Only hours after Voices of Hideaway published an article examining the connection between Hideaway General Manager Del Polikretis and Strategy Blvd, an anonymous source came forward with new information that significantly changes the story.
Earlier today, we reported that Hide-A-Way Lake Club is working on a new website while its General Manager, Del Polikretis, is publicly associated with Strategy Blvd, a Texas marketing company that specifically offers website-development services.
At the time that article was published, we had not established that Strategy Blvd was actually working with Hideaway on the website project. We were asking whether the connection between the HOA's General Manager, a website-development company associated with his family, and Hideaway's ongoing website work was merely coincidental or something members should know more about.
Now we have additional information.
Following publication of Part One, an anonymous source provided Voices of Hideaway with information connecting Strategy Blvd directly to work being performed for Hide-A-Way Lake Club on its website.
We are withholding the identity of that source to protect their confidentiality.
Just as important, after reviewing the information currently available to us, we have not located any public disclosure to the membership identifying Strategy Blvd as working with Hide-A-Way Lake Club on this project.
That does not prove there was never a disclosure somewhere.
But it does raise an entirely new set of questions.
The Connection Is No Longer Just Theoretical
Several parts of this story are independently verifiable through public information.
Strategy Blvd describes itself as a Texas marketing agency and specifically advertises website creation among its services. The company says its services include website usability, accessibility, form and function.
Strategy Blvd's own website currently identifies Ciara Polikretis as its Managing Member and Del Polikretis as an Associate specializing in “Market Analysis / Web Dev.”
Del Polikretis is also the General Manager of Hide-A-Way Lake Club.
Meanwhile, hideawaylake.net is clearly being used for Hideaway-specific content. The website contains a July 24, 2024 Hideaway Town Hall page identifying Del Polikretis, then Board Vice President, and former General Manager Rob James as presenters. It also contains a January 21, 2025 Security Gates Town Hall page identifying the same presenters.
Those are public facts.
The new information is what our anonymous source brought forward:
Strategy Blvd is working with Hide-A-Way Lake Club on its website project.
If that information is confirmed by the Association's contracting, payment or internal records, this is substantially different from simply discovering that Hideaway's General Manager happens to be associated with a company capable of building websites.
It means members need to know how that relationship came about.
https://hideawaylake.net/hideaway-lake-home/
“It's On The Tip of His Tongue”
There is another part of our original reporting that suddenly looks very different in light of this information.
When the subject of the company connected to Hideaway's website work came up, Del Polikretis struggled to recall the company's name, saying it was “on the tip of my tongue.”
Well, apparently it was a particularly difficult name to remember.
Because Strategy Blvd is not some unrelated company several degrees removed from Hideaway's General Manager.
Strategy Blvd publicly identifies Ciara Polikretis as its Managing Member.
And Strategy Blvd publicly identifies Del Polikretis himself as part of its team, specifically in Market Analysis and Web Development.
Now, according to information provided to Voices of Hideaway by an anonymous source, Strategy Blvd is also working with the HOA on its website project.
That makes the “tip of my tongue” moment worth revisiting.
Maybe Del simply could not remember the company's name at that particular moment. People forget things. That is certainly possible.
But members are also entitled to ask a pretty obvious question:
If Strategy Blvd was involved in Hideaway's website project, why wasn't that relationship immediately and clearly disclosed when the company doing the work came up?
For a company whose Managing Member is Ciara Polikretis and whose website publicly identifies Del as one of its own web-development associates, “it's on the tip of my tongue” suddenly feels like an awfully strange answer.
Fortunately, we don't have to speculate about what happened.
The records can tell us.
Where Was This Relationship Disclosed?
This is now one of the most important questions.
We have reviewed the materials presently available to us and have not located a public disclosure to the membership stating that Strategy Blvd is working with Hide-A-Way Lake Club on its website.
That wording is important.
We are not claiming that no disclosure exists anywhere.
There could be a disclosure in Board minutes, committee records, internal communications, a contract, an invoice, an executive-session summary or another document we have not yet obtained.
But we haven't found it.
And given the relationship involved, members should not have to discover something like this because an anonymous source decided to come forward.
If a company whose Managing Member is Ciara Polikretis and whose own website identifies Hideaway's General Manager as part of its web-development team is performing work for the HOA, the membership deserves to understand exactly how that relationship was handled.
Who Selected Strategy Blvd?
There is nothing inherently improper about an HOA doing business with a company connected to someone associated with the organization.
The real issue is how the relationship was handled.
- Was it disclosed?
- Was it independently reviewed?
- Who approved it?
- Was the person connected to the company removed from the decision-making process?
- Was the price reasonable?
- Were alternatives considered?
Those protections become particularly important when the person connected to the company is the organization's General Manager.
We now want to know who first recommended Strategy Blvd for the project, who selected the company, whether a written proposal or contract exists, what services Strategy Blvd is performing and how much Hide-A-Way Lake Club has paid—or agreed to pay—for those services.
We also want to know whether other website-development companies were considered, whether competing proposals were obtained, who negotiated the arrangement and who ultimately approved it.
And there is another important question:
Did Del Polikretis participate in recommending, selecting, negotiating with, supervising or approving Strategy Blvd?
If he did not, the records should establish that.
If he disclosed the relationship and removed himself completely from the process, that matters too.
If the Board independently evaluated the company and determined that Strategy Blvd offered the best value for Hideaway, show the members.
And if Strategy Blvd is not being paid directly by Hideaway, then who engaged the company and under what arrangement?
None of those questions presume wrongdoing.
They are basic governance questions that become unavoidable when a business connected to senior management is reportedly performing work for the organization that management oversees.
Hideaway's Own Bylaws Make the Contract Important
Hideaway's bylaws have something very specific to say about contracts.
Article VIII, Section One states that the Board may authorize officers or the General Manager to enter contracts on behalf of the Club. It also describes requirements for the execution of Club instruments.
But one sentence is particularly important now:
“All contracts shall be made available to a Club member on request.”
That provides a remarkably simple way to answer many of these questions.
Produce the contract.
If Strategy Blvd has a contract with Hide-A-Way Lake Club, members should be able to inspect it under the Club's own bylaws.
If no contract exists, that creates another question:
What agreement authorized Strategy Blvd to perform work for Hideaway?
Perhaps Strategy Blvd is working under another contractor.
Perhaps the work was donated.
Perhaps there is a different arrangement entirely.
We don't know yet.
That is precisely why the records matter.
What If It Was Discussed Behind Closed Doors?
Hideaway's bylaws permit the Board to discuss contract negotiations during executive session.
That does not mean whatever happens afterward simply disappears.
The bylaws state that following an executive session, decisions made there must be summarized orally and placed in the minutes in general terms. They also specifically require a general explanation of expenditures approved during executive session.
So if an agreement involving Strategy Blvd was discussed or approved behind closed doors, there should still be a governance trail.
Where is it?
We are not asking Hideaway to disclose legitimately confidential negotiating discussions.
We are asking something much more basic:
Who was hired? What was approved? What are members paying? Who authorized it? And how was the relationship involving the General Manager handled?
What Did the Board Know?
Hideaway's bylaws place management of Club services, operations and personnel with a General Manager appointed by the Board.
They also require the General Manager to work under a Board-approved job description and Code of Ethics and state that the General Manager is to be held accountable by the Board for the expectations contained in those documents.
That means this isn't only a question for Del.
It is also a question for the Board.
- Did Board members know Strategy Blvd was involved?
- When did they know?
- Were they informed that Strategy Blvd publicly identifies Del as one of its associates?
- Were they informed that Ciara Polikretis is the company's Managing Member?
- Did the Board approve the arrangement?
- Was there a vote?
- Were other vendors considered?
- Was anyone tasked with reviewing the relationship for an actual or perceived conflict?
- Did Del participate in any portion of the decision?
- And if the Board knew about the relationship, why can't we locate a disclosure to the membership?
There may be records answering every one of those questions.
We would like to see them.
Members Shouldn't Have to Learn This From an Anonymous Source
This may be the larger governance issue.
Members should not have to rely on an anonymous source to discover who may be performing work for their HOA.
That is especially true when the company involved has an obvious, publicly documented connection to the organization's General Manager.
Transparency in a situation like this does not hurt the HOA.
It protects it.
If Strategy Blvd was properly selected, the relationship was fully disclosed, Del had no role in selecting or approving the company, appropriate safeguards were used and the arrangement provided good value to the membership, then the records should demonstrate exactly that.
That would protect the Board.
It would protect Del.
It would protect Strategy Blvd.
And most importantly, it would give members confidence that their money and their organization are being managed appropriately.
What damages confidence is discovering the relationship somewhere else and then having to work backward to figure out how it happened.
No Disclosure We Have Located
Because this is an ongoing investigation, we want to be precise.
Voices of Hideaway is not claiming that no disclosure was ever made anywhere.
What we are saying is this:
We have not located a public disclosure to the membership identifying Strategy Blvd as working with Hide-A-Way Lake Club on the website project.
We also have not yet located records establishing when the relationship was disclosed, who formally approved it, what Strategy Blvd is being compensated, whether other vendors were considered, whether Del participated in the process or whether he recused himself from it.
Those documents may exist.
If they do, Hideaway should provide them.
Doing so could resolve a substantial portion of this story almost immediately.
The Records Should Settle This
Voices of Hideaway will be seeking records concerning Strategy Blvd, hideawaylake.net, Hideaway's website redevelopment and any related services performed by Strategy Blvd or affiliated individuals or companies.
That should include contracts, proposals, invoices, competing bids or proposals, purchase orders, checks and other payments, reimbursements, Board approvals, meeting minutes, executive-session summaries, communications concerning vendor selection, scopes of work and any conflict-of-interest disclosures or recusals associated with the project.
If Strategy Blvd donated the work, show the documentation.
If another company hired Strategy Blvd as a subcontractor, show the arrangement.
If Strategy Blvd competed against other vendors and the Board concluded it provided the best value, show the process.
If Del disclosed his connection and completely removed himself from the selection, negotiation and approval process, show that too.
Those facts matter.
Our goal is to establish what actually happened—not force the evidence into a predetermined conclusion.
Part One Asked Whether There Was a Connection. Then Someone Came Forward.
When we published Part One earlier today, we knew Hideaway was working on its website.
We knew Strategy Blvd offered website-development services.
We knew Strategy Blvd publicly identified Ciara Polikretis as its Managing Member.
And we knew Strategy Blvd publicly identified Hideaway General Manager Del Polikretis as one of its associates specializing in Market Analysis and Web Development.
Those facts alone justified asking questions.
Then, only hours after that article was published, an anonymous source came forward with information connecting Strategy Blvd directly to work being performed for Hide-A-Way Lake Club.
That changes this story.
It does not establish that anyone broke the law.
It does not establish that Hideaway overpaid.
It does not establish that Del personally awarded a contract to Strategy Blvd.
And Voices of Hideaway is not going to claim any of those things without evidence.
But it absolutely establishes the need for answers.
- Was the relationship disclosed?
- Who approved it?
- Who selected Strategy Blvd?
- Did Del participate?
- What work is Strategy Blvd performing?
- What is Hideaway paying?
- Were other companies considered?
- And why, when the company apparently came up before, was its name merely “on the tip of my tongue”?
Hideaway members fund this organization. They have every reason to expect business relationships involving senior management to be transparent and handled with safeguards that protect the membership.
Hideaway's leadership now has a very easy opportunity to answer these questions.
Show the members the records.
This is Part Two of Voices of Hideaway's ongoing investigation into Hideaway's website project and the relationship between Hide-A-Way Lake Club leadership and Strategy Blvd. We will continue reviewing information and records related to this matter and will update members as additional facts are independently verified.
Matt DeFeo
Matt is a husband to Chrissy, father of three, and retired law enforcement officer. Through Voices of Hideaway, he documents records, firsthand experiences, and unanswered questions while trying to inform Hideaway members and promote transparency and accountability in the community.