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FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | SEPTEMBER 2024 29 There are various reasons why each of us chose to live in Four Seasons Beaumont. I often ask residents why they decided to purchase a home in our community. The most frequent response is that they were impressed with the overall beauty and appeal of the community. Maintaining that overall beauty and appeal requires residents to adhere to various rules and policies set by the Board of Directors. There are carefully constructed rules and guidelines designed to protect that beauty and appeal that helped you decide to move to our community. Our Finance Committee works diligently to ensure that we have adequate funds to operate the community, maintaining the beauty and appeal of the community's common areas and infrastructure. They make this happen with the lowest HOA fees possible. The Landscape Committee also spends multiple hours ensuring that our contracted landscaping company, Park West, meets the standards expected by our residents while providing services at a reasonable cost. There are numerous other committees that work together to keep our community beautiful and a wonderful place to live. These committees provide information that helps the Board of Directors make decisions that keep our community the place we bought and want to live in. One of the key committees is the Architectural Review Committee or ARC. This committee is a group of volunteer homeowners who are tasked with reviewing requests by homeowners wanting to make changes to the exterior of their home or property. These requests include all changes to the exterior of the home and the surrounding yard, including both back and front yards. ARC reviews all the details of each request to ensure that it aligns with the standards set by the CC&Rs. These standards are set forth in the Architectural Review Guidelines, a part of the CC&Rs. (Both the CC&Rs and the Guidelines are available on our website, www. fourseasons.org.) While not every home needs to look exactly the same, they must all adhere to the same guidelines. This protects homeowners from having a neighbor who paints their house bright purple or builds a radio tower in their front yard. They also help maintain the value of our homes. Our CC&Rs established an Architectural Review Committee which is regulated by the California Civil Code Section 4765. This code requires that the association, through the ARC, (a) provide a fair, reasonable, and expeditious procedure for making its decisions; (b) that decisions are made in good faith, and are not unreasonable, arbitrary, or capricious; and (c) that decisions do not violate any governing provisions of law, including, but not limited to, the Fair Employment and Housing Act, building codes, or any applicable law governing land use or public safety. The code also spells out specifics on how decisions on proposed changes are communicated to homeowners and what information must be included if a decision is disapproved. Our ARC takes its responsibilities very seriously. We strive to follow the CC&Rs and the Guidelines. We meet frequently – every first and third Wednesdays of each month in order to accommodate the needs of our homeowners. There are no automatic approvals for any one including Board or committee members; in fact every Board member currently serving has submitted complete applications and had them reviewed during regular meetings. Our decisions are based on the CC&Rs and the Guidelines which are frequently reviewed and updated as conditions warrant. In almost every instance, a homeowner can review the guidelines and determine if their request will be approved or not. Occasionally, ARC members have been accosted by homeowners who believe that they should not have to follow the rules or that they should be allowed to skip getting approval for changes. Studies have shown that when HOA rules/building codes are not followed, communities become worn down and less desirable. This can be observed first hand by driving through neighboring communities and taking note of run-down homes and overgrown yards and trash that has been allowed to accumulate over time. The best maintained and best-manicured yard cannot overcome the effects of a neighbors rundown house or trash strewn yard. These neighborhoods didn't become the mess that they are overnight — it happened over time, one item at a time. Please don't ask ARC members to let you skip the approval process. Just as important, please don't ignore the requirements thinking that compliance takes too much time or shouldn't apply to your project. Remember you chose to live in our HOA and agreed to adhere to all rules and guidelines. It takes all of us to keep Four Seasons Beaumont the beautiful and appealing place that you chose for your home. Following the rules and guidelines will help ensure that the beauty and appeal that we find desirable will continue to be the outstanding community we live in. While only the full committee can approve your application, all members are willing to discuss your ideas and requests and help you understand what is allowed and what is not. Please feel free to reach out to any member. A list of all the members appears on page 4 of the Breeze magazine. We meet the first and third Wednesday of every month in the RCN Conference Room. Whether or not they have an application before the committee, all residents are invited to attend the meetings. We also invite questions about any upcoming projects and will provide guidance and suggestions to you. ~ Steve Cooley, (801) 815-5302, cooleyaudit@gmail.com Architectural Review Committee

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