Forest Property Owners' Association, Inc

Development

In 1978 when developer David Swor first saw the 700 acres of virgin Florida woodland, he was enthusiastically dedicated to creating a unique environment that would be an appealing blend of the natural beauty of the property. During these past years , development of The Forest has been accomplished in various phases with each phase having been first conceptualized with the attitude that "Nature created The Forest ... and we are preserving it." The community, one of the first gated, is located in south Lee County just off busy highway US 41, offers residents a secret oasis from the outside world. There are 347 single‑family homes on half‑acre lots and 441 condominiums, and the whole development backs up to a nature preserve. In March, 1985, the property owners assumed control of the Forest Property Owners' Association from the developer. The Association then merged with The Forest Community Association (the established security organization). The final result of the merger has been a cohesive homeowners group which monitors security and directs community growth for the mutual benefit of all Forest residents. The Association successfully petitioned Lee County in 1987 and regained private ownership and maintenance of the roads within The Forest which allowed them to make The Forest a controlled access community with a manned guard gate at the main entrance and mechanical gates at the Island Park Road entrance. Each Forest homeowner is assessed a nominal annual fee by the Association to pay for the costs of the guard gate, common areas landscaping and maintenance, enforcement of deed restrictions, etc.

Legal Status

The Forest Property Owners' Association, Inc. (FPOA) is a not for profit Florida corporation formed on December 7, 1979. The FPOA was formed under, and is governed by the provisions of Florida Statutes Chapter 720 dealing with not for profit corporations and corporations in general. The organization is not a "condominium association".

For federal tax reporting purposes, The FPOA is a "Homeowners Association" under Internal Revenue Code Section 528. The organization files an annual Form 1120H and, therefore, it is not subject to Federal Income Tax on association activity revenues.

Membership

The FFOA is not a "stock corporation;" instead it is an association of members. Membership in the Association is limited to persons (individuals, corporations, partnerships, trusts, estates etc.) owning property in The Forest Subdivision, Lee County, Florida, commonly referred to as The Forest. Presently, membership is limited to persons owning property in the following units, condominiums, and villas: Unit One Lots (Phase I), Unit Two Lots (Phase II), Unit Three Lots (Phase III), Unit Four Lots (Oaks‑Phase IV), Dove Hollow, Dove's Nest, Eagle's Landing, Fairway Woods I, Fairway Woods II, Falcon Crest, The Heron, Heron Villas, Partridge Court, Partridge Place, Pheasant Court, Quail Cove, Sparrowood & Waters Edge.

Activities

The FPOA is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of one representative per each unit of Condominiums or Villas, and three representatives per unit of lots. The activities of the Board are governed by all of the Deeds of Restrictions, Articles of Incorporation, Bylaws and other polices and procedures of the Association.

Members of The FPOA are subject to certain restrictions, declarations, and bylaws. The major sources of these rules are as follows:

× Unit One, Two, Three and Four lots: Deeds of Restrictions for the respective units, as amended to date, Articles of Incorporation of The FPOA and its Bylaws.

× Condominiums and Villas: Declaration of Covenants and Restrictions, if applicable, Declarations of Condominium for the respective condominiums, bylaws for the respective condominiums, as amended to date, Articles of Incorporation of The FPOA and its Bylaws.

The FPOA is a corporation separate and distinct from The Forest Country Club Membership Association, Inc., although a number of its members are also members of The Forest Country Club. In addition, The FPOA is a separate and distinct legal entity from the various condominiums and villas.

Address, E‑Mail, & Telephone Number:

The Forest Property Owners' Association, Inc.

5990 Forest Boulevard

Fort Myers, Florida 33908

TEL: 1‑239‑482‑1109

FAX: 1‑239‑482‑3366

E‑Mail: fpoa@forestpropertyowners.com

Purpose

The major purposes of The FPOA are:

× Maintenance of roads and grounds owned by The FPOA

× Maintenance and preservation of lighting on or effecting the properties owned by The FPOA.

× Providing and supporting personnel to provide authorized entry into The Forest for the benefit of members, their property and Association properties.

× Enhancing and maintaining the beauty of the community.

× Enforcement of covenants and restrictions running with the land and the deed restrictions for the various phases.

× Maintenance and preservation of a drainage and surface water management system jointly with The Forest Country Club Membership Association, Inc.

The Forest History

On Monday, December 27, 1920, two days after Christmas, a long‑gone Southwest Florida entity known as the Iona Drainage District filed with Lee County's Clerk of the Circuit Court a plat indicating that three parallel canals were to be dug on a straight line from a point east of what is now the Tamiami Trail (U.S. 41) west to Hendry Creek, a tidal estuary emptying into Estero Bay. The canals designated on the plat as Canal K and Canal T marked the northern and southern boundaries, respectively, of a square‑ish 430‑odd acre tract of timbered‑over but still raw land. The third canal, designated Canal S, ran through the center of the property and with the others was part of the district's overall scheme to drain semi‑swamp land for mosquito control, possible agricultural purposes, and for any second‑growth timber that might be profitably cut. The eventual digging of the canals by steam‑powered draglines was started 1927, mainly to realize their original intent but also to drain water left behind by a devastating hurricane that in September of that year pasted the entire southwest coast of Florida, even to the extent of flooding the Tamiami Trail to depths of as much as four feet. The principal "crop" afforded by the newly drained land (which stood more or less fallow for the next 50 years), apart from sawtooth palmettos, Brazilian pepper trees known as "Florida holly," sabal palms, some live oak trees, and both slash pine and cypress trees, turned out to be an almost impenetrable proliferation of melaleuca trees, an exotic imported early in the century from Australia. Being by nature thirsty, melaleucas were introduced to Southwest Florida to help dry the spongy land then prevalent throughout the region, and being by nature prolific the trees soon began to elbow aside native trees and vegetation, in some instances almost to the point of eradication. Inhabiting this fortress‑like tangle was an array of wildlife, some considerably less than hospitable insofar as human beings wishing to penetrate it might be concerned. Testy rattlesnakes, many in the four‑to‑five‑foot range, a few even larger, aggressive water moccasins, lurking coral snakes, feisty bobcats, grumpy alligators, and short‑fused feral boars discouraged all but the most intrepid of adventurers and outdoors men. Nonetheless, in hunting seasons and out, gunfire echoed throughout the tract signifying the dispatch of deer, ducks, fox, quail, and the occasional wild turkey. Buried deep in the thicket at the west end of the property, latter‑day explorers were to find a ramshackle cabin in which, presumably, hunters camped and ‑ a nervous‑making thought ‑ perhaps even spent nights. In all, then, hardly a promising spot upon which to forge a high‑end gated golf course community. But almost 25 years ago to a pair of high‑flying optimists named David Swor and John Santini just about anything seemed possible. David Swor, a Kentuckian originally from a small town near Ashland, set out to be a school teacher, even to the point of qualifying for and obtaining a teaching certificate. But after discharge from military service he began selling newspaper advertising space on behalf of the Orlando Sentinel, a job that eventually led him to a management position in the Midwest operations of Texaco, where he worked with a man named Frank Carroll. During the 12 years Swor was with Texaco he dabbled weekends in real estate, buying a bit of land here, selling it there, acting as agent in various property transactions, all the while acquiring hands‑on experience that in years to come would prove useful. At the bidding of Carroll, Swor left Texaco and came to Southwest Florida in 1970, joining his former associate in the operation of the Carroll Oil Company. "That job got me a lot more involved in real estate," Swor said, "mainly acquiring property for and establishing gas stations. About two years of doing that and I went into real estate full time on my own, mainly forming property syndications for clients seeking tax shelters." Academia's loss of Swor was compensated for by John Santini. A Fort Myers native, Santini taught at both Cypress Lake High School and Fort Myers High School , and although he found teaching psychologically rewarding it wasn't terribly lucrative. He had a young family to support, and he, too, began to dabble in real estate, working part‑time for an area broker. He studied for and earned a real estate broker's license, and at the end of the 1973 academic year resigned his teaching post and began selling real estate full‑time. It was then he met Swor, and in 1974 they established their own Fort Myers real estate brokerage firm ‑ Swor & Santini, Inc. Carrying on Swor's principal professional activity, the new firm's thrust was in forming real estate syndicates as tax shelters, which in turn led them into the high risk world of Southwest Florida real estate development. "Being a developer was risky, yes, but it was fun," Santini would later characterize their venture. "It was creative." Among the fledgling firm's speculative development projects over the next few years were the Key Estero Shopping Center, the College Parkway office and shopping complex in Fort Myers known as The Rafters, a College Parkway office park, and more than 100 residential condominium units on Bonita Beach, all of which were, to varying degrees, successful. "In those days you had to get a 50 percent sellout before a bank would lend you the money needed for a project," said Swor, "so you know John and I and our associates had to do some heavy duty selling." It was one of those heavy duty sales associates ‑ a man named Alan Johnson ‑ who one early fall day in 1978 suggested to Swor that he talk to the owners of a piece of South Fort Myers property considered by most observers of the area's Fort Myers‑based real estate market to be too far out in the boonies to be of much immediate value. It turned out the property's owners were saddled with mortgage payments they were struggling to meet, and while it had been their original thought to build a golf course on the property, not in their tentative plan was any sort of residential community to be tied in with it. At the time, however, the nation's economy was in one of its periodic slumps, and the owners were unable to obtain the needed financing to start the project. Too, having been told building a golf course on the property really wasn't feasible, the idea was abandoned, leaving the owners anxious to get out from under their mortgage obligations. Initially, Swor & Santini's interest in the property was in brokering its sale. But within a day or two of meeting with the property's owners, Swor strolled into Santini's office and half‑kidding said, "How'd you like to own a golf course?" His partner immediately and impulsively replied, "Why not?" At that very moment, according to Santini, the idea took root in their collective imagination and the two of them began "flying by the seat of our pants." Following their instincts and their usual practice, they set about forming a syndicate to buy the property, admittedly feeling at the time not unlike they might be jumping off a financial cliff. Accordingly, an option contract was entered into in the late fall of 1978 calling for Swor & Santini, Inc. to buy the property for $3,100 an acre. Although admittedly vaguely, and conscious of knowing little about golf, the partners had in mind a 27‑hole layout around which both high‑end residential condominiums and single family homes would be built. The plan was to form a limited partnership to be called Timberlakes Limited, "Timberlakes" to be the name of the development, the club to be Timberlakes Country Club.* Based on their past experience as developers, they put together some rough figures estimating the cost of building the golf course and putting in place the needed infrastructure ‑ roads, power lines, water lines, sewer lines, and so on. "Back then there were no private country club developments in Lee County ," said Santini, "so we were on our own. We were the first one, and really we were picking numbers out of the air." The number thus plucked was $1.8 million, a formidable sum at the time, especially with the nation in the grip of a less than robust economy. The first thought to raise the money was to offer limited partnership units in $300,000 blocks. This proved to be a tough sell, which, if the partner's dreams were to be realized, forced them to accept, to quote Santini, "more or less whatever anyone had." Eventually the syndicate numbered 30 limited partners who held varying‑sized slices of the pie, and the $1.8 million was raised. * Although Timberlakes would remain the development's "on paper" name, those involved in getting it built began to mull what they hoped would be a name more suitable and descriptive. Finally, everyone working on the project, ever mindful of its heavily wooded expanse, started referring to it as "the forest," which soon thereafter became its official designation. One quickly rejected thought was to call the development "The Fore‑Wood Country Club."

While all this was in the works the partners, accompanied by a man named Jim LePera and his wife, Janet, at the time an active LPGA Tour player (now one of The Forest's staff professionals), both of whom had become friends of the two men, began studying golf courses throughout South Florida with an eye to adapting to the still imagined Timberlakes Country Club as many of the most desirable features of each as might be possible. "Neither David nor John knew anything about golf," Janet LePera would later say of the visits to regional clubs and courses. "They were literally babes in the woods. In this instance, real woods." The visits also gave Swor a realistic appreciation of what he and his partner had undertaken. As an corollary to their research they talked to golf course architects Jack Nicklaus and Arthur Hill, both of whom quoted design fees that buckled the partners' knees. At this point, early in 1979, they were introduced to a man named Bill Maddox, a fourth generation golf course construction contractor and occasional course architect who at the time was building the golf course at Spanish Wells in Bonita Springs . The meeting was auspicious in that Maddox later proved to be the linchpin in getting the project off the ground. "I drove down to Spanish Wells one day to talk to Bill and literally had to get him off a tractor," said Swor. "He was always a hands‑on guy, and no one on any project he was working on worked harder than he did." Swor told Maddox that at least two golf course architects had said it wasn't possible to build a course on the proposed site because its elevations, ranging from three to six feet overall, were too low. Maddox countered by saying that his company had built a golf course on the west bank of the Mississippi River near New Orleans where some of the ground was 21 feet below sea level, and that since the early 1960s the pumps to keep it from being inundated had never been shut off. He pointed out that this "submarine" course ( Lakewood Country Club) was for a number of years the site of the Greater New Orleans Open. The upshot of the conversation was that Maddox expressed interest in what the partners hoped to accomplish and agreed to drive up to Fort Myers the next day to look over the property. In the late 1970s the Tamiami Trail upon which part of the property fronted was a narrow two‑lane road, one lane going north, one lane going south. Island Park Road was in place (albeit "paved" with gravel), and a few houses had been built at its southernmost end. The only commercial enterprise in the immediate vicinity was beekeeper Walt Johnson's Honey Factory, the hives of which were squatted on the proposed Timberlakes site. The building that housed the Honey Factory originally was a roller skating rink and bowling alley (it's now a Good Will store). Otherwise, there wasn't much to be seen other than a virtual wall of tightly packed melaleuca trees. When Maddox showed up at 8 o'clock the following morning he was met by a man named George Wheaton, at the time a Swor & Santini sales associate. Born and raised in Fort Myers , Wheaton had been tapped to show Maddox around because, "I was the only guy in the office who didn't get lost when he went off a paved road," and because he owned and drove a four‑wheel‑drive Jeep Cherokee. Following traces of an old timbering tram roadbed, Wheaton drove to one of the site's unexpected surprises ‑ a thriving marijuana patch he had discovered on one of his original exploring forays. The patch, destroyed when Swor & Santini took title to the property, was located on what is now The Forest Country Club's golf practice range. Pressing on, Wheaton and Maddox drove to about where the clubhouse now stands and found themselves up to the Jeep's doors in standing water. In Maddox's words: "I'm looking at George and thinking this guy is nuts, that we may have to swim out of here. He stops and says, =Can't go any farther, there's a ditch up ahead in those trees.' I asked him what the ditch was and he said he didn't know. And then I wanted to know if he could get us out of there. I remember he laughed and said he was a native and had been a woodsman all his life. And sure enough, he managed to get us out. Then we drove around and looked over as much of the property as was accessible." Maddox later asked Wheaton to find out where the ditch went to, who had dug it, and was it possible to clean it out. The next day Wheaton reported back about the three east‑west Iona Drainage District canals, adding that after the excavation work was completed in 1927 it appeared they had never been cleaned out, meaning that in the ensuing nearly 50 years they had become overgrown and their intended flow into nearby Hendry Creek choked off by a proliferation of aquatic vegetation. They were, in a word, plugged. Swor then met again with Maddox and asked if in Maddox's opinion building a golf course on the site was feasible. The contractor said he would first clean out the canals, and if they adequately drained the surrounding land he wouldn't have any problem building the course. Swor then asked Maddox to give him a construction price, specifying that he'd like to have a figure within 24 hours. Again in Maddox's words: "I stayed up all night, and the next morning gave him a price to build the course. He told me he had ten principal investors and that he and John Santini would be two of them, that they'd also be the (project's) general partners, and that he'd get back to me. "I kept on at Spanish Wells, and some time went by without me hearing from either David or John. When I was finishing up in Bonita Springs I was looking for the next job, so I called David and asked what had happened, that I hadn't heard from him. He said the deal was off because he now had only nine principal investors and needed a tenth. I then asked him what each share was worth. When he told me I was kind of staggered but said if I could build the golf course, which at the time was only 18 holes, I'd take the tenth share. And that's how the project got started." The involvement of Maddox proved providential, for if a key man was needed to turn raw, swampy acreage into what eventually would become a luxurious golf course community, very likely he was that man. Armed with a "can do" imagination, a lifetime of hard‑earned experience, and what James P. Elliot, the project's engineer, referred to as "a heavy duty bulldozer and a lot of dynamite," Maddox mounted an all‑out assault on the site's 420‑odd acres. After first clearing out the three drainage canals and determining that the project could indeed be built as Swor and Santini had envisioned it, he then cleared paths so that a surveyor named Larry Hay could ascertain where the proposed roads, residential areas and similar features of the needed infrastructure could be located. "It really was a forest," Hay would later say. "There were a lot of melaleucas for sure, but there also were a lot of pine trees and some live oak trees. There was no way we could have surveyed the property properly had Bill Maddox not cleared lines for us." Once the property was surveyed and the required permits applied for and obtained, the almost overwhelming task of turning dreams into reality began in earnest. When ground was officially broken in late 1979, one of the principal concerns of both Swor and Santini was that as many trees as possible be left standing. Accordingly, Maddox and his versatile bulldozer cleared very specific swaths through the thickets, knocking down and shoving aside for eventual disposal, usually by burning or burying, only those trees that simply had to be sacrificed if even the basic development plan was to be realized. Maddox and his crew also had to contend with huge deposits of near‑the‑surface rock, tons and tons of which were dynamited and then either relocated, hauled away, or buried, the latter a practice that would give future renovators of the course fits. In that the developers admittedly were neophytes when it came to hacking a gated golf course community out of a seemingly impenetrable fortress of trees, it fell more or less by default to Maddox to advise on and even oversee subsequent installation of the underground utilities, the building of the roads, and the grading of the areas set aside for both condominiums and single family homes. In addition, Maddox remained up to his hips, both figuratively and literally, in transforming course designer Gordon Lewis' sketches and architectural drawings into a real live 18‑hole golf course. For Lewis, the entire project was a baptism of fire. "The Forest was a break for me," Lewis would later say. "It was the first course I designed myself, my first experience in designing a golf course that had to be integrated into a proposed residential development. Also, I got a first‑hand look at how a course is built. One day I'd be driving a truck, and the next I'd be installing sprinklers. I was working with Bill Maddox as his assistant, and often that meant working in a ditch right along with him. I stayed on the job until The Forest opened." That the whole came into being at all is a tribute not only to the determination and perseverance of those charged with bringing it off, but also to the project's very real need to have attention paid to it. Undeniable keys to its realization, then, were the Monday morning meetings in an on‑site construction trailer, meetings during which all supervisors of all aspects of building the development discussed both progress and problems specific to their respective areas of concern. Solutions to the problems were proposed and probed, compromises were arrived at, assistance offered, decisions made . . . whatever was required to get the job done. "But we didn't hire a lot of outside people," said Swor. "We did most of it ourselves." "Everyone was involved in planning and building the overall community," said Lewis. "As for my part, designing the golf course, like designing any golf course, was an exercise in the possible ‑ what can and can't be done, especially when there are residential areas to be considered." While the golf course was under construction, work began early in 1980 on Phase I of the development ‑ installation of water and sewer lines and systems, power lines, the building of roads, the staking of home sites, even construction of residential units. An on‑site sales office had been set up in the waning months of 1979, its location that of the present sales office. To get to it, office personnel and anyone interested in what was going on or in perhaps buying a homesite had to negotiate a crude and often rutted dirt road leading off U.S. 41. Initial sales were considerably less than brisk, and from the very beginning survival of the project was touch‑and‑go. "Nobody thought this thing was going to work," said Santini. "We were scrambling. There were to be 700 residential units built around the golf course, and what we needed were rooftops." The partners, somewhat nervous and seeking assurance they hadn't gone off the deep end, commissioned a feasibility study by a firm of consultants who told them the only way the development was going to succeed was to sell a house and lot "package" for $75,000. The consultants also said a name was needed that "reflected Americana," a name that would suggest to potential buyers sound financial footing; they wanted to call the development the Rockwell Country Club, which suggestion, considering the unanticipated down‑the‑road problems both natural and buried rock would give subsequent renovators of the course(s), was not without merit. "We didn't act on any of the recommendations other than that we started a word‑of‑mouth campaign they referred to as =a whisper campaign,'" said Santini. That thought in mind ‑ to make the development a topic of area‑wide water cooler, cocktail party and dinner table chatter ‑ the partners in December of 1979 invited a number of possible buyers, most of whom lived in Fort Myers and environs, to sales office wine‑and‑cheese parties to be held on consecutive nights. "That first night, about 100 or so people showed up," said Swor, "but they were just milling around. Nobody was buying. So to indicate sold lots I spotted five or six of those little red dot pins on the topographic model we had on display, and once people thought others had bought, they began to buy. "For the first four or five months, most of our lot sales were to locals. After that, the out‑of‑towners just started showing up. As it worked out, the word‑of‑mouth idea was probably our best advertising." But both Swor and Santini are quick to add they were holding their collective breath throughout. "I can't recall just when, but at some point along the way I told my wife I was personally signed on for almost $12 million," said Swor. "She about had a fit. There was no way I could come up with that kind of money." What saved the project as well as the backsides of the intrepid pair was the decision to bring in as a joint venture partner a one‑time local and prudently conservative banking entity known as First Federal Savings and Loan. With the exception of the golf course and the clubhouse, which had been built in 1981, the bank bought out Timberlakes Limited. "It was expensive," Santini would say later, "but it gave us the financial strength we needed, and shortly thereafter, in late 1981 and early 1982, the project started to take off." While the partners were walking a financial tightrope, work on Phase I of the project forged ahead. The infrastructure was put in place, 96 single family home sites were staked out, 56 condominium units ( Partridge Place ) as well as 17 detached villas ( Pheasant Court ) were under construction. It already had been decided that roadways designated as streets would be named for animals, and that multi‑family units would be named for birds. Exceptions to this dictum were made later on, but most of the original names remain in use and serve to lend The Forest much of its undeniable ambiance. Adding to that ambiance was and is the distinctive gumbo‑limbo tree upon which The Forest tree logo is based. The tree, which occupies a prominent spot off the right side of the road leading to the clubhouse, was a transplant from Sanibel Island . According to Santini the tree was a gift to the new development by a man named Robert Troutman, a Georgia attorney who at one time aspired (in vain, as it turned out) to become a Fort Myers area developer. Although it would seem to be a sort of cart‑before‑the‑horse situation, at about the same time preliminary work began on Phase I, the water management authority for the area called for the establishment of an entity responsible for, among other things, the maintenance of the three drainage canals. The authority's principal concern was that when the development was completed, someone or some organization be charged with keeping the canals cleared and seeing to it laws regulating the retention and discharge of ground water be observed. Thus, in December of 1979, the Forest Property Owners Association (FPOA), a not‑for‑profit Florida corporation, was formed. Although the organization's initial membership didn't exactly constitute a multitude, in the years following its founding FPOA and its members would play key roles in making The Forest the outstanding and desirable community it is today. A year or two after the FPOA was formed, a rash of break‑ins over the Christmas holidays prompted the founding of The Forest Community Association, the main purpose of which was to provide community‑wide security. "I think that year there were something like 53 break‑ins," said Fort Myers attorney Andre Patrone, one of the young community's early residents. "Obviously something had to be done." What was done was the hiring of off‑duty law enforcement officers to patrol the development's roads, which at the time were public, and keep potential trespassers in check. The move proved a wise one in that the incidence of break‑ins dropped dramatically. In October of 1980 construction began on the 16 condominium units of Partridge Court . At about where the golf practice range is now (2001), site of the long‑since destroyed marijuana patch, four tennis courts were built. Also put up was a small building that doubled as a clubhouse and a golf and tennis shop. A snack bar, the offerings of which were served up by a man named Bill Anderson, was part of the cramped golf shop. Behind the present tee area on the north end of the practice range, where the small putting green is now, a swimming pool was built.* The golf course ‑ all 18 holes of it ‑ was completed and opened for play in December of 1980. Once golfers teed it up they were quick to find the course a challenge, decidedly so. Thanks to thick woods both right and left, several of the fairways appeared almost punitively narrow. What's more, uncertain as to how cranky the property's previous occupants might be about having been so rudely dispersed, there was an aura of mystery involved in what might be lurking in among the thickets. Accordingly, shots straying off course and into the trees and palmettos tended to be written off as lost.** "Before the course opened," Gordon Lewis would later relate, "David, John, Wayne (Lippold, The Forest's first golf course superintendent) and I decided we'd play a round. By the time we got to No. 14 or No. 15, we'd run out of balls."

* The pool saw little subsequent use, many of the community's residents having private or condominium swimming pools; hence the down‑the‑road decision to fill it in.

** In 1983, when palmettos were cleared out for about 150 yards from the tee on the left side of the Bear's No. 7, over 200 golf balls were found, mute testimony, perhaps, to discretion.

Janet LePera recalls playing the Bear's No. 6 for the first time and taking a nine on the hole. "I lost three balls on that one hole," she said. "At first some of the fairways were so narrow it was almost impossible to not lose a ball." Upon first seeing the course, Charlie Knowles, a Michigan professional introduced to Swor & Santini by one of the development's investors and subsequently engaged to organize and oversee all golf operations, found himself facing a dilemma: He didn't want to offend the partners, yet he felt obligated to speak out. "Honestly, I thought it was going to be too tough a golf course," Knowles recalled. "I told David (Swor) I thought it was too tight. But as the first couple of years went by and we cleared out some areas it became very playable. At first, though, there were some holes I didn't know how to play; I wasn't sure whether to hit a driver or a 5‑iron." Nonetheless, despite its seeming difficulty, both local and visiting golfers were eager to play the new course. Open to the public, its initial greens fee was a modest $15, the half‑cart fee an additional $6. In summer months the daily greens fee dropped to an even more palatable $10. Yet as high as was interest in the course, and as gentle as were the fees to play it, no stick was needed to beat off would‑be golfers. Not even the more‑than‑attractive charter and annual memberships and modest annual dues schedules offered to residents of The Forest resulted in hordes beating down the barriers in a rush to the first tee. At first, even before the course opened in December of 1980, would‑be residents were offered charter memberships for an initial fee of $2,000. Annual family dues were $900, individual annual dues $750. An annual family membership was priced at $1,200, an annual individual membership at $900. Annual tennis dues for an entire family were pegged at $450, while individual tennis memberships were offered for $300 annually. If you were a resident of The Forest you could become an annual social member for $250, a deposit of $100 sealing the deal. In January of 1981 construction began on a 20,000 square‑foot split‑level clubhouse. Construction was completed in July, and on Saturday, August 8, an open house cocktail party was held to dedicate the new building. About 500 guests showed up, most of whom were property owners or who had contracted to buy either home sites or condominiums. Also on hand were a number of sales prospects as well as some friends of the management plus a sprinkling of hangers‑on who simply were curious. The hours of the open house were to be from 5:30 until 9 p.m., but, to quote a then‑contemporary account, "The party lasted until the wee hours of the morning." Perhaps more than any single event up to that point in the development's brief history, the open house resulted in an attitude and an awareness that in many respects continues to this day. It united its guests in feelings of family; The Forest was fun, and so were the people who cared about it. In 1982, as prospects for the project's success in the new year were starting to look up, construction began on a third nine holes, also designed by architect Gordon Lewis and also built by Bill Maddox. Construction of the new nine moved along at a brisk pace, and by late fall it was ready for play. The official opening took place on December 7 when a dedication round was played by PGA Tour standout Calvin Peete, at the time a resident of North Fort Myers, and The Forest's own professionals ‑ the aforementioned Charlie Knowles, director of golf; head professional Richard Gilstad, who had been Knowles' assistant at the Country Club of Jackson (Michigan); and teaching professional Janet LePera. At some point shortly thereafter the developers held a "Name the Course" contest among residents and pending residents, and here, too, an animal enthusiast prevailed. Because it was deemed feisty and aggressive, the first nine was named the Bobcat. The second nine was named the Bear because it was thought to be toughest and strongest, the new third nine the Deer because it seemed "placid and easy‑going." If any year could be designated a pivotal year for the fledgling development, a strong argument could be advanced on behalf 1982. Not only was the new nine ‑ the Deer ‑ started and completed, but as its construction began so did construction of The Forest 's Phase III. By that time over 90 percent of the single family home sites called for in Phase I and Phase II had been sold. Phase III called for 84 such lots to be established on Timberlakes Drive , and by July the roads and the allied infrastructure for the new home sites were in place. Also completed in July were the Quail Cove and Dove Hollow condominiums. During that same summer the clubhouse, which in less than a year was showing the strains of inadequate space, expanded its dining room by 1,600 square feet, its kitchen by more than 1,000 square feet. But as The Forest's subsequent growth is reflected upon, perhaps the most important innovation of that year was what at first take might seem one of its most insignificant ‑ the starting of a twilight couples golf program. Eight resident couples were the pioneers, and one of their first determinations was to welcome like couples as guests. This welcoming policy not only added to the group's growth and popularity, it produced unanticipated results. "Although the club was active right from the start, twilight couples play was a big factor in our sales," Swor would later say. "It probably sold as much property as anything." What these sales added up to, apart from community growth, was the critical need for even more clubhouse space, a need that became apparent as an ever‑larger membership took advantage of an outstanding kitchen and an "in house" ambiance unique to The Forest . Accordingly, in 1983 another 3,200 square feet were added to the clubhouse, the expansion allowing the creation of a separate bar and a further enlargement of its kitchen facilities. What may have been the next "Great Leap Forward" in ensuring The Forest 's success took place on February 22, 1984. PGA Tour stars Fuzzy Zoeller, the 1979 Masters champion, and Calvin Pete, who the following year would win the coveted Tournament Players Championship, along with The Forest director of golf Charlie Knowles and head professional Richard Gilstad played under a skins format for $100 a hole. The event was billed as "Skins for Charity," and an estimated 3,000 golf enthusiasts showed up to see the stars and the local heros do their stuff. A total of $20,000 was raised, a check for $10,000 of which Peete presented to the Lee County Sickle Cell Anemia Foundation, the other $10,000 of which Zoeller, an alumnus of Edison Community College , presented to ECC's Athletic Scholarship Fund. Apart from the money raised for charity, the event received a great deal of area‑wide publicity, both in the press and on television. "In my opinion that event put us on the map," John Santini would later say. "I think it had more to do with acceptance of The Forest than anything we did or might have done. Originally we planned on selling only 500 tickets, but instead we opened the event to everyone and a whole bunch of people showed up. It was big success." Much of that success and the euphoria that followed it as well as earlier successes would prompt Santini to dream of broader horizons. He cast an eye on some available acreage located farther south along the Tamiami Trail, suggesting to his partner that perhaps they might have a go at establishing and developing yet another gated golf course community. But Swor, believing his plate at The Forest to be sufficiently full, was at best tepid in his response to the idea. The upshot was that the partners agreed to disagree, and in March of the following year Swor bought Santini out, thus dissolving Swor & Santini, Inc., and becoming The Forest 's sole general partner. "In that first or second year when we were struggling to get The Forest off the ground we got a call from a fellow who was acting as trustee for about 155 acres that abutted us on the west side," Swor would later relate. "The owner wanted to sell it, but we really weren't interested. On paper, the property was a subdivision called, I think, Lee City , and perhaps even a few home sites had been staked out. Anyway, the guy kept calling, and finally we bought it for $1,100 an acre, which brought us to the 650 or so acres we have now." The acquisition, in addition to making possible the building of additional residential units (Forest Oaks), enabled the number of golf holes at The Forest to be expanded to 36. Again golf course architect Gordon Lewis and contractor Bill Maddox were called upon, and by November of 1985 construction began on holes that when combined with certain holes of the‑then existing Deer course would become Nos. 5 through 13 of the present Bobcat course. The new project consumed over a year, primarily because Maddox and his crew had to cope with extensive rock formations that not only made contouring difficult, but also made installation of a working irrigation system all but impossible. Nonetheless, the new nine was opened for play on January 26, 1987, when 250 equity members of the club participated in an event billed as the "Bobcat Open." The Forest thus became one of the few private gated golf course communities in all of Southwest Florida to offer its members and guests the option and the luxury of playing two par‑72 courses, both of which were popularly deemed to be among the area's finest in terms of both layout and conditioning. Members spoke with pride of the club and its courses, and with a long list of good reasons. In May 1987 The Forest tennis complex at the end of Deer Run Road was opened, and the following month its building, including a pro shop affording a panoramic view of the new facility, was completed. The club's tennis enthusiasts and their guests now had at their disposal six state‑of‑the‑art Har‑Tru courts, three of which were lighted. It was and remains one of the outstanding such complexes in all of Southwest Florida . As the calendar year closed and another winter season opened, the club's Membership Committee wrote to members advising them that given the new nine, the new tennis complex, plus several improvements that had been made in the clubhouse, it had become necessary to increase the annual dues "to maintain the quality of our country club operation." Also to be covered by the increase were costs of additional maintenance and the equipment necessary to perform it, higher taxes, higher insurance costs, higher overall operating expenses. In spite of the increase, a study of the dues schedules of similarly structured clubs in the greater Fort Myers area showed that The Forest offered its undeniable attractions at comparatively modest cost, which it still does. Among the amenities enjoyed by residents of The Forest community as well as by members of the club, a number of whom were and are non‑residents, was and still is a special "in house" enclave known as Ruthie's Park, located on Forest Oaks Drive. How the park came into being reflects the spirit that has defined The Forest community pretty much since its very beginnings. In 1988, contractor Maddox, himself then a resident of The Forest , was approached by some women neighbors, most of them young mothers. They had held a bake sale and wanted to know if with the sale's proceeds he could build a modest playground for the community's resident children and visiting grandchildren, a playground that might feature a swing or two, a sandbox, and maybe a slide. "I knew the money they had might pay for an hour of time for a bulldozer to start clearing, but that was all," Maddox would later say, "so I told them to hold onto their money, that I'd build them a playground." Swor and his investors agreed to donate the land, and Maddox did indeed build a playground that when finished was named Ruthie's Park in honor of the contractor's wife of 40 years, who earlier that year had died of cancer. Due largely to neglect over the years, the park fell upon hard times, but with the launching of the new century and through the efforts of the FPOA it was refurbished and once again is appreciated as an attractive and desirable feature of living at The Forest. In March 1985, Swor turned control and administration of the FPOA over to the development's property owners. The FPOA then merged with aforementioned Forest Community Association, Inc., previously established to set up and staff security provisions for the entire community. The newly enlarged FPOA set about on a number of undertakings, the foremost of which was the successful petitioning of Lee County in 1987 to assume private ownership and maintenance of the community's roads, which since its inception had been public. Because The Forest thus became a controlled access community, the FPOA was able to build and staff security guard gates at both the Tamiami Trail and Island Park Road entrances. These and subsequent FPOA activities were and are funded by assessing homeowners within The Forest a nominal annual fee that covers the costs of staffing and maintaining the guard gates, the landscaping and maintenance of all common areas, the enforcement of deed restrictions as well as other considerations deemed pertinent to the community's security, beauty and well‑being. For example, about a third of the association's annual budget is earmarked for the landscaping and upkeep of common areas. At present, 60 percent of FPOA's membership also are members of The Forest Country Club. Although the thought had been bandied about since virtually the inception of the country club, it wasn't until January 1988 that a meeting was held to discuss and plan the membership's assuming ownership and operation of the clubhouse and the golf courses. At the meeting a steering committee of charter members was formed, and while it was charged with making the initial preparations for the purchase of the club by its equity members, it was understood that no action would be taken until the full roster of such members was made aware of specific details of the sale. Further, the members were to be included in any final decisions. Thus the first right of refusal of the deal was given to those who owned equity in the club, but apparently objections, in any, to its provisions were minimal, for a year later, on January 3, 1989, the purchase of the club and its facilities from Timberlakes Limited was completed and The Forest Country Club began operating as a private entity owned by its equity members, its affairs administered to by an elected board of governors. The price was $7.9 million, $3.2 million of which was paid in cash. Members received credits for $2.4 million, and a non‑interest‑bearing note was signed for another $2.4 million. In addition, $679,000 was placed in the club's capital expenditure account. Secure in its financial health and optimistic about its future, the club set about on an ambitious program of overall improvement and upgrading. Within its first ten months of equity ownership, the club:

Retained golf course architect Gene Bates, formerly a top executive in superstar Jack Nicklaus' golf course construction company, to study and make recommendations for improvement of both the Bear and the Bobcat courses.
Redecorated the Grill Room, the dining room, and both men's and women's locker rooms.
Installed a computerized accounting system designed to serve the needs of both members and the club.
Moved No. 7 green on the Bobcat to the left, and rerouted the cart path to the left side of the fairway (to mitigate potential danger and distraction to golfers teeing off on No. 8).
Completed the halfway house on the Bobcat.
Leveled and improved all Bobcat tee areas.
Worked out a program to improve critical drainage areas on the Bobcat.
Developed detailed plans and cost estimates proposing major reconstruction of the Bear's greens, including switching to a new variety of Bermuda grass deemed to be all but ideal for Southwest Florida 's semi‑tropical growing conditions.

Had the club's well‑meaning governors had a crystal ball before taking action on the latter proposal, one of the saddest and most controversial, to say nothing of costly, chapters in the history of The Forest Country Club might have been avoided. But no such magic insight existed, and the club, its collective heart in all the right places, set out on a path that in time would lead to disputes, resignations, law suits, and bruised feelings. It all began innocently and logically. As the 1980s waned, the Bear's greens, often criticized as being rather small, appeared to be in ill health, sulky and unresponsive to prescribed and appropriate treatment. The ultimate diagnosis was that they were outdated, that their construction wasn't up contemporary standards. This being so, the only logical thing suggesting itself was to plow them under and start from scratch by enlarging and rebuilding the greens to specifications recommended by golf's governing body in this country, the United States Golf Association (USGA). The final step in the process would be to sprig them with a variety of a type of Bermuda grasses known as Tifdwarf. So far so good. Accordingly, the greens were plowed under and were redesigned by golf course architect Bates. Being an old Nicklaus hand, he specified contouring that in a number of instances resulted in what many members deemed rather steep undulations, suitable, perhaps, to the putting skills of his mentor but frustrating, even infuriating to average golfers. Not only did many of the rebuilt greens feature wicked putting breaks, the steep undulations limited allowable space for pin placements, the result being uneven wear and tear on green surfaces. Were these negatives not enough, the grass with which the greens were sprigged failed to thrive as advertised. Heroic measures were undertaken to bring the greens around to suitable condition but nothing worked. To say members were disgruntled is to put it mildly. Club officers tried their best to explain and to mollify, but they, too, were in the dark and accepted and passed along what the experts were telling them ‑ that the procedures being followed were correct and that attainment of pristine putting surfaces was simply of matter of time and benign weather. Throughout the ordeal, however, intelligence began to filter in that the Bear wasn't the only regional golf course having trouble with its greens. Superintendents, club officials and memberships understandably may have been reluctant to admit it, of course, but similar and in most cases identical problems eventually were reported by, among a number of others, Fiddlesticks (its practice putting green), Lely Classic in Naples, Stauffer Venoy in Tampa, by Boca Del Mar, Delray Dunes, Palm Beach Gardens, and the Country Club of Miami. To no one's surprise, really, it turned out that all of them had purchased the grass with which their greens had been sprigged from Southern Turf Nurseries in Lake Wales , then Florida 's foremost supplier of turf grasses. At the time, Southern Turf's reputation was unassailable, and the last thing to enter anyone's mind was that the grass itself was suspect. Finally, however, that proved to be the case; The Forest and the others had been furnished with an inferior strain of grass that all the fertilizers and all the tender loving care in the world could never make healthy. As a letter to members of The Forest dated October 1, 1992 pointed out, "The greenkeepers involved thought they were dealing with their own private hell and weren't anxious to tell others of their problems." What followed at The Forest was a trying time for all concerned. Every attempt was made to hold the grumbling to a minimum, and in general the membership expressed its patient understanding. Nonetheless, the fallout included the resignation of the club's then‑president, its golf course superintendent, some unhappy members, and joint legal action (with 27 other plaintiffs) against Southern Turf, which soon thereafter declared bankruptcy. When the dust settled, The Forest accepted its share of the divvied‑up spoils ‑ all of about $7,500 ‑ and bit the bullet of once again tearing apart and rebuilding the Bear's greens, this time surfacing them with the superior strain of Tifdwarf for which they now are widely acclaimed, many deeming them the finest such greens in all of Southwest Florida. Before this exalted state was reached, however, the club's golf courses once again underwent extensive renovation, projects that in the case of the Bobcat changed the layouts of several holes and addressed what had proved to be ongoing drainage problems, especially the latter. As mentioned, elevations above sea level on the overall site measured from three to six feet, and as a man named Jim Elliot, the project's original supervising engineer, would later point out, at times water would "run across Island Park Road about a foot deep." "When we started building in here," said Swor, "we were required to put all the houses and residential units at eight‑foot minimum elevations. Three or four years later we were required to go to 11‑foot elevations." Given Southwest Florida 's torrential summer rains, provisions had to be made for potential flooding. Accordingly, the golf courses were engineered so that any water spilling over the banks of the development's lakes, retention ponds and canals would flood the fairways first and thus spare residential units from possible inundation. All very well, but in fact heavy summer rains often made the courses unplayable, especially the Bobcat. For example, often under water after a heavy downpour was almost the entire length of the fairway on Bobcat No. 2; it was not uncommon for days to go by before the fairway drained enough to be playable, and even then a well‑hit shot was apt to plug to a depth of two or more inches and the ball be lost. Plainly, something had to be done. Mindful of the need for action, the club's governing body (at this point called the board of directors rather than the board of governors), acting on the advice of the greens committee and golf course architect Chip Powell, who had been retained to make recommendations to improve the quality of the golf course, gained approval from the membership to embark on an extensive renovation program for the Bobcat, the avowed primary purpose of which was to improve its drainage. In order for the work to be completed in the shortest possible time, the Bobcat was closed from the spring of 1997 until well into the fall. One of the project's initial requirements (intended to hold down costs as much as possible) was that all fill material was to be obtained within the community's boundaries. In the main, this meant either creating new lakes or enlarging those already on the Bobcat. One of the first of the former was dug to the left and in front of the tee on No. 3, the fill thus derived going to raise the level of the fairway on No. 2 by as much as three and four feet. Enlarged was the lake to the right of No. 4 green. On No. 6, the entire fairway was elevated by as much as two feet, and on No. 7 fill from the lakes was moved to raise the left side of the fairway, thus assuring proper drainage off to the right. On No. 9 the cart path leading down the right side of the fairway was removed, its traffic diverted to the waste bunker on the left. The green was moved left and doubled in size. Changes from No. 10 through No. 14 were comparatively minor, but on No. 15 the change was dramatic, the result being what in effect was an entirely new hole. Gone was the line of melaleuca trees on the right that separated the fairway from the virtually parallel 16th hole, their place taken by a new, large, and golf ball‑hungry lake. "One of the reasons that lake was built," said former TFCC golf course superintendent Rick Tatum, who oversaw most if not all of the Bobcat's renovation, "was that it not only enhanced the design of the golf course, but that it proved to be our best source of fill." The new lake also changed No. 16 significantly in that tee shots now had to be hit over water. On the par‑3 17th the bunker that once was to the right of the green was moved to its left, all the better to punish pulled and hooked tee shots. On No. 18, the green was enlarged and moved to the left, making possible a challenging pin placement behind a protective bunker. The "new" Bobcat opened for play on November 1, 1997, the same day a "soft spikes only" policy went into effect for both it and the Bear. While all this activity was going on outside, extensive renovation and redecoration was underway in the clubhouse. By fall the dining rooms, the entry, the lobby, and the terrace lounge had been either enlarged, redecorated, or both, complete with new furniture and fixtures. In December work began on an added second floor extension over what six months later would be a much enlarged ground floor golf shop, the extension enlarging the women's locker and card rooms as well. With the exception of this latter project, completed in April of the following year, the start of the 1997‑1998 "season" saw both the golf courses and the clubhouse and its facilities pretty much as they exist today. In all, golf course and clubhouse combined, almost $1.6 million had been spent on renovations, improvements and upgrades. Yet even then additional changes and upgrades were in the wind.

Throughout the decade of the 1990s Americans in general were urged to become fitness conscious, members of The Forest Country Club being no exception. The catch was that other than going to a public gym or "working out" on their own, TFCC members had no specific facility at which they could, presumably, slim down and shape up, an amenity offered by most of the new upscale golf course communities that over the course of the decade were springing up throughout Southwest Florida . Accordingly, and with thoughtful consideration of the area‑wide competition for new members, the club's board of directors voted in November 1999 to have just such a facility built ‑ a fully equipped and readily available exercise studio to be overseen part‑time by a professional trainer. Its location was to be in the clubhouse in space that originally served as a banquet room, a determination that to be realized required only minor structural alterations and renovations to the areas directly behind the lobby reception desk. In less than a year, on October 15, 2000, the fully equipped amenity known as the Fitness Center opened for use by members and their guests. The building of the Fitness Center coincided with extensive work on what had been known as "the terrace," an open air and awninged lounge that overlooked the cart staging area. The lounge served refreshments as well as light luncheon menus, and although perennially popular with members, over the years many ‑ especially year‑=rounders often wilted by the summer's withering heat ‑ expressed the wish it was air‑conditioned. The wishes were heeded, and in May, 2000, work was begun to enclose the area and cover it with a permanent roof. Named the Gumbo‑Limbo Lounge in recognition of The Forest 's hallmark gumbo‑limbo tree, the now even more popular facility opened the following December. Of The Forest, both as a community and as a country club, it can be said as it often is of, say, New York City, or Atlanta (perhaps especially Atlanta), "Is it ever going to be finished?" It's doubtful, and it's hoped not, for spontaneity and innovation are but two of the characteristics that give both community and club their unique appeal. The Forest is a special corner of paradise, and those who live, play, and socialize within its confines appreciate that maintenance of paradise, even a small corner of it, demands diligence, that constant attention be paid to its attractions, its success, its well‑being. There's no secret involved in all this, no magic ingredient. The community and the club are, in literal truth, reflections of those concerned with the welfare of both. Thus it is that the club, for example, never lacks for men and women willing to devote time and energy, and in more than one instance substantial resources to the common good. From the official dedication of the original clubhouse more than 20 years ago, the club's "We're all in this together" spirit has never faltered. Men and women have served its offices and guided its course of actions on equal footing, the result being unusual harmony in the conduct of its affairs. It is, then, a special place enjoyed and cared for by special people. Just how special is perhaps exemplified by several club and community committees devoted to keeping it special, an example of which would be the Remembrance and Beautification committee. Funded since its inception by anonymous contributors, over the years the committee has overseen the community‑wide placement of countless trees, shrubs, and flower beds, the trees often planted in remembrance of a departed family member, or a club member no longer among those present. The committee also has been the conduit through which bird houses have been located on or adjacent to both golf courses. First‑time visitors to The Forest Country Club are certain to be impressed by a pair of life‑sized bronze cranes that grace the lovely view from the clubhouse grill room, by the huge American flag that flies so proudly in front of the clubhouse, by the handsome gumbo‑limbo tree representation that hangs on a wall in the clubhouse lobby. These and many other additions and contributions were made possible through the devoted ministrations of the Remembrance and Beautification committee. A former club employee who went on to bigger if not necessarily better (considering his sentiments) things perhaps put the appeal of The Forest Country Club best when he said, "It has a great membership, some of the finest people I've ever known. They love their club, they love their golf courses, and they're really don't care what others may or may not think."

BOARD OF DIRECTORS ( The Forest Country Club)

1989 ‑ John Copeland, president Austin Goosey Lee Green Bob Lugan Bob Moore Lillian Quaranto John Selby Jim Timlin David Swor

1990 ‑ John Copeland, president Austin Goosey Lee Green Frank Haskell Bob Lugan Bob Moore Lillian Quaranto Charlie Weyant David Swor

1991 ‑ Bob Logan, president Austin Goosey* Bob Hagen Frank Haskell Bob Moore Leighton Smith Charlie Weyant David Swor * Resigned, Jim LePera elected to take his place

1992 ‑ Bob Moore, president* Bob Hagen Frank Haskell David Keiser Jim LePera Judy O'Donnell Ed Ruby Leighton Smith Charlie Weyant Wayne Wells * Resigned, Charlie Weyant elected as president, Wayne Wells elected to fill board vacancy

1993 ‑ David Swor, president Bill Cunningham Jim deBruin Bob Hagen David Keiser Judy O'Donnell Ed Ruby Leighton Smith Wayne Wells

1994 ‑ David Swor, president Clarke Dahlgren Bill Cunningham Jim Dwyer Jim deBruin David Keiser Judy O'Donnell Ed Ruby Wayne Wells

1995 ‑ Wayne Wells, president Bill Cunningham Clarke Dahlgren Jim deBruin Jim Dwyer Ray Felitto Frank Freels Earl Webber David Swor

1996 ‑ Jim Dwyer, president Clarke Dahlgren Ray Felitto Frank Freels Don Gwinnup Sharon MacLean Rick Reichle Earl Webber Wayne Wells

1997 ‑ Sharon MacLean, president Ray Felitto Bill Franks Frank Freels Don Gwinnup Fred Lange Quinton McNew Ken Parker Rick Reichle

1998 ‑ Bill Franks, president Clarke Dahlgren Russ Gilbert Don Gwinnup Frank Kelley Fred Lange Quinton McNew Sharon MacLean Ken Parker

1999 ‑ Ken Parker, president Clarke Dahlgren Bill Franks David Fullen Russ Gilbert Don Gwinnup Frank Kelley Fred Lange Judy West

2000 ‑ Ken Parker, president Clarke Dahlgren Bill Franks Dave Fullen Russ Gilbert Don Gwinnup Frank Kelley Fred Lange Judy West

2001 ‑

PRESIDENTS (The Forest Property Owners Association)

1986‑1988 Vern Ahlgren

1988‑1990 Wilber Shellenbarger

1990‑1992 Latham Gray

1992‑1994 John Morse

1994‑1996 David Keiser

1996‑1998 Bill Parker

1998‑2001 Fred Kelly

2001‑2003 Charles Webster

2003‑2007 Mark Griffin

2007‑ David Fullen

5990 Forest Boulevard, Fort Myers, Florida 33908