Burlingame Ranch Phase 1 homeowners concerned about where their dues are going

The Burlingame Ranch Phase 1 Homeowners Association Board voted during a September meeting to only require receipts from Rutledge and Company, which manages the community, if the cost is over $500, one homeowner said. 

Below that amount, the company does not need to answer to the board.

“Having been on a number of boards and business associations, I almost fell out of my chair,” said Steve Wiseley, a Burlingame Ranch Phase 1 (BG1) homeowner, in a joint letter with his wife, Anna Garofalo. The couple sent the letter out to other community homeowners Tuesday.

“The board had just agreed to allow Rutledge and Co. to send them any bill up to $499.99 for payment without any justification or backup paperwork at all,” he said in the letter.

During the September meeting, Wiseley asked where he could find the current Homeowners Association (HOA) bylaws and all records pertaining to board operations for BG1.

Wiseley said that he was told that all records and documents had to come from Will Rutledge, since Rutledge said he was ostensibly the bookkeeper.

Elizabeth Stewart is the BG1 bookkeeper. In the letter, Wiseley said that Rutledge keeping the books was a conflict of interest.

“He was just a hired company to oversee the functions the board instructed of him,” he said.

On Sept. 18, Wiseley and his wife requested records from the board. By Sept. 28, all they had received was a profit/loss statement for the first six months of 2024, as well as the operating documents for the HOA. Wiseley said they “were missing everything else” they requested.

The couple decided to hire Chris Bryan of Garfield & Hecht to send a formal request from their firm to the board. They received a response saying they would receive the records after paying $1,000 up front to cover the bookkeeper’s time. The couple forwarded a check to the board through their attorney.

Another 10 days passed without records, and Garofalo filed a suit against the HOA. The court date is scheduled for Oct. 24.

As of Oct. 14, the couple has still not received the records.

Wisley said that he believes that his request is being systematically controlled as to what data they might receive from Rutledge. 

“It seems we are correct in believing these documents were intended to be manipulated so that we only receive the data he and the board wanted us to,” his letter states.

“All of this adds up to a very inept board who we are trusting our money with and who is asking for no justification or transparency from Will Rutledge,” the letter further states “They are trusting Will to do the right thing without any oversight by the board at all.”

Stewart, who sent an email of her own, with the subject “BG1 | ISSUE OF CORRUPTION,” out to Chris Bryan of Garfield Hecht, Cindy Christenson of the Aspen-Pitkin County Affordable Housing Association, Aspen City Manager Sara Ott, Perry Kleepsies of the city of Aspen, and the editors of both local newspapers in Aspen, is the bookkeeper who was tasked with gathering these records.

Rutledge sent the request on Oct. 5. On Oct. 7, Stewart confirmed she received the request. She said, however, that her delay in getting the records to the couple was the fact that the records would have to go through Rutledge, whom she does not trust.

“I (especially) do not trust Will Rutledge to deliver records that have not been falsified,” she said. “Since this records request process started, Will has been controlling every single aspect of the request, down to directing the Board exactly which emails and exact verbiage to send to me.”

At the end of the week, on Oct. 13 — her deadline — she emailed the board and told them she did not feel comfortable sending directly to Rutledge. Instead, she wanted to send them directly to Wiseley or Garofalo. She also didn’t feel comfortable sending the numbers over Excel, but preferred PDF, as an Excel document could have been manipulated. 

Stewart, the HOA bookkeeper since Dec. 2022, said she “would never think to send our financial reports in anything other than PDF format exported directly from our Quickbooks. Any format otherwise goes against all values of transparency, which we owe the homeowners of BG1 who are paying the Association’s expenses out of their own pockets.”

In the email, Stewart went on to state that Rutledge’s invoices detail a total of $166,720.70 in reimbursable expenses since his contract started in March 2023 with only three receipts received. 

“No indication of who was paid, an invoice number, absolutely nothing. Will also lists his reimbursable expenses with descriptions such as ‘BG1 – c/p 2024 roof repairs – 161 Mining Stock roof repairs; code to capital line named 2024 roof repairs. That could not be more vague or raise more red flags,'” her email states.

The board denied Stewart’s requests to not send the records to Rutledge or over Excel.

In Stewart’s email, she stated that the board was planning on firing her during the Oct. 15 meeting. In response, Wiseley asked homeowners to rally around Stewart, seek immediate removal of Rutledge and Co. as the property manager, and immediately remove the remaining four board members from their positions.

Stewart was initially going to control the Zoom meeting as she does during every board meeting. But in light of her email, Rutledge decided to send out a Zoom link himself. 

He controlled who was let in at the beginning of the meeting. During an executive session, homeowners were sent to a Zoom waiting room while Rutledge, the board, and their lawyers talked.

Stewart said that when she controlled the board meetings, she never monitored who attended.

When the meeting started at 6:30 p.m., The Aspen Times was let in a few minutes later. When the reporter stated they were with The Times and was not a resident of a unit, they were sent to the waiting room. Around an hour later, the reporter was let back into the waiting room for less than a minute before they were kicked to the waiting room for the rest of the meeting that ended at 8:11 p.m.

During a phone call with The Aspen Times after the meeting, which Stewart was not let into, Stewart said that the board decided not to fire her and the homeowners did not garner enough majority votes to fire Rutledge or remove the current board members.

The Aspen Times also called Rutledge for a comment after the meeting was over. He declined to comment and said the board would release a statement at a further date.

Regan Mertz can be reached at 970-429-9153 or rmertz@aspentimes.com.