Lake Fight: Cherry Lake Bought for a Dollar?
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA["It's done," said a somewhat defiant Jerry Jeremiah, not wanting to offer many details of how he bought some or all of Cherry Lake and the surrounding unincorporated areas that made up the "Cherry Lake Club" properties "in consideration of $1."
How can you buy something you never owned without a vote of the Cherry Lake Club board of directors or the 49 landowners who have homes and cabins here?
"Well, Cherry Lake was a not-for-profit club, so it wasn't suppose to make a profit," he said.
Really?
Some kind of a deed which transfers property from Cherry Lake Club president Karla Kirk to vice-president Jerry Jeremiah is now on file in the office of Perry County Clerk Kevin Kern.
Residents who have gone to Perry County State's Attorney David Stanton and to their own attorneys are seeing red at the thought of someone that served on the board can get somebody else on the board to sell all or part of the small recreational lake for $1.
The Cherry Lake Club was a not-for profit association of lakeside property owners who had a board, once met regularly and had access to the lake for fishing and swimming (before the IEPA) shut the lake down to swimmers six years ago because of e-coli contamination. Ducks and a handful of residents who were piping their sewage into the lake were blamed.
The Cherry Lake Club was the subject of an involuntary forfeiture of its not-for-profit status three years ago because the "board" didn't file its annual not-for-profit renewal documentation with Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White.
The newspaper has repeatedly left messages for Karla Kirk to call us and explain how the club was dissolved and how--without a board and its majority--she or that board could transact a sale of real estate.
On June 27, 2010 club president Karla Kirk --long after the Secretary of State dissolved the club--signed a one sentence document which reads, "Cherry Lake, Inc. gives Jerry Jeremiah permission to oversee Cherry Lake property in accordance to state and federal laws pertaining to fishing, hunting and trespassing." She signed the recent document as president and Jeremiah signed the document as vice-president. There are no other signers.
But, does that allow her to sell lake property to him for $1. The newspaper pressed on for board minutes or resolutions. While Jeremiah says, "It's all legal. I spent a lot of money" the newspaper still can't find anyone who bought into this transaction.
For Jeremiah, having some kind of a deed doesn't necessarily mean he has or can obtain a title or title insurance for the property, the only documentation that would give him equity and salability. Even with a deed, he may own nothing. Title insurance companies won't touch this kind of a transaction.
"Nobody ever paid their $50 dues out here. Nobody comes to the meetings. Nobody took care of it. Now, I've got it. It's done."
There is a set of by-laws to the Cherry Lake Club dated July 14, 2002. It states specifically in Section 2: "The income or assets of this corporation (the lake and unincorporated land around it) shall not benefit any private individual or member. Section 3 states: "Upon dissolution of the corporation, the officers and directors shall dispose of all assets of the corporation to provide for the payment of all the liabililties of the corporation. Balance of any funds should be distributed evenly among members in good standing. If corporation closes, the water line and the water assets will be transferred to the home owners on the water line."
That water line was replaced three years ago and proceeds from the purchase of water have gone into a bank account to help retire the debt on that water line. That's a whole other issue that needs to be addressed--and soon.
Jeremiah claims the property at least on the north side of the lake is his because of the default of the obligations and voting powers of the members of the on-and-off again board. He's already surrounded the picnic pavilion property with tarps and says he is working on the inside.
State's attorney Stanton has not had the small amounts of information provided by club members long enough to decide if there is enough substance for a case. Otherwise, it will be up to former members of the Cherry Lake Club and cabin owners to contact their attorneys and pursue the matter in civil court.