed. The President's September 28 update: the 2027 budget is being reduced by $1,100,000, "consistent with our responsibility to maintain our infrastructure and basic services"; which lines are cut will be explained once the budget is approved in December.

The last time a vote failed, the Association kept the roads program alive by cutting the things residents see every day: the medians, the mailboxes, the cookouts, the police patrol, the recycling center. It also ran at a loss. That is the realistic forecast for 2027: a $1.1M cut, mostly from visible services, while the repair fund still falls short of what the engineer says it needs.

Budget Workshops, Nov 2019 ("Changes to Budget since 2018"), slides 5–12, 21, 27; 2019 and 2020 Annual Meeting presentations; President's Update, Sept 28 2026.

Voting no does not make the cost go away. Three things happen instead: prices keep rising while dues do not, so the same money does less each year; the repair fund is drained to keep daily services going; and the Board raises the fees it controls without a vote (gate decals, marina slips, storage lots, permits) and can borrow for repairs. Those charges fall unevenly and are harder to see than dues. Postponed road and drain work also costs more later, because small failures become big ones.

How TLA compares

Per lot, TLA is mid-pack among structurally similar communities. Per mile of road it must maintain, it is near the bottom. Both readings are needed; the per-lot one will be used against any proposal.

Annual assessment per improved lot, 2025–26

Each bar is what an owner pays per year at a similar gated community that runs its own roads, drainage and security, with the golf club billed separately. The Landings sits in the middle. The dotted line is the midpoint of the group.

Association documents, or guides citing the association (lighter bars). Peers: private, staffed gates, association-owned roads and drainage, club separate. Median $2,424; TLA at the 55th percentile. Full method and 37-community dataset in the benchmark workbook.

Infrastructure-adjusted

Measure	TLA	Peer median
Lots per mile of association road	49	71
Assessment revenue per road mile	$126K	$172K
Assessment that would match the peer median per road mile	$3,547	—
Published capital spend per lot (TLA 2026 plan; Sea Pines 2025; Kiawah 2024)	$1,263	$1,109–$1,324
Non-assessment share of operating revenue	47%	Sea Pines ≈40%

TLA: 91 miles of roads, 89 miles of storm drains, 151 lagoons, 30 miles of paths, 7 gates (Budget Book p.18). Peers with road miles: Sea Pines, Hilton Head Plantation, Palmetto Dunes, Indigo Run, Kiawah, Seabrook, Ford's Colony, Kingsmill.

The Landings has 91 miles of road for 4,420 homes, which is 49 homes per mile. Similar communities average 71 homes per mile. Fewer homes sharing each mile means each home's dues buy less road upkeep: about $126,000 per mile here against $172,000 per mile elsewhere. Our dues are ordinary; our road and drain burden per home is not.

Reading: TLA's price is ordinary; its road and drainage burden per lot is not. The peer evidence supports an assessment in the $3,100–$3,550 range as normal for this structure. The reserve study, not the peers, says what is required.

On this tab: The mechanics · Who votes

Why votes fail: the mechanics

Every threshold below is a count of lots out of 4,420. The Board's thresholds are counted among nine directors; the members' are counted among all owners.

Votes needed, out of 4,420 lots

Each bar is how many of the 4,420 lots must vote the same way for something to happen. Short bar, easy; long bar, hard. Stopping a dues increase takes only 885 votes. Removing one Board member takes 2,210. Changing the voting rule itself takes 2,947, a bar owners have in fact cleared four times (see the next card). By contrast, the Board changes its own Bylaws with six votes around one table. That lopsidedness is why unhappy owners use the dues vote: it is the only lever they can reach.

Sources: Covenants 8.4, 8.5, 11.1B; Bylaws 2.2, 2.5, 3.3, 3.17. "Block the dues" assumes exactly a 60% quorum (2,652 ballots). The Board amends the Bylaws with six of nine votes and no member notice (Bylaws 7.9).

The hardest bar has been cleared four times: covenant amendments since 2007

Vote	What it changed	Window	Turnout	Yes votes (of 4,422 needed 2,948)	Result
Sep–Oct 2007	Removed the once-a-decade limit on amendments; added 11.1B (amendment by vote, written consent or both)	6 weeks; every approval had to be notarized and witnessed; notaries at the office, LandingsFest, town halls and through block captains	—	—	Passed
Feb–Jun 2013	Adopted the Georgia Property Owners' Association Act	5 months; paper and online	≈75%	2,462 by Feb 27 with 486 to go; adopted April 2013	Passed
May–Dec 2014	Five modernization items: developer language removed, POAA provisions, wells, emergency entry, home businesses	8 months; survey of 1,600+ owners first	—	—	Passed
Feb–May 2015	Maintenance standards, fines, appeals (11.3)	4 months	78%	2,995 yes, 445 no: 47 votes to spare	Passed

The rule that looks impossible on paper, yes from two-thirds of every lot whether they vote or not, has been met four times in the last twenty years, once with notarized signatures. The recipe was the same each time: a single clear question, a voting window of months rather than weeks, block captains and online voting, and turnout near 75–80%. The 2015 vote cleared by only 47 votes, which is the honest measure of how hard it is. An inflation escalator for the dues rule could be put to owners the same way.

Covenants Voting Packets 2007, 2013, 2014, 2015; 2013 Annual Meeting presentation; 2015 Annual Report; 2016 Annual Meeting presentation. The 2014 and 2015 language appears in the current compiled Covenants (4.7, 4.12, 6.6, 8.8, 11.3). Turnout for 2013 is the 2014 packet's "25% of property owners didn't vote."

The covenant rule (Art. 8)

The maximum assessment is set by member vote for three-year periods (8.3.1). Any change needs at a meeting with a 60% (8.4, 8.5); if quorum fails, a second meeting within 60 days needs 30%, halving thereafter. A ballot in lieu of a meeting must clear the same quorum in ballots returned (Bylaws 2.8). There is no CPI and no : a failed vote leaves the prior maximum in place with no expiry. The Board may set the actual assessment below the maximum (8.3.2) but never above it. for capital face the identical bar (8.2.2). Changing any of this means a : 66⅔% of the total eligible vote (11.1B).

Owners vote on the dues ceiling once every three years. To pass, two separate tests must be met. First, turnout: at least 60% of all 4,420 lots (2,652) must cast a ballot. Second, approval: of the ballots cast, at least two out of three must say yes. The Covenants give relief only on the first test: if too few owners vote, the Board may call a second meeting within 60 days where 30% turnout is enough, then a third where 15% is enough. The two-thirds yes requirement never drops. In 2026 turnout was not the problem; 72% and then 73% of lots voted, but only 48% and then 62% of them said yes. If a vote fails, the old ceiling just continues; there is no automatic inflation adjustment and no "keep last year's rate" rule. Changing the rule itself needs yes votes from two-thirds of all owners, voting or not.

The accountability gap (Bylaws)

Removal requires a majority of all members (3.3), a bar the Bylaws raised above Georgia's default (O.C.G.A. § 14-3-808, which applies "unless the articles or bylaws provide otherwise"). Candidates reach the ballot only through a Board-appointed (3.7; Charter Apr 28 2026) that selects "at least two" per seat; the only alternative is a without the published bio. Officers are chosen by the outgoing Board in executive session (4.2). The Board can remove one of its own by simple majority for a "knowing violation of Board policy" and fill the seat itself (3.3, 3.4). Bylaw amendments take two-thirds of the Board, no member vote (7.9). Member levers: a 25% petition forces a special meeting within 60 days (2.2), the President sets its date and agenda; member-initiated ballots do not exist (2.8 is Board discretion).

Owners cannot realistically fire a director (it takes a majority of every lot, not just of those voting), cannot get onto the Board ballot without the Board's own committee choosing them, and cannot call a vote on anything themselves. The Board, meanwhile, can rewrite its own rulebook with six votes. Georgia law would let owners remove a director with far fewer votes; the Bylaws chose the higher bar.

In practice: every election packet from 2019 to 2026 offers exactly six Committee-chosen candidates for three seats, the Bylaws minimum. Board-election turnout runs 41–50%, against about 70% for dues votes. The Committee's own June 2026 article acknowledges the perception that its slates show "little differentiation."

Can the Board change the vote thresholds? No. What it can change is everything around them.

Rule	Where it lives	Who can change it	What it takes
60% quorum and two-thirds of votes cast for a dues increase	Covenants 8.4, 8.5	Owners only	Declaration amendment: 66⅔% of the total eligible vote (≈ 2,947 lots), by vote, written consent, or any combination (11.1B); the Board proposes, certifies and records but cannot enact. The Georgia POA Act independently requires two-thirds of all votes to amend the recorded instrument.
Three-year cycle; no escalator; frozen maximum on failure	Covenants 8.3.1	Owners only	Same
Director removal (majority of all members), Nominating Committee gate, no member-initiated ballots, 25% petition, 10% ordinary-meeting quorum, director terms, Bylaw amendment rule itself	Bylaws 3.3, 3.7, 2.8, 2.2, 2.5, 3.2, 7.9	Board alone	Six of nine votes at one meeting; no member notice or vote (7.9). A Bylaw may not contravene the Declaration.
How the covenant vote is run: meeting or ballot, timing, how many options on one ballot, whether to call a second meeting within 60 days under 8.5	Board discretion within 8.4–8.5 and Bylaws 2.8	Board	Resolution. The 8.5 step-down relaxes turnout only (60% → 30% → 15%); the two-thirds never moves.
Fees and charges; borrowing for maintenance, repair and restoration; the actual assessment at any level up to the frozen maximum	Covenants 8.8(a)(iv), 8.3.2; Bylaws 3.17	Board	Majority of the Board; member approval only for discretionary capital debt above ~10% of budgeted expenses.

The Board cannot lower the bar for a dues vote; only owners can, and the bar for doing that is higher still. But the written-consent language in 11.1B matters: the 2,947 owner consents needed to add an inflation escalator do not have to arrive on one ballot day. They can be gathered over months by a signature campaign and combined with a ballot. That turns the hardest number in the documents from a single-day lottery into a campaign, which is work a leaders' group can organize and a Board cannot. Everything else that shapes the outcome, from who may run for the Board to how the ballot is designed, the Board can change by itself.

Covenants 8.3–8.5, 8.8, 11.1B; Bylaws 2.2, 2.5, 2.8, 3.2, 3.3, 3.7, 3.17, 7.9; O.C.G.A. § 44-3-226. Minutes of open Board sessions are public: each monthly agenda packet carries the previous meeting's minutes and committee minutes. Executive sessions (personnel, litigation, confidential matters) are not minuted in the packet. Members may already address the Board for five minutes at each meeting.

How other large communities avoid this

Community	Board may raise without a vote	Member vote	If the vote fails
The Landings (TLA)	No	Every 3 years; 2/3 of votes cast, 60% quorum	Maximum frozen indefinitely
Kiawah Island (KICA)	Up to greater of 5% or CPI each year	Only to exceed the cap; 2/3, 60% quorum (25% at 2nd meeting)	Escalator continues
Sea Pines (CSA)	Up to trailing CPI	Only above CPI; 75% of ballots returned	CPI increase still available
Tellico Village	Up to greater of 5% or CPI	Only above the cap; majority of members voting	Cap still applies
Seabrook Island (SIPOA)	No	Whole budget every year; majority of votes cast, 35% quorum	Board resubmits within 30 days; prior-year rate meanwhile
Ford's Colony (VA)	Yes; budget stands unless disapproved	Only to disapprove: majority of all members within 30 days	Prior-year assessment continues
Dataw Island (DIOA)	Yes; budget stands unless disapproved	Only to disapprove at annual meeting, 50% quorum	Budget stands
Bella Vista (AR)	No	51% of votes cast, 50% quorum, 3-year freeze after approval	Frozen; votes pass or fail by 1–3 points

Most comparable communities let the board raise dues a little each year on its own, usually inflation or 5%, and ask owners to vote only on bigger changes. Several also keep charging last year's rate if a vote fails, so the lights stay on. The Landings does neither: every change goes to a hard vote, and a failed vote freezes dues with no end date. Bella Vista, Arkansas, the one other community with an owner-vote-only rule, sees its votes pass or fail by one to three points.

Governing documents as located in the benchmark workbook (TLA_Dues_Benchmark_2026.xlsx, Governance sheet). The two recurring design features are an automatic escalator and a fallback that keeps the association funded when a vote fails. TLA has neither.

Who votes: the owner base behind the arithmetic

The companion report Landings Demographic Trends profiles the 4,138 homes inside the gates from the county's parcel digests (1999–2025), three Censuses, the American Community Survey and IRS returns. Four of its findings bear directly on the dues vote: the owner base is older than any ballot design assumes; a no-voting bloc of that size makes two-thirds unreachable; the older households are income-constrained but equity-rich; and a second community of recent, higher-earning buyers now sits beside them.

33%

Owner households headed by someone 75 or older

2020 Census; 18% in 2000, 27% in 2010

~1 in 5

Owner households headed by someone 80 or older (estimate)

The Census splits at 75 and 85, not 80; see note below

≈$97K

Estimated median income, households headed by someone 75+

Island 65+ median is $114K (ACS 2020–24); split by the national 65–74 vs 75+ ratio (CPS 2023). 80+ not published; likely $85–90K

$854K

Median home value; 34% of homes above $1 million

Assessor's 2025 fair market value

36%

Owners who bought in 2020 or later, at prices that doubled since 2019

County digests; median sale $425K (2019) → $835K (2024)

~7%

Homes changing hands each year

6.6% in 2023, 6.8% in 2024; about 290 homes a year

One owner household in three is headed by someone 75 or older, up from one in five in 2000. Roughly one in five is headed by someone 80 or older. Those households report about half the income of the working-age households next door (an estimated $97,000 for the 75-and-over households against $205,000 for owners aged 45–64), but they own homes worth, at the median, $854,000, often bought decades ago. Meanwhile a third of all owners arrived since 2020 and paid roughly double what 2019 buyers paid. About 290 homes change hands every year, so each three-year dues cycle faces an electorate that is about one-fifth new.

Owner households by age of householder, 2000 → 2020

200020102020

Each group of bars is an age band of the ; the teal bar is the most recent count. The 55–64 band has shrunk by nearly half since 2000 while the 75–84 band has grown by more than half. The original owners from the 1980s and 1990s aged in place. The under-45 band is the only young group growing, which is the arrival of the post-2015 buyers.

Decennial Census 2000, 2010, 2020, owner-occupied housing units by age of householder, Skidaway Island CDP (which is the island inside the gates plus a small number of homes outside). The report does not count 80+ householders separately. The "one in five" estimate takes half of the 75–84 band (26.2%) plus all of the 85+ band (6.9%), which gives 20%; the true figure in 2026 is probably a little higher after six years of aging in place. Treat it as 18–23%.

What a no-voting bloc does to the two-thirds rule

If a bloc of this share of ballots votes no as a unit…	One in five (20%)	One in four (25%)	One in three (33%)
Yes needed from everyone else to reach two-thirds	83%	89%	≈100%
What Vote 1's 48% overall implies everyone else voted	60%	64%	72%
If the bloc abstains instead, everyone else needs	66.7%	66.7%	66.7%
Lots in the bloc, of 4,420	884	1,105	1,459

Read down a column. If one owner in three votes no no matter what, the other two-thirds would have to vote yes almost unanimously. That never happens on any question. If the same bloc simply sits the vote out, the others need the ordinary two-thirds, and on the Vote 1 numbers they may already have been there. The bloc does not need to be converted; it needs a reason not to vote no.

Arithmetic: required yes among the rest = 66.7% ÷ (1 − bloc share); implied yes among the rest = 48% ÷ (1 − bloc share). Vote 2 figures from the GM Update of Oct 2026 (62% / 38%, 73% of lots) and the President's Update of Sept 28 (45% yes, 27% no, 27% not voting, of all lots); counts are derived from those percentages and rounded. Two cautions. The bloc shares are shares of households, not of ballots; older owners usually vote at higher rates, so the bloc's share of ballots cast may be larger than its share of homes. And no one has shown that the 75+ group voted no as a unit: the by-neighborhood results the Association holds are the test (see the table below).

Vote 2 as counted: how close it was

Vote 2 as counted (73% of 4,420 lots voting; 62% yes, 38% no)
Ballots cast	≈3,230
Yes / no	≈2,000 / ≈1,230
Yes needed for two-thirds	≈2,150
Hard no at a 10% ask, as a share of all lots	27% (≈1,190 lots)
To pass: no voters who switch to yes	≈150
or: no voters who stay home instead	≈230
or: non-voters (27% of lots) who turn out and vote yes	≈450

The second vote measured the hard-no bloc directly: at a 10% increase, 27 lots in 100 still voted no. That is smaller than the one-in-three 75-and-over share and larger than the one-in-five 80-and-over estimate, which is consistent with age being a large part of the no vote but not all of it. The gap is small in absolute terms: about 150 changed minds, or 230 no voters persuaded to abstain, or 450 of the 1,190 owners who did not vote.

Fixed income, but not without means

Measure	Figure	Source
Median income, households headed by someone 65+	$114,495	ACS 2020–24 (the finest age cut the Census publishes for the island)
Estimated median income, households headed by someone 75+	≈$97,000	Author's estimate: the island's 65+ median split using the national ratio of 65–74 to 75+ incomes (CPS 2023: $61,830 vs $45,440) and the island's own 65–74 / 75+ mix. For 80+, not published anywhere; likely $85–90K
Households with income under $50,000	13.5%	ACS 2020–24; was 23% in 2012–16
One-person households aged 65+	736	2020 Census; 300 in 2000
Owner households headed by someone 65+	63%	2020 Census; 51% in 2000
Owners who have owned more than 20 years	978 (24%)	County digests, 2025
Share of home value shielded from property tax by the freeze	~25%	Assessor digest, 2025
Median 2024 sale price	$835,000	Recorded sales; $425,000 in 2019

The oldest households are not poor, but many live on pensions and withdrawals that do not grow, and 736 of them live alone. What they have is the house: at the median it is worth more than $850,000, and a quarter of owners have held theirs for over twenty years. That is why a deferral secured by the home fits this group. The increase is small against the equity; it is large against a fixed monthly budget.

Landings Demographic Trends, sections 4–5. Income figures are survey estimates for the Census-designated place and tax-return aggregates for ZIP 31411; they describe the community, not any household.

Two communities, one gate: where the yes votes are

Since 2015 a younger, higher-earning wave has arrived: 1,486 of today's owners (36%) bought in 2020 or later; residents under 45 nearly doubled between 2000 and 2020; the share of households earning $200,000 or more rose from one in five to one in three; and 39% of tax returns filed from ZIP 31411 now report $200,000 or more, up from 27% in 2015. These owners paid the most for their homes, carry the largest mortgages, and have the longest horizon over which roads and drains affect their property value. They are the natural yes bloc, and the ballot has given them nothing to organize around.

Length of ownership	Owners	Share
5 years or less	1,171	28%
6 to 10 years	1,094	26%
11 to 20 years	895	22%
More than 20 years	978	24%

Half the island has owned for ten years or less. These owners bought into the community at today's prices and will live with the roads the longest. The ten-year residency test in the deferral idea would, by design, leave most of them paying the full increase, which is where the money has to come from anyway.

Turnover of about 290 homes a year (derived: 7% of 4,138) means roughly 850 homes, one in five, will have a new owner by the next scheduled cycle in 2029–30. The 2026 electorate is not the 2030 electorate.

Where the older households are, and where incomes are lower

Two maps of the same island. The left one is the county assessor's neighborhoods, shaded by the share of homes headed by someone 75 or older (darker is older), from the companion report. The right one is the seven Census areas inside the gates, shaded by median household income (darker is richer), from the American Community Survey. Click or tap any area for its figures. The two sets of boundaries do not match, which is why both are shown.

Assessor neighborhoods: share of homes headed by someone 75+

Click a neighborhood for its figures.

Census areas: median household income (and share of residents 75+)

Click an area for its figures.

Census area inside the gates	Residents	75+	80+	Median household income (± margin)	65+ households under $50,000	Median home value
110.05 block group 2, south	1,383	30%	12%	$138,750 (±$100,000)	6%	$666K
110.06 block group 1, north	1,728	29%	20%	$114,940 (±$22,000)	25%	$820K
110.05 block group 4, west and south-west	1,956	28%	12%	$111,671 (±$5,500)	11%	$924K
110.06 block group 2, north-central	997	24%	8%	$110,721 (±$18,000)	17%	$526K
110.05 block group 1, west-central	791	23%	15%	$98,523 (±$71,000)	25%	$645K
110.06 block group 3, central-east	1,095	17%	7%	$133,045 (±$32,000)	0%	$566K
110.05 block group 3, central (Village area)	1,027	9%	7%	$193,684 (±$121,000)	0%	$893K
Island inside the gates	8,907	24%	12%	$121,991 (±$14,000)	14%	$763K

The belief that the older parts of the island are also the lower-income parts holds up in the Census figures, with one caveat. Across the seven areas, the more residents over 75, the lower the median income: the three oldest areas (28–30% of residents 75+) have median incomes of $112,000 to $139,000, the two youngest $133,000 and $194,000, and the share of older households living on less than $50,000 runs 15% in the oldest areas against 11% elsewhere. The caveat is that two of the seven estimates carry margins of plus or minus $70,000 to $120,000 because the samples are small; the pattern rests on the four areas measured tightly, and those four say the same thing. The oldest areas are not the cheapest: the north and south-west, where a fifth of residents are over 80, have homes worth $820,000 to $924,000 at the median. Age-rich, income-modest, equity-heavy: the profile the deferral is built for.

Left map and its figures: Landings Demographic Trends, section 6 (assessor neighborhoods, 2025 digest; householder ages from Census blocks). Right map: Census TIGER block-group boundaries for tracts 110.05 and 110.06 (the Skidaway Island CDP); figures from ACS 2019–2023 tables B01001, B19013, B19037 and B25077, downloaded from the Census summary files. Compass descriptions of the Census areas are the author's; the Census does not name them. Correlation between the 75+ share and median income across the seven areas is −0.7.

By neighborhood: where the 75+ households are

The Association presented Vote 1 and Vote 2 results by neighborhood at the September 22 drop-in but has not published them. Laid against this table, they would show whether the no vote tracked age and tenure (the fixed-income thesis) or ran evenly across the island (the no-confidence thesis). The two call for different remedies.

Assessor neighborhood	Homes	Median value	Householder 75+	Householder under 55	Bought in last 5 years	Median years owned
Oak Shadow / Sea Eagle	29	$799K	50%	8%	28%	9
Sundew / Islanders	290	$1,291K	48%	11%	28%	8
Dame Kathryn	64	$383K	43%	8%	39%	8
Log Landing / Hasleiters	415	$1,010K	37%	22%	31%	9
Tidewater / Little Comfort	226	$1,438K	36%	24%	20%	12
Southerland / Hobcaw	210	$765K	35%	17%	35%	7
Village Green / Willeford	248	$568K	35%	22%	29%	9
Sparnel / Cabbage	187	$776K	35%	25%	38%	7
Harbor View / Sound View	21	$630K	33%	18%	43%	9
Delegal / Yam Gandy	889	$924K	32%	23%	25%	10
Mainsail / Amberly	145	$1,060K	30%	11%	32%	8
Wiley Bottom / Hemingway	1,206	$644K	27%	24%	27%	10
Franklin Creek / Hawksbeard	169	$732K	18%	32%	27%	10
Franklin Creek Village	39	$536K	18%	24%	44%	7

Sorted by the share of homes headed by someone 75 or older. The two biggest neighborhoods, Wiley Bottom and Delegal, hold half the island's homes and sit at or below the island average for older householders, so they decide any vote. The oldest neighborhoods are also among the most valuable (Sundew, Tidewater, Log Landing), which is the equity point again.

Landings Demographic Trends, section 6, Chatham County assessor neighborhoods (2025 digest); householder ages from Census blocks matched to neighborhoods. Island average: 33% householder 75+, 22% under 55, 28% bought in the last five years.

Best estimate of who voted which way, by age

The ballots are secret, so this is a reconstruction, not a count. It takes the two published results (72% turnout and 48% yes; 73% and 62%), the Census age structure of owner households, and two assumptions stated below, and allocates the votes so that every row adds up to the published totals. The tilt between young and old is a judgment; the totals are not.

Householder age	Lots	Turnout (assumed)	Ballots	Vote 1 yes (30% ask)	Vote 2 yes (10% ask)	Vote 2 no votes	Did not vote
Under 45	540	56%	300	62%	80%	60	240
45–54	410	63%	260	58%	75%	65	150
55–64	685	71%	490	54%	70%	145	195
65–74	1,325	79%	1,055	49%	64%	380	270
75–84	1,160	79%	920	40%	51%	450	240
85 and over	305	66%	200	31%	40%	120	105
All lots	4,420	73%	3,227	48%	62%	1,226	1,195

On this estimate, owners 75 and over cast about a third of the ballots and nearly half of the no votes; they split about evenly on the 10% ask and voted roughly 60–40 against the 30% ask. Owners under 65 said yes about three to one on the second vote. Owners 65–74, the largest group, were close to the island average both times and decided the margin. The people who did not vote skew young: the under-55s are a fifth of lots but nearly a third of the non-voters.

If the truth is…	Vote 2 yes among 75+	Vote 2 yes among under 65	Share of all no votes cast by 75+	What it would take to pass, everyone else unchanged
Flat: age made no difference (the no vote was about trust, not age)	62%	62%	35%	About 150 minds changed anywhere; a deferral for the oldest owners buys little
Central: the best guess above	49%	74%	47%	75+ owners move from 49% to 62% yes, about 145 of their 1,120 ballots; a deferral is aimed at exactly that group
Steep: age is most of the story	42%	81%	53%	75+ owners move from 42% to 56% yes; the under-65s are already near unanimous

By length of ownership the same estimate gives, for Vote 2: owners of five years or less about 73% yes; six to ten years 66%; eleven to twenty 57%; more than twenty years 48%. By income, only a judgment is possible: the households under $50,000 (one in seven, mostly one-person 65+ households) perhaps 40% yes, the $200,000-and-over third perhaps 70–75%. The affordability arithmetic is worth stating plainly: the second vote's first-year increase was $256, which is half of one percent of a $50,000 income and about a quarter of one percent of the estimated $97,000 median for households headed by someone 75 or older. Even the 2029 level, $781 more, is 1.6% of a $50,000 income. For most no voters this was not about being able to pay; it was about horizon (why fund 2035 roads) and trust (why fund this Board). Those are the two things the paths address.

The test. If the central estimate is right, the Association's neighborhood tallies for Vote 2 should show about 41% no in Sundew/Islanders and Oak Shadow (half the homes headed by someone 75+), 38% in Delegal and Wiley Bottom, and 35% in Franklin Creek (one in six). If the no share is the same everywhere, the flat row is right and the remedy is accountability, not a deferral. If the spread is wider than six points, the steep row is right. The Vote Decoder runs this comparison from the tallies.

Assumptions: turnout rises with age until 85 (56% under 45 to 79% at 65–84, 66% at 85+), the usual pattern in local elections, scaled to the published 72% and 73%; willingness to vote yes falls with age in a fixed ratio across both votes, with the overall level set by each vote's result. The three rows differ only in how steep that fall is. Age structure: 2020 Census owner households by age of householder (Landings Demographic Trends), applied to 4,420 lots. Counts are rounded. Income shares: ACS 2020–24. Calculation file: vote_guess.py.

How the estimate could be confirmed

Not person by person: ballots are secret. But the question is answerable in the aggregate, and most of the data already exists. The survey route needs no one's permission.

Route	What it answers	Who holds the data	How sure
Participation file	Who turned out (not how they voted) by years owned, home value, homestead or absentee status, trust or LLC ownership	The Association: the list of lots that returned a valid ballot, joined to its owner database	Exact
Neighborhood inference	How older, newer and wealthier households voted, estimated from how neighborhoods with different mixes voted	The Association holds the by-neighborhood tallies; the neighborhood mix is in the companion report	Approximate, with ranges
Survey	Self-reported vote and reasons by age, income band and years owned; the only route to income	The summer 2026 Annual Dues Survey (2,600 responses), if it asked age or tenure; otherwise a short new survey	Self-report; 600+ responses give about ±4 points

Nobody can look up how a neighbor voted. What can be done is to lay the Association's neighborhood tallies, which it has already shown but not released, beside each neighborhood's age and tenure mix. Neighborhoods where half the homes are headed by someone over 75 (Sundew, Oak Shadow) and neighborhoods where it is one in six (Franklin Creek) will tell the story between them. The Vote Decoder page does that arithmetic the moment the tallies are typed in, with ranges, and says in a sentence what they show. Income itself is never recorded by lot; home value and length of ownership stand in for it, and only a survey can ask directly.

If the Association ever releases them: turnout by tenure, value and ownership type from the participation file (aggregates only); yes and no counts by neighborhood for both votes; the summer survey's cross-tabs by age and years owned. Without the Association: a four-question survey through the clubs and Landlovers lists, 600 responses, ±4 points.

What this changes in the paths. First, the fixed-income bloc is real and larger than the 25% working assumption: a third of owner households at 75+, a fifth at 80+. Second, converting it is unnecessary; a deferral that removes its reason to vote no is enough, and the equity to secure that deferral is there. Third, the yes coalition already exists in the post-2015 buyers and may already have voted two-thirds yes in April; a smaller, clearer third ballot with a deferral attached is aimed at them. Fourth, the Association's by-neighborhood results are the one dataset that would confirm or refute all of this, and the leaders' group should ask for them first.

On this tab: One island, two rulebooks · Residents will pay · The governance gap · Why the Club needs this vote · The aging dynamic · What to ask the Club

The Club and the Association: one island, two rulebooks

The Landings Golf & Athletic Club and The Landings Association serve the same households behind the same gates. One of them raised its dues 71% in four years without a vote; the other could not get 10% through a referendum. The Club's IRS filings (Form 990, 2020 and 2024), its reports to its own members, and the Association's documents tell the story. This tab is written for a conversation with the Club's leadership: why the Club needs the Association's vote to pass, and what it can do about it.

+71%

Club dues revenue, 2020 → 2024 ($18.8M → $32.2M), set each year by the Board of Governors

Form 990, Part VIII line 2a

+32%

Association assessment per lot, 2020 → 2024 ($1,850 → $2,445), set by member referendum

Voting packets; 2019–20 were frozen years

$3 to $1

Club dues collected for every dollar of Association assessment in 2024 ($32.2M vs $10.8M)

990 line 2a; 4,420 lots × $2,445

Member votes the Club needs to raise dues or to borrow; a capital assessment takes a simple majority of those voting

Club Bylaws 6.4h, 11.1–11.2; Form 990 Schedule O

Net change in Club memberships in 2025: 164 joined, 161 resigned, golf down 12

2026 Annual Meeting report, membership update

1 in 3 → 1 in 5

Homes inside the gates without a Club membership, 2018 → 2025; the Club's own "30%" is of residents by headcount

Club annual reports; county digest; see the reconciliation below

Point one: residents will pay for what they trust

The argument that Landings residents will not pay more does not survive the Club's own books. Between 2020 and 2024 the Club's dues revenue rose 71%, almost exactly the rise in road-building costs over the same years, and its members stayed: initiation fees reached $7.0 million in 2024, the Club added 141 employees, and it closed the year with an $8.4 million surplus. The Association's assessment rose 32% in the same window, and the 2026 request to continue at that pace drew 62% yes on a 73% turnout.

Seven of eleven dues votes since 2002 passed. The four that failed (2011, 2018, twice in 2026) all came with a trust problem attached, not a price the community could not afford.
When the need was visible, owners voted 87% yes for the $400 storm-recovery assessment in December 2016 (2,733 to 422).
Vote 2 was a majority for an increase. 62% of ballots, 45% of all lots, said yes to 10%. The no vote was 27% of lots. A one-third minority held the result.
The ability to pay is there. Median household income inside the gates is about $122,000, median home value $854,000, and delinquency on assessments runs 0.1–0.3% a year. A $256 first-year increase is 0.2% of the median income.
Asked the Club's way, they say yes. Club members approved a $24.85 million capital plan in 2017 by majority vote, and the capital plans of 1997, 2002 and 2007 before it. The Club tells them to expect dues increases of "roughly inflation + 3%" every year and reports an average increase of 5% a year since 2005. The same households have absorbed that for twenty years.

The same people who said no to $256 a year for the Association paid the Club increases many times that size over the same four years, because the Club's documents never asked them. Willingness to pay is not the constraint. The vote design and the trust deficit are.

The Club's 2024 return labels its dues line "equity membership" where the 2020 return says "membership dues"; the 71% is the growth of that line and may not equal the change in any one member's bill. Member counts are not reported on a 990, so dues per member cannot be computed. Employees: 724 (2020) to 865 (2024), Part V line 2a.

Point two: the governance gap

The two organizations are run by the same kind of people, elected by the same households, for the same island. The difference is what their documents let them do.

Decision	The Landings Association	The Landings Golf & Athletic Club
Annual dues	Members set a three-year ceiling: two-thirds of votes cast, 60% of all 4,420 lots voting (Covenants 8.3–8.5)	Board of Governors sets them every year; no member vote
Capital assessment	Same two-thirds vote as dues (8.2.2)	Board proposes; a majority of votes cast approves, with a quorum of 600 of about 3,400 members (Bylaws 3.4, 11.2). The current capital fee, about $1,040 a year per golf or athletic membership, was approved in 2017 and runs to June 2027
Big projects	Within the dues ceiling, or a special assessment at the same two-thirds vote	Any construction or renovation over $2.5 million (2008 dollars, indexed) needs a majority of votes cast, in advance (Bylaws 6.4h). The 2017 plan, $24.85 million for three projects, passed; so did the capital plans of 1997, 2002 and 2007
Money from newcomers	None; a 1% transfer fee lapsed in 2001	Initiation fees, $7.0M in 2024
Borrowing	Board, for repair and restoration	Two-thirds of the Board of Governors
If a vote fails	The old ceiling stays in force indefinitely; no inflation escalator	Not applicable: nothing is put to a vote
What members vote on	Dues ceiling, special assessments, covenant changes, three directors a year	Three governors a year; assessments and projects over $2.5M (majority of votes cast); merger, sale or dissolution (two-thirds of votes cast); bylaw changes (two-thirds of votes cast or a majority of all members, whichever is less)
Votes per member	One per lot	Golf members three, tennis two, social, athletic and house members one
Choosing the board	Slate from a Board-appointed Nominating Committee; six candidates for three seats every year since 2019; no petition route	Nominating Committee chaired by the immediate past president; the slate must exceed the vacancies (up to double); a member interviewed but not slated can get on the ballot by petition of 15% of voting memberships (Bylaws 5.3–5.4)

The Club can price its product, and when it needs members' permission for something big it asks for a simple majority of those who vote, with a quorum one sixth the size of the Association's. The Association has to win two-thirds against a one-third veto, with 60% of every lot voting, to keep up with asphalt. Both boards answer to the same voters. The Club's members have said yes to every capital plan put to them since 1997; the Association's have said no to four dues votes since 2011.

Club rules from its Bylaws (approved July 23, 2025; amended March 14, 2026), Sections 3.4, 5.3–5.4, 6.4, 11.1–11.2 and Article XIII, on the member portal, and from Schedule O of its 2024 Form 990. Association rules from the Covenants and Bylaws; see "Why votes fail."

Point three: if the Association fails, the Club fails

The Club's $129 million of courses, clubhouses and courts (at cost; $62 million net of depreciation) sit inside infrastructure the Club does not own and cannot fund by itself. Every member, guest and employee reaches the Club on Association roads through Association gates, and every fairway drains into a lagoon and storm-drain system the two organizations share. The Club's balance sheet is strong; the ground it stands on is the Association's.

The shared plumbing. The island has 91 miles of roads, 87 miles of storm drains and 151 lagoons on 269 acres. The lagoons are the storm-water system; they are "owned by either The Landings Association or The Landings Golf & Athletic Club," and on September 22, 2026 the Association's Board approved a Master Services Agreement that formalizes the two organizations' responsibilities for stormwater infrastructure, lagoon structures and related assets. The Club already pays the Association for security and lagoon services, $125,000 in 2024 and about $174,000 in 2026, rising to $196,000 by 2031 in the long-range plan. The reserve study's capital plan for 2026–2030 is roads $12.7M and storm drains $6.6M; a $40M storm-pipe replacement sits outside the study as an allowance. On the frozen path the reserve fund falls from 27% funded to 3% by 2031, and that work is what gets deferred.

What a freeze does, from the record. After the 2018 failure the Association cut the 2020 budget 4% below 2018: security budgeted at 90% of staffing, the off-duty police patrol eliminated, center-island refurbishment cut, projects deferred. Those are the gates and entrances the Club's members and prospects drive through. This freeze has already taken $1.1 million out of the 2027 budget before the Club's season starts.

The Club's pipeline is the housing market. About 7% of the island's homes change hands each year, roughly 300 sales, and those buyers are where the Club's $7.0 million in initiation fees and its new members come from. A buyer judges the community before the Club: at the gate, on the roads, at the entrances the Landings Company photographs. The Club's premium rests on the community's condition. Median home value is $854,000; the Association's roads and drainage protect that value for the Club as much as for the owner.

Cost of waiting falls on the Club too. The Association's own analysis (April 2026): deferred road maintenance turns into reconstruction at up to three times the cost; $5.07 million of storm-drain work and $9 million of road work are due in 2027–2029 whether or not they are funded. Road-building costs are up 76% since 2018. A larger special assessment later lands on the same households that pay Club dues, at a worse moment.

In the Club's own words. Its strategic plan commits it to work with the Association "to protect real estate values, maintain shared infrastructure and effectively use land and natural resources." Reaching a stormwater and lagoon agreement with the Association was a Board KPI every year from 2021 until it was signed in September 2026. Its 2024 president told the annual meeting that "partially as a result of our Club's success, Landings community home values have increased substantially higher than surrounding comparable markets," which is the same dependency read from the other side. And GGA's 2024 focus groups reported that "in every session, the discord between the HOA and Club was mentioned as the #1 dislike and strategic concern for the Club and community"; members "want the Club and HOA to work in harmony," and listed "continued investment in security of the community" among their capital priorities.

The hard version. A gated community with 3%-funded reserves, deferred roads and a security budget in retreat is not a community that supports a $67 million club with a seven-figure initiation-fee stream. The Club can outlast one bad year of Association budgets. It cannot outlast a decade of them.

The Club is the biggest single beneficiary of the Association's infrastructure and pays for almost none of it. That is not a complaint; it is the reason the Club's leadership should want the vote to pass more than anyone, and the reason its voice is the one the Board cannot supply for itself.

Infrastructure counts and lagoon ownership: 2026 Budget Book, community description. Master Services Agreement: Sept 22 2026 Board minutes. Service-agreement payments: Budget Book long-range financial plan, "Service Agreement – TLGAC – Security/Lagoons." Capital plan and reserve path: Reserve Study (Oct 2025) and "What a frozen cap costs." Turnover and home values: Landings Demographic Trends. Cost of waiting: landings.org, April 3 2026. Club figures: Form 990, 2024; strategic plan and KPIs from the 2023–2026 Annual Meeting reports; GGA Focus Group Report, July 2024, p. 7; 2024 president's message, 2025 Annual Meeting report.

The dynamic: an aging membership, a pipeline tied to home sales

The Club's own annual-meeting reports describe the mechanism that links the two organizations. Memberships drifted down for a decade, from 2,943 in 2007 to 2,819 in 2018, as golf members aged into lower categories or out of the Club; the Club's own 2008 projection model "projected a continuing decline in golf memberships over the foreseeable future." In 2018 about a third of the homes inside the gates carried no membership. Then two things happened at once: the 2017 capital plan opened The Deck, the new Wellness Center and the new Marshwood Clubhouse, and the pandemic sent people to golf and to Savannah. Memberships jumped 550 in two years. By 2024 the Club called 37% of its members "joined since 2019." The non-member share of homes fell to roughly a fifth. (The Club's leadership puts non-members at about 30%; the figures reconcile, and the note under the chart says how.)

All membershipsGolf membershipsHomes inside the gates

Year-end counts from the Club's 2026 Annual Meeting report (Chart 1, membership by category) and the 2019–2020 Annual Reports. Homes from the 2025 county digest. Three ways to count the non-member share, all defensible: by homes, 3,444 memberships against 4,216 homes leaves 18%, or 22–23% after setting aside the memberships held by non-residents (national members, the up-to-100 non-property-owner golf memberships allowed since 2010, and members who kept their membership after moving to The Marshes); by lots, one vote each, 22–26%; by headcount, about 8,500–8,900 residents against roughly two people per member household, 25–33%. The Club's "30%" is the headcount figure. In 2018 the same arithmetic gave a third of homes and 36% of lots. For a vote counted by lots, the lot figure is the one that matters: about a quarter of lots carry no Club membership today, down from more than a third in 2018.

The surge is over; the drift has resumed. 2025 ended with 3,444 memberships, up 3. The Club added 164 members and lost 161 to resignation. Golf fell by 12: 93 new golf members and 25 upgrades in, against 43 resignations and 87 members who moved down a category. The old Social category, closed to new members since 2014, has gone from 1,212 to 541. The 2026 Annual Meeting listed "maintain golf memberships – lost 12" under "good, not great," and the 2023 report named the constraint: "lack of home inventory is a challenge."

Why that is the Association's problem too. The Club's capital money comes from two places: operating surplus and net initiation fees ($6.6 million in 2025, $7.0 million in 2024). Initiation fees come from joins, joins come from buyers, and buyers come from homes being sold. A community that ages in place does not sell homes. GGA's 2024 focus groups put the choice to the Club in exactly those words: an "age in place" strategy "will lead to the average age of the community growing older in the future and with less turnover to active lifestyle families." Older members, they reported, "are fearful that the current trajectory of the Club from a cost perspective will price many out," and want the Club to "maintain what we have." That is the Association's fixed-income bloc, seen from the other clubhouse.

How the Club handles the same problem. It prices by age: golf dues are discounted 10% at 80, 25% at 85 and 50% at 90, and 10% for members with 25 years' tenure who are 75 or older; joiners under 50 pay reduced initiation fees. It charges newcomers for capital through the initiation fee. And it tells members what to expect: the average dues increase from 2005 to 2024 was 5% a year, and future increases will run "roughly inflation + 3%." The Association's deferral, resale contribution and inflation escalator are the same three tools.

The Club is not a growing institution sitting next to a shrinking one. It is at replacement rate, its golf base is slipping, and its capital model depends on the homes inside the gates changing hands, which an aging community does less and less. Every road, drain and gate the Association defers makes those homes harder to sell, and every unsold home is a join the Club does not get. The two organizations have one aging customer and one housing market between them.

Club member portal, Document Library: 2026 Annual Meeting (membership update, Chart 1, KPIs, Financial Review), 2025 and 2024 Annual Meetings, 2023 Annual Meeting (membership summary), 2019 and 2020 Annual Reports, GGA Partners Focus Group Report (July 2024, pp. 6, 9–10), 2022 Dues & Fees schedule, A History of The Landings Club (2021 edition, 2008–2010 entries). A golf household's 2022 schedule: $12,096 dues, $1,098 house charge, $1,038 capital fee, about $14,200 a year before cart and food, against $2,594 to the Association.

What to ask the Club for

The Club has three things the Association's Board lacks: credibility with the owners who voted no, a demonstrated way of raising dues without losing members, and a balance sheet. Each can be put to work.

Say it in public. A statement from the Club's leadership that the reserve study is right and that the Club needs the Association's infrastructure funded. The Club's letterhead reaches members the Association's cannot.
Lend its past presidents. The leaders' commission (Path B) should include Club past presidents and finance chairs. The last decade's: John Kinnaman (2016), Peter Calder (2017), Cliff Frohm (2018), Mike Welch (2019–20), Mike Barber (2021–22), Bob Lindenschmidt (2023), Bob Hainly (2024), Mark Lastner (2025); Tony Marino is the 2026 president. Patty Morgan, the Association's 2025 president, was a Club officer first. Barber, Frohm and Welch served together on the Club's 2023 strategic-planning committee.
Share the playbook. The Club raised dues 71% in four years and kept its members. Its communication, its member surveys and its budget presentations are the model for a third vote that explains rather than asks.
Put money where the courses are. Under the new Master Services Agreement, a Club contribution to the lagoon and storm-drain structures that border its fairways, which are the assets that protect the Club first. It can be structured as the Club's share of a defined project list rather than a gift.
Endorse the newcomer-pays model. The Club's initiation fee is the precedent for a resale capital contribution (Path A, "Resale capital contribution"). The Club can say what the Association's Board cannot: buyers pay it without complaint.
Line up the calendar. The Club's capital fee expires in June 2027 and its "Our Club, Our Future" ten-year plan goes to members in early 2027, almost certainly with an assessment vote attached. The Association's third vote lands in the same spring. Two asks of the same households, weeks apart, should be one story: here is what the island needs, here is who pays, here is how the oldest owners are protected.

The ask is not charity. It is the Club protecting a $129 million investment that sits on someone else's roads, by helping the owner of the roads do what the Club already does for itself every year.

On this tab: Paths to a resolution · Open items

Paths to a resolution

The four moves are on the Summary tab. This tab holds what sits behind them: the deferral that answers the fixed-income bloc, the seven paths compared with their thresholds and timing, and why the order matters. None is exclusive; the first two are designed to run together. Every threshold is from the governing documents; timing assumes the Bylaws' calendar.

The fixed-income bloc: a deferral

A third of owner households are headed by someone 75 or older, and roughly one in five by someone 80 or older (see Who votes). The second vote put a number on the hard no: at a 10% increase, 27% of all lots still voted no. Owners with a short horizon have little reason to fund a ten-year plan, and the vote arithmetic shows how decisive that is: if a bloc of one-third votes no, the rest of the community would need 99.5% yes; if the bloc is one-fifth, 83%. Read the other way: if a one-third bloc did vote no as a unit, Vote 1's 48% overall means everyone else voted about 72% yes, already above two-thirds. The bloc does not have to be won; it has to stop voting no. If it abstains, the rest need 66.7%, which on Vote 1's numbers they may already have delivered.

The design. Eligible: an owner or spouse 80 or older (75 is the alternative gate), living in the home, holding title personally or in a personal trust. Only the amount above today's $2,594 may be deferred. It accrues modest interest as a lien on the lot and is paid at sale, transfer or the end of occupancy. It is not open to everyone: a universal deferral is a zero-interest loan to 4,420 lots, and the money the vote was meant to raise never arrives. Georgia's senior property-tax deferral (O.C.G.A. § 48-5-70 et seq.), with the same age and occupancy gates and interest, is the familiar model.

Measure	Cost to the Association	Who bears it	Covenant fit	What it does for the vote
Deferral for owners 80+ (or 75+) living in the home	Carrying cost only; a receivable of $0.8M (80+ gate) to $1.4M (75+ gate) by 2029, repaid as homes turn over at about 7% a year	Nobody today; the estate at sale, when the value is realized	Good: the assessment stays uniform (8.9); only payment timing changes, like the existing monthly plans; the lien already exists (8.8). Counsel to confirm.	A clear promise to the oldest owners, "no one over 80 pays more out of pocket while living here," with no subsidy for anyone to resent
Resale capital contribution, 0.5% of sale price, as at Kiawah, Seabrook, Kingsmill	Revenue, not cost: each $100M of annual sales yields $500K	Buyers and estates at sale	Lawful: Georgia's 2010 ban on private transfer fees exempts associations under the Property Owners' Association Act, which TLA adopted in 2013 (O.C.G.A. § 44-14-15(c)). The Landings had such a fee from 1997 until it lapsed in 2001 "due to a legal technicality," before that exemption existed. Likely needs a Declaration amendment (66⅔% of all lots) to impose; can ride on the dues ballot. Counsel to confirm.	Vote-neutral for current elderly owners; ties infrastructure cost to the point where the value is captured; restores a funding source the community once had
Hardship fund, private application, needs-based	Small; could be seeded by The Landings Company revenue	All lots, thinly	Good: relief, not a rate	Catches the 72-year-old in real difficulty whom an age line misses

Stop asking people with a short horizon to pay today for a ten-year plan. A deferral does that without a subsidy: an owner over 80 living in the home pays nothing more while living here, the amount sits as a lien earning modest interest, and the estate settles it at sale, when the value the roads protected is realized. It must be limited to that group; offered to everyone it becomes a free loan to the whole island and the money the vote was meant to raise never comes in. Pair it with a resale fee so heirs contribute at the moment they benefit, and a quiet hardship fund for anyone in difficulty at any age.

Deferral sizing: the Vote 2 schedule ($256 / $521 / $781 above $2,594) applied to 884 lots (one in five, the 80+ estimate) or 1,459 lots (one in three, the measured 75+ share), out of 4,420; if 60% of eligible lots defer, about $136K in 2027 rising to $414K in 2029 with an 80+ gate, $224K rising to $683K with a 75+ gate. Median home value is $854,000, so the lien is trivially secured. Age shares are from the Landings Demographic Trends report (2020 Census owner households by age of householder); the 80+ figure is an estimate, as explained in Who votes. Take-up of 60% is an assumption. Delinquency on assessments runs 0.1–0.3% a year (Annual Reports), so collection risk on the lien is negligible. The by-neighborhood vote results held by the Association could sharpen all of this.

The full comparison of seven paths, with thresholds and timing

Path	Who acts	Threshold	Earliest effect	What it fixes	Feasibility
A. Accountability-for-assessment package, then a third vote Board amends Bylaws first: petition route to the ballot (3.7), statutory-default removal (3.3), member-initiated ballots (2.8); by resolution: annual independent audit (7.7), reserve oversight committee with a non-Board majority, increment earmarked to the restricted reserve. Then a tiered ballot (escalator-only option beside a step-up).	Board (6 of 9), then members	Bylaws: 2/3 of Board. Dues: 2/3 of votes cast, 60% quorum	Reforms: one Board meeting. Vote: spring 2027	Gives "no" voters something to trade; converts the veto into a preference	High Entirely within existing authority. Timing has precedent: after the fall 2011 vote failed, owners approved a new three-year maximum in spring 2012 for 2013–2015; after 2018, in 2020 for 2021–2023. A 2027 vote would set 2028–2030; 2027 stays at $2,594 either way. Counsel should confirm, but the Association has done this twice.
B. Leaders' commission An independent group (past presidents, club leaders) that reviews the reserve study, CAMP priorities and governance, and publishes a package the Board adopts and residents ratify. The credible broker the Board cannot be for itself.	Community leaders; Board accepts	None; persuasion	Weeks	Trust deficit; the 48% → 67% gap	High Needs the Board to accept the review publicly and the group to be seen as independent of it.
C. 2027 Board election Nominating Committee appointed by May 2027 (≥7 members, 2 directors, Board-appointed chair); interviews Sept; vote Oct. Three seats; with 2026's three, six of nine turn over by Jan 2028. Leaders apply, and press for the Committee to slate more than the minimum.	Members, via Nominating Committee or write-in	Plurality, top 3	Jan 1 2028 (majority)	Board composition	Medium Gatekept slate; write-ins lack the published bio. Term limits and vacancy appointments do not count toward them (3.2).
D. Declaration amendment: add an escalator Kiawah model: Board may raise the maximum by the greater of 5% or CPI each year; referendum reserved for step changes. Could ride on the same ballot as a dues vote.	Members; Board certifies and records	66⅔% of total eligible vote (≈2,947 lots)	2027 ballot if paired	The structural cause; ends triennial all-or-nothing votes	Medium Highest bar in the documents, but owners have cleared it four times (2007, 2013, 2014, 2015; the last by 47 votes with 78% turnout and a four-month window). It takes the same playbook: one clear question, months not weeks, block captains, online voting, and trusted non-Board voices (path B). The 2013 Act vote also opened at the Annual Meeting with a running tally, which kept pressure on.
E. Special meeting by petition 25% of total vote compels a meeting within 60 days (2.2). Agenda can include director removal (needs 2,210 yes) or an advisory resolution. The President sets date, place and agenda.	Members	1,105 signatures to call; 2,210 to remove	60 days from petition	Forces the Board to stand and be heard; signal	Medium The meeting is achievable; removal almost certainly is not. Useful as leverage behind A and B, costly to goodwill if used first.
F. Board-only measures (no vote) Fee increases, borrowing for repair/restoration, service cuts, re-sequencing CAMP.	Board	Majority of Board	2027 budget	Cash, not trust	Default if nothing else happens Deepens the perception that the vote is being bypassed; raises the regressive, less transparent share of funding.
G. Court removal of a director O.C.G.A. § 14-3-810; narrow grounds (fraud, gross abuse of authority).	Members with standing	Judicial	Months	Individual conduct only	Last resort Not indicated by anything in the record.

Sequencing that respects the incentives. The Board moves first, because it is the only party that can act unilaterally and the only one whose credibility is in question; its concessions are self-binding and visible. The leaders' commission validates the reserve need and the governance package independently. The third ballot is tiered, states plainly that it sets a ceiling with a three-year sunset, and carries the escalator amendment beside it. The 2027 election runs in parallel as the backstop.

Open items before this circulates

Vote 2 tally: resolved. 62% yes, 38% no, 73% of lots voting (GM Update, Oct 2026); 45% / 27% / 27% of all lots yes / no / not voting (President, Sept 28). Exact counts have not been published; the figures in this brief are derived from the percentages.
Annual Dues Survey results (2,600+ responses) referenced in the Vote 2 packet; the Board's reading of resident priorities should be checked against the raw results. The October 2023 EMG community survey that fed the Strategic Plan is a second source.
Timing of the next vote: precedent found. Spring 2012 (after the fall 2011 failure) and 2020 (after 2018) each set a new three-year period beginning the following January. A 2027 vote would set 2028–2030. Counsel should confirm that reading of 8.3.1, but the Association has acted on it twice.
Nominating Committee Guidelines (Bylaws 3.7 says the GM keeps them) beyond the charter; request under Bylaws 7.10.
Vote results by neighborhood exist (Sept 22 drop-in). Laid against the householder-age and tenure columns in Who votes, they would show whether the no vote tracked age (fixed-income thesis) or ran evenly (no-confidence thesis). This is the single most useful request to make of the Association.
Owners 80 and over are estimated at one in five households; the Census reports 75–84 and 85+ only. If the Annual Dues Survey asked respondents' age, its results could settle it.

Prepared from The Landings Association's published Covenants, Bylaws, 2026 Budget Book, Reserve Study, voting packets and Board packets as of November 4, 2026, its Documents library (dues and covenant voting packets 2002–2026, Annual Reports, Annual Meeting presentations, budget workshops, committee charters, election packets) and its 2025–26 news posts, plus a 37-community benchmark (TLA_Dues_Benchmark_2026.xlsx) and the companion Landings Demographic Trends report (county digests, Census, ACS, IRS). Analysis and path assessments are the author's. Numbers are exact where the source gives them; derived figures (per-lot and per-mile ratios, real-value erosion at 3% inflation) are computed from the cited inputs.