After arrests and 300% fee hikes, Florida’s largest homeowners association gets new board

Article Courtesy of  The Miami Herald

By Linda Robertson

Published April 10, 2023

 

  

The last time the Hammocks held an election for board members, it was a debacle that further alienated homeowners from a tyrannical board of directors that had seized control of the West Kendall subdivision. Hundreds of residents waiting in line were not allowed to vote because of a bomb threat, which police later said was fake. A protest erupted outside the clubhouse. There were accusations of ballot-tampering and bribery.
   

Despite the outrage, the board running the largest homeowners association in Florida was re-elected after certifying its own results. The new board then held a secret budget meeting and promptly ordered a 300 to 400 percent increase in monthly maintenance fees.

Ten months later, two board members and two former board members were charged with stealing $2 million from the HOA.

On Thursday, a sense of serenity returned to the Hammocks. And a sense of trust. A clean election was held and seven new board members took office. First order of business to be discussed at their first meeting Tuesday, April 4: How to get the fiscal books in order and replenish the reserve fund that was plundered.

“It was a secure and fair election. The best I’ve seen in my 30 years here, and we feel relief,” said Idalmen “Chicky” Ardisson, who led all candidates with 926 votes. She served on the Hammocks’ architectural control committee before it was disbanded by the old board.

Prosecutors displayed a chart explaining some of the suspect transactions involving the Hammocks homeowners association.


 

About 2,500 ballots were cast in the community of 5,800 homeowners and 18,000 residents, which is spread over almost 4,000 acres from Southwest 88th to 120th streets, between Southwest 147th and 162nd avenues.

“My vision is to ensure we get what we’re paying for,” Ardisson said. “But we have a lot of catching up to do after years of corruption and turmoil. Our lakes and beaches are in disarray. Two swimming pools are closed for repairs. Many things are broken and it will be expensive to fix what’s been neglected.”
 

Budget more than tripled under old board

After the board members were indicted in November, the Hammocks Community Association was placed under the supervision of receiver David Gersten by Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Beatrice Butchko. She heard testimony about how the old HOA harassed the community with code violation fines and threats of foreclosure. The board had not held a public meeting in four years. They refused to provide documentation of expenses. The annual budget mysteriously ballooned from $4 million to $13 million with no signs of how the money was being spent as the Hammocks’ amenities deteriorated.

Gersten has found evidence of at least $3.4 million in missing funds, confirming Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle’s warning last year that investigators would uncover more fraud. Board members have been accused of running a scheme in which they used HOA checks and HOA credit cards from 55 bank accounts to pay for no-show work by shell companies or vendors, who would funnel money back to the board for their personal use.

“I believe there are many more arrests to come and justice has yet to be served on individuals who looted this community into oblivion and terrorized people,” said Don Kearns, a 29-year Hammocks homeowner and former HOA president who was elected to the new board. “We are thankful the receiver has stabilized the ship and is going down every single rabbit hole.”
Racketeering, money laundering, theft charges for ex-president, husband

At the center of the scheme was former Hammocks president and treasurer Marglli Gallego, according to law enforcement investigators. More than 200 checks were written to a company run by Gallego’s husband called Excellent Work and Services.

Both Gallego and her husband, Jose Antonio Gonzalez, were charged with racketeering, money laundering and grand theft. They allegedly used money to renovate their house, buy a truck and build a home in Colombia — one of the reasons Gallego has been deemed a flight risk and has not been released from jail.

Gallego was first charged in April 2021 for stealing $60,000 from the HOA from 2016 to 2018, which prosecutors said she used to pay a private detective to spy on her rivals in the community. Around the Hammocks, Gallego and her allies were known as the “Gallego Mafia.”

About $825,000 in HOA fees have been used to pay for Gallego’s defense lawyers, Gersten found.

Homeowners rebelled in 2022 after the chaotic Jan. 3 election. They suspected their fees were being siphoned off by the board, which stopped holding public meetings and ignored bylaws. A group of residents formed a coalition called Justice for the Hammocks and complained to the state agency that oversees HOAs and the state attorney’s fraud investigators. They managed to hold a recall election in June but two-thirds of the ballots were thrown out by the board.

‘Seven-year battle’

In November, the grass-roots activists triumphed when Gallego, her husband, board members Monica Isabel Ghilardi and Myriam Arango Rodgers and former board member Yoleidis Lopez Garcia were arrested. Fees were temporarily reduced to their former level then hiked 50 percent by Gersten starting April 1.

“It was a seven-year battle that started with four people fighting the board,” Ardisson said. “Little by little it grew as we cut through the apathy to show residents how they were being exploited and ripped off. We proved that people have the power to make change if they don’t give up.”

Kearns, the longtime Hammocks resident and former HOA president, advocates major reform of state laws regulating HOAs but doesn’t think it’s a priority during the current legislative session.

“The abuse that HOA boards perpetrate on homeowners — it’s an epidemic in Florida,” he said.
Board meeting

The new Hammocks board will hold its first meeting at 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 4.

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