praised the new closed captioning ….

praised the new closed captioning system, which displays text on screens in Clubhouses 3 and 4, and will soon be available in other places, including the Administration conference room, where GRF committee meetings are held.

She thanked Treasurer Sandy Geffner and Impaired Vision Club members Sharon Kohn and Don Craig, who were instrumental in bringing the project to fruition. Closed captioning will give “equitable access” to government and club meetings for vision- and hearing-impaired people, plus those who need meetings in another language. The system, coupled with a cell phone, offers translation into 23 languages.

“It’s really a wonderful thing for this community,” she said, giving special thanks to the Golden Age Foundation, which helped fund the lion’s share of the project.

Jayna Kling, Optum’s manager of clinical operations at the Health Care Center, told the board that the annual flu clinic will be held on Friday, Sept. 4, from 8 a.m.-3 p.m. The Mutual rotation of times will be publicized in an upcoming issue of the LW Weekly.

The following is a partial list of board business. To livestream the entire meeting, visit lwsb. com.

Recreation Sign-In Form Revision

Upon the recommendation of the Administration Committee, the board unanimously voted to slightly modify the sign-in form used by Recreation to track attendance numbers at dances and other events. The form includes a liability disclaimer and explains that users participate at their own risk.

GRF Excess Income

The GRF finished fiscal year 2025 with excess income in the amount of $220,847 for the first time since 2021. GRF policy mandates that excess income must be specifically allocated. The board unanimously upheld the staff recommendation to allocate the excess income to the GRF contingency fund, which is used to pay for the annual insurance down payment and/ or potentially for an unbudgeted “rainy day” event, according to the staff report.

GRF Donation

Upon the recommendation of the Finance Committee, the board voted to approve the acceptance of a $30,900 cash donation made to the GRF from a former Leisure World member. Recommendations on how to allocate the money will be forthcoming.

Community Gardens

Despite the recommendation of the Member Services Committee, the board voted to return a policy change related to the length of garden leases to the committee for further review.

In July, the Member Services Committee recommended that the GRF Board expand the lease term from four to six years. There is currently no waiting list for gardens; some people have two plots, and there are open plots. Current gardeners requested the longer lease.

In past years, the Minifarm lease term was eight years. This gave gardeners more time to grow and care for their gardens. When the new Community Gardens opened, the lease term was changed to four years because the prior waitlist was long, sometimes more than five years.

Director Marla Hamblin of Mutual 15 recommended keeping the four-year lease and adding two one-year lease extensions, which could be applied if there was no waiting list.

Director Mark Hughes of Mutual 2 said Recreation staff expressed concern that administering a more complicated lease could intensify staff workloads. “Extending the term to six years seemed to fix everything,” he said. “That’s coming from the committee.”

Director Hamblin, who is an attorney, also questioned a potential conflict of interest by three GRF Board members who have community gardens. In her opinion, the law precludes them from discussing or voting on the issue.

After the meeting, Mulqueen directed GRF Executive Director David Norvell to ask for an opinion from the GRF’s attorney, Jeffrey A. Beaumont of Beaumont Tashjian.

It is his opinion that a GRF director who rents a community garden plot (or RV lot space under comparable terms) may participate in discussion and vote on proposed changes to the applicable rental agreement and associated fees. There is no conflict of interest.

This is based on Civil Code section 5350, which provides the framework for director conflicts in common interest developments, like Leisure World. Revisions of community garden and RV leases do not fall into any of the six conflict categories listed in the law. Categories include matters of discipline, an individual assessment for damage, a payment plan request, foreclosure, architectural review of a separate interest or a grant of exclusive use common area.

Beaumont’s letter also cited Corporations Code section 7233. That law says directors can receive no special or unique personal benefit in any matter relating to GRF governance. Because every garden user is treated in the exact same way— under identical lease terms and conditions—there is no conflict of interest even if the garden happens to be leased by a GRF director.

Forcing directors to step aside on rules that affect everyone in the community would stop them from doing the job they were elected to do, he concluded. Thus, voting on general community rules is a normal duty for GRF directors, not a conflict.