WOULD YOU SELL YOUR HOME or another BUSINESS without knowing the VALUE of your ASSETS; considering your debt; looking at current and possible future liabilities . . . and, more???
The below questions were asked at the Town Hall, but NOT ANSWERED.
“Former WOWSC Director: “What have you based your purchase offer on?” Town Hall at Min. 35:34.
Former WOWSC President: “. . . we are expected to have a vote in December. And, you have offered us a price, um, but you have not, as of yet, evaluated the assets to give us a reckoning of what the fair value of our existing assets are so that we would know if we’re getting a fair price. My question is . . . that seems a little backward, because if you are buying a house, you have an appraiser come in. Both parties talk about that appraisal. So, from a member standpoint, we’re providing you kind of the benefit of the doubt for giving us a fair appraisal, for a vote . . .” Town Hall at Min. 39:00.
Sean Nichols, VP CSWR: “It’s likely that we’ll go through an appraisal process, but not in order to determine valuation.” Town Hall Min. 43:45
Local companies, with crews “in our backyard” were not made aware that our Water Company was for sale!!! Our Board did Little or NO MARKETING or outreach.
Let’s at least know what’s out there and reach out to our neighbors: Briarcliff, Ridge Harbor, Spicewood Beach, and other lake properties to hear about their water history, quality, & service.
Two of these Local Water Utilities voiced interest but were not approached. WHY?
Village of Briarcliff (neighboring utility)
U.S. Water
Spicewood Utilities (currently contracts to operate WOWSC). Can they be given more responsibility in order to lessen a Volunteer Board’s work, yet maintain ownership and control.
We are being told the board has acted with transparency and asked to vote to sell a valuable ASSET with little information, a confusing Town Hall, and ZERO transparency from the Board:
The extreme “push to sell” from WOWSC President, Patti Flunker, causes this deal to be suspect.
Upon information & belief:
WOWSC Member-Owners might like to know:
The 10/16/25 Meeting at which the WOWSC Board voted to accept a proposal for purchase of our Water company was not in compliance with State Law.
As of September 1, 2025, the Texas Open Meetings Act (TOMA) requires that 3 full business days must pass before the scheduled date of a meeting. This replaces the former 72-hour requirement. “Business days” do not include Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays; the date of posting is not counted; and the day before the meeting counts as the 3rd day. This law would have required that the Thursday, Oct 13, 2025 meeting be posted on Friday the 10th. It was not.
Would actions taken at these meetings be considered invalid?
Another issue not fully addressed at the Town Hall.
Presumably, If the entity [WOWSC] that owes us Ratepayers refunds is dissolved, there would be no more refunds.
How would we — there are NO FINANCIALS AVAILABLE!! See: “NO TRANSPARENCY.”
There is a pending lawsuit (Madigan v. WOWSC) for breach of contract. Should an award be judged for the Plaintiff who would be responsible? CSWR is not taking on WOWSC debt. If WOWSC is dissolved would insurance still be valid???
This issue was not addressed by WOWSC President or CSWR at the Town Hall.
The Oct 25, 2025 Town Hall concluded with confusing & conflicting information at best.
A contract with details coming later ?!!!
Sean Nichols, VP CSWR: “We have a standard purchase agreement. Probably 80% of the parties just sign it without any changes.” Town Hall at Min 32:30
Where is the DUE DILIGENCE in this effort?
Message from WOWSC President / May 17, 2025 Newsletter
“Your newly elected board of directors is committed to restoring trust and ensuring that decisions are made in the best interests of all members, not for personal benefit, as has been the unfortunate pattern in the past. Our goal is to rebuild a utility that serves everyone fairly and as we continue to address the years of financial and operational neglect, we appreciation your patience and support.”
Message from WOWSC Board / November 16, 2025
Instead of responding appropriately to the issues posed, the Board has busied itself in working to discredit other volunteers and their efforts. We encourage you to read the outline that was distributed (no matter where it originated) and consider the points of concern.
If the Board wants to “get politics out of the Water Company” as it has stated is the reason to sell our company, perhaps it should stop making statements & taking actions that continue creating controversy.
The “scare” tactic:
“Without the sale, every dollar of these mandated upgrades will fall directly on the membership through higher rates, surcharges, and assessments easily exceeding $2,000 per household, and likely more” was not constructed in reality.
See “Reality of a Fence & Clarifier” below.
In the past, both items were specified by the TCEQ as necessary improvements but it appears the urgency, status & cost of projects varies greatly from one day to the next:
FENCING — In 2022 WOWSC President, Joe Giminez, and WOPOA President, George Pareja, successfully collaborated on a letter to the TCEQ (Texas Commission on Environmental Quality) requesting an exception. The Board, in its letter, cites this joint communication to TCEQ that in essence gave WOWSC a reprieve on the fencing. The dramatization of immediate need for fencing is just that. The Board’s estimate is also unrealistic.
CLARIFIER — There will be a need for greater clarifying capacity eventually due to the growth of the community and the impending lower lake levels but it is unclear where the current reparations/upgrades stand and how much this will really cost.
The Board cited $500,000 to replace the clarifier. Latest understanding was that the existing clarifier works fine as long as the lake maintains some clarity, and “repairs” to the existing clarifier are relatively negligible.
The project to “retrofit the old storage tank,” in order to create a clarifier of greater capacity, was on the way to completion with $200,000 of the $350,000 funds originally designated, already invested (see testimony linked in Board’s 11/16/25 letter). It should cost only $150,000 to retrofit an old storage that is just sitting, unused, wasted as an asset. That was the plan in 2022 and it remains a solid plan.
The WOWSC valuation would increase significantly if the current Board dedicated some of the 1.5M proceeds from the latest sale of land to finish the retrofit project. Additionally, this effort would better secure members’ future water quality and needs.
Instead, the Board appears to be using land sale proceeds to keep rates artificially low as they burn through cash, instead of investing in future water quality. This is of great concern with the lake already down 8 feet from the August high of 674 feet. The existing clarifier begins to have problems at 635ft. Just last May 2025 the lake level was at 635!
Since there are NO GOVERNANCE DOCUMENTS (recently removed from the website) we must rely on the Boards direction that the
vote will be decided by a majority of members present on December13, 2025 (by ballot or in-person). This means your “NO” vote must be SUBMITTED.
An “unreturned ballot” IS NOT a no vote
Get your ballot in!
ABSOLUTELY. Think: “NOT-FOR-PROFIT” -vs- “FOR-PROFIT”
A “FOR-PROFIT” commercial company (like CSWR) will have costs that need to be passed on to the end-user. These are costs that our “NOT-FOR-PROFIT” member owned corporation does not have including:
CSWR is backed by Private Equity (PE) firms. By definition a PE is an investment management company that operates FOR PROFIT. These firms acquire controlling stakes in companies with the GOAL of SELLING THEM FOR A PROFIT. CSWR (Central States Water Resources), located in St. Louis, Mo, and is backed by Private Equity (PE) firms. CSWR has “invested” in hundreds of Water Companies across 11 states.
Sean Nichols, V.P. CSWR, at Town Hall shared: “We do have private investors in New York, private Equity Money, and so they do have certain requirements. Town Hall at Min. 32:25
“We have certain financial investment criteria we have to meet.” Town Hall Min. 37:00
“Over the course of 5 years I’ve bought 180 systems in Texas and more in other states.” Town Hall
Sean Nichols, V.P. CSWR: “Any historical liabilities you [member-owners] are going to keep.” “Not going to assume liability. Going to assume assets.Buying physical assets.” Town Hall Min. 37:00
“Your current financial black hole stays with you.” Town Hall Min. 37:40
WHICH IS IT?? At the Town Hall it was stated that prior to CSWR takeover, capital improvements would likely need to be made. WOWSC discussed assessing the members for cost of an updated Clarifier. This issue was left unclear as to who pays for this. Town Hall at Min. 1:01:45
A) These improvements would need to be made prior to purchase by CSWR and current member-owners would be assessed with CSWR adding reimbursement funds to the proposed 1.2M buyout (still unclear as to how the payout total would be disbursed to member-owners)
B) WOWSC [Member owners] would pay for the upgrades and the 1.2M proposed CSWR buyout would essentially act to reimburse member-owners; thereby basically zeroing out any member-owner profit from the sale of the WOWSC.
It was also mentioned that improvements
How much do we know? How much do they know?
Sean Nichols, V.P. CSWR: “We’re going to create the ‘dot map’ thing” and then has to ask Clarence (CSWR engineer) what it’s called. Town Hall at 1:00:20
As Mr. Nichols describes the 3 locations of the WOWSC facility (intake location, effluent field, and hidden treatment plant) Clarence [CSWR Engineer] replies that he “HASN’T SEEN THE SYSTEM YET.” Town Hall at Min. 53:30
The 40 acres of woods along Exeter Rd. is included in the “Assets” our Board wants to sell. The chances are very high that this “FOR PROFIT” multi-state water corporation will develop those 40 acres to hold a “Regional Water Plant” in order to serve many many more neighborhoods. (See Exeter Eyesore – a route to regret)
Thomas Springs is projected to add 3,500 homesites right down the road. How many other “for sale” signs do you notice on neighboring ranches?
CONSIDERATIONS for IF/WHEN we do want to sell: