Dear Fellow Indian Hammock Member,

I am reaching out to bring to your attention significant concerns regarding the actions of our current Board that will have serious financial and legal consequences to them personally and our Club.

Earlier this month, we wrote of the numerous secret board meetings in violation of Florida law by the IH Board.

Since then, records of Zoom board meetings have been deleted and destroyed to avoid or escape detection!  Copies of the records, as recovered from Zoom, are attached.

Such document destruction is a third degree FELONY as set forth in Florida statutes 720.303(5)(f).

Florida statutes 720.303(5)(f). 
Any person who willfully and knowingly refuses to release or otherwise produce association records with the intent to avoid or escape detection, arrest, trial, or punishment for the commission of a crime, or to assist another person with such avoidance or escape, commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

In particular, the IH Board conducted six unnoticed board meetings, five of which were Zoom meetings. 
By Florida law, all HOA Board meetings are required to be noticed, even if they are closed meetings for legal or personnel issues.  No such notice was provided to IH.

                Unnoticed Board Meetings

1.       January 24, 2025 – Zoom; 

2.       February 4, 2025 – Zoom;      

3.       February 14, 2025 – Zoom;

4.       February 16, 2025 – In person hours after the February monthly board meeting;

5.       February 24, 2025 – Zoom; and

6.       March 3, 2025 – Zoom.

(See attached meeting records with attendees.) 

Subsequently:

1.       Mrs. Carla Sapp (Interim manager Ron Sapp’s wife) logged onto Zoom on March 10, 2025 at 8:58 PM.  See attached.  No one else was logged into Zoom at that time. 

2.       Seven minutes later, Zoom generated an email at March 10, 9:05 PM indicating that the February 24, 2025 Zoom meeting was deleted.  The meeting was also canceled from Zoom’s trash can in an attempt to permanently delete the record, which shows that the act of deleting the Zoom meeting record was intentional and not merely an accident.

3.       One minute later, Zoom generated an email at March 10, 9:06 PM indicating that the March 3, 2025 Zoom meeting was deleted.  Once again, the meeting was also intentionally canceled from Zoom’s trash can thereby attempting to permanently delete the record.

4.       Every one of the secret board meetings has been deleted from the Recent Meetings section and the Zoom trash can except for the properly noticed annual Member’s Meeting in January and the properly noticed, monthly Board Meeting in February.

Legal counsel for the association was contacted regarding these concerns and appeared to be UNAWARE of all of the unnoticed board meetings.

The evidence clearly shows that this deletion of Board meeting records was an intentional act to destroy evidence of secret board meetings to avoid or escape detection. 

The Need for Immediate Action

The Board’s continued disregard for legal and ethical governance presents serious risks to all members, including:

• Increased legal expenses;
• Higher HOA fees to cover financial liabilities; and
• Loss of trust in Board governance.

As members, we have a responsibility to uphold the integrity of our Club. The pattern of decision-making, lack of transparency, and disregard for legal obligations cannot be ignored. Addressing these concerns is critical to protecting our Club’s financial and legal well-being as they leave us open to additional legal action. Please share with others as we know this is not getting to everyone.  Everyone should be aware of this significant problem.

2026-05-13 David Bass – More about Closed BOD Meetings.

David Bass email to Indian Hammock Manager Ron

Hi Ron,

Thank you for providing these notices and minutes.

I have reviewed the notices and the minutes and have a few questions and a few requests. None of my questions are concerning matters of attorney/client privilege or pertain to any inadvertent disclosure of a board’s decision, past or future. I am only requesting the board consider its fiduciary duty under FL720.303 and ratify any motions from a closed board meeting in an open meeting. I believe the Club’s counsel should agree that this can be classified as a “procedural mistake” and is an easy fix for the Board to resolve.

If it pleases the board, I have attached an excerpt from thelaw.com that explains what the board can and cannot do at a closed board meeting. It includes a simple ratification process to become compliant if motions are made at a closed board meeting. It offers good faith protection for a board that may have only discovered this procedural mistake after the fact. It also provides sample language that does NOT violate any attorney client privilege and does NOT disclose the boards legal strategy.

I am sharing these observations and requests because there are numerous groups of Indian Hammock members who believe that the board has acted in secrecy and failed to be transparent regarding these particular closed board meetings. My goal is only to calm those member concerns and allow the board an opportunity to ratify its actions and come into compliance with the law. Florida courts often look favorably on boards that quickly correct procedural mistakes in good faith.

Question #1:
On March 13, 2025, the closed board minutes reflects a motion and a vote to hire Sarah Webner as legal counsel. As per FL720.303 this vote should have occurred at an open board meeting not a closed board meeting. I ask that you encourage the board to add this item to their next open board meeting agenda as a board motion to “ratify” their prior action (the closed vote on March 13th). For example, the motion could say, “The board will vote to ratify the prior action taken on March 13, 2025 in a closed board meeting regarding the hiring of Sarah Webner as council.” This is an easy fix and removes any perception of secrecy under the provisions of FL720.303.

Question #2:
The notices and minutes reflect that the Board held 11 closed meetings from March 13, 2025 up to April 17, 2026. During this 13 months, the Board proceeded through mediation, a temporary injunction hearing, and a request for re-hearing. These are substantial legal events, but it appears from the closed minutes that there were no items that the board “agreed” to move forward on during all of those meetings, except for the April 10th meeting. It is difficult to understand how the Board could have discussed so much over those 11 meetings and had no motions. Were there any settlement offers authorized by the board to be presented to the complainants? If there were, where is the vote on those? This reminds me of the ending of the movie Contact, where nobody believes that Jodi Foster visited aliens because her spaceship went through the transporter in what was only 1 second on earth, but her video recorded 20 minutes of total time. So what really happened in that 20 minutes? I request that you encourage the Board to review their closed board meeting minutes and using the “procedural mistake” format, include any decisions that were made in closed session as motions in a open board meeting. I would also ask that the closed board meeting minutes be reviewed to include missing names of board members who were or were not present and the date/times of the closed meetings (start and end time)…so that information is not “hidden” from the membership.

Question #3
On April 10th, the closed board minutes state “board agreed” to proceed. Was there a motion? Was it unanimous? Who was present at the board meeting? If council provided a “recommendation” to the board, that recommendation would need to be voted on to be “approved” as advice of counsel is only advice. I ask that you encourage the board to add this item to their next open board meeting agenda as a motion to “ratify” their prior action (the closed vote on April 10th). For example, the motion could say, “The board will vote to ratify the prior action taken on April 10, 2025 in a closed session regarding the motion to request a re-hearing of the court’s temporary injunction against the Club” This is an easy fix and removes any potential violation of FL720.

Thank you for your attention to these observations and requests.

Can you provide me a response to the above requests as to whether or not the board will be responding?

Thank you.

David Bass
Lot 208

Relevant files: