May 5, 2005 e-mail to a Baywinds Resident from Irwin Seitelman in response to an e-mail this resident sent out.

When you say, "which may or may not be true", you are creating fear of shadowy, conspiratorial forces that are arrayed against us.  I don't believe that to be true. 

Later in your email, you speak of one person complaining against us, however the bottom line is that the weekend (event) on the veranda will most likely go on. 

There is a reality that do-gooders find difficult to swallow; MOST PEOPLE JUST DON'T CARE!!  Sure they'd like a perfect world or perfect community, but they just won't lift a finger to help make it happen. 

Look to our election of a week or so ago.  Every home was previously mailed.  There was a big meeting at Royal Palm Beach High School.  People were talking about it thanks to a circulating petition. It was written up by Kathryn Stellmack in her BayWinds Breeze, as well as by Bernie Amero on his BaywindsLife© website.  A week later homeowners had the options of voting in person, dropping off a proxy vote at the Clubhouse, mailing in a proxy, or giving a neighbor a proxy to cast a vote for him. 

With all of that hoopla only little more than 500 votes in total were cast out of more than 1000 homes.  Roughly 50% of the homes voted. 

Most of us are retired.  Did we have such urgent business to conduct that we could not vote?  We demonstrated that we are no better than the American public at large: apathetic & uninterested.  With an attitude of, "Let the other guy do it 'cause I have more important things to do."

Were we to break into separate coves for (organization) purposes we'd only create greater dissention & discord.

I can well appreciate your sense of frustration at the lack of interest or concern with something we believe to be important & of benefit for the ENTIRE community.  Whether or not there are shadowy forces at work in Baywinds using the general apathy to their own purposes, I cannot say. 

Look to a community like Andros Isle.  They have only ONE regular COP.  We have approximately 38 COPs.  Riverwalk's COPs number fewer than Baywinds.  Apathy???  We're doing great compared to our neighboring communities, but we have a way to go. 

As I stated at our BaywindsLife© meeting, perhaps we should consider dissolving the separate cove associations & only have one Baywinds association.  We'd still have our neighborhoods, but we'd only have one homeowner's association,....Baywinds.  That's the way it is in Andros Isle & Riverwalk.

You say we live in a dictatorship.  At its worst I would call it a benevolent dictatorship.  People want to be left alone to do their own thing & they want someone else to take care of things so the community runs smoothly.  Fortunately we have those among us that want to "run" things & that is their thing. 

So what if things are not always to a homeowner's personal likings.  They'll gripe a bit & go on.  These communities are perfect for sheep being dictated to.  In some ways, that's what most of us are. 

When we purchased our homes we agreed to be uniform.  That is a form of dictatorship (e.g., to subject ourselves to architectural controls, to NOT put out garbage cans before 6pm, to NOT decorate the outside of our homes in other than prescribed ways, to NOT change the look of our landscaping without permission, to NOT swim in the pools after sunset even though we've never had lifeguards in the daytime, to NOT keep a workman's truck, a boat trailer or a mobile home in our driveways & our mailboxes must all look alike). 

We live under a huge list of do & don't rules, but that's what we all agreed to when we closed on our homes.  By living in Baywinds we've abrogated many of the rights we used to have when we lived in non-gated communities in other states.  Yes, we all agreed to living in a benevolent dictatorship. 

So what do you expect of those individuals who only want to be left alone to do their thing?  You are an activist do-gooder.  That seems to be YOUR thing.  Apparently others in Baywinds don't want you to have your "thing". 

It may even be simpler than that.  It may be that busting someone’s, anyone's chops, is THEIR thing. 

Continue the good fight.  It's worth it.

Irwin Seitelman

Click here to see Albert Kolkin's response to Irwin