November 4, 2016

This and that - a few notes and thoughts about the Circle.

The Newest Assessment.

The new assessment is out and here they go again!  I opened my envelope from Resource to find the same tripe that was panned in the last assessment!  Another rendition of the "Reimbursement Scheme".    This reminds me of the movie "Dumb and Dumber" or "Groundhog Day".   Absolutely no rhyme or reason for this!  When the question was asked, at the Board Meeting last week, if the owners in attendance would accept an assessment to balance the budget, many hands were raised, including mine.  The word reimbursement was not uttered.  To me, it is apparent that our management team badly misconstrued that vote.  If they had detailed the assessment and talked about padding the reserves, I can't believe that it would have gotten the votes that it did.

If this current assessment is so important, and I'm hearing that this is being sold as an emergency, then why muck it up? There are far better and more honest ways to add to the reserves.  It makes little sense to screw around with this important issue when we supposedly need money so badly!

The amount of the reserves that they want us to "reimburse" is $14,349 (of the $37,000).   If you divide $14,349 by 48 units, that would be about $299 per unit -  give or take a few dollars, depending on the size of your unit.  Not an insignificant amount when you're trying to stretch your income to meet your daily needs.  Apparently $21,933.63 is all that is really needed to balance the budget.

Unfortunately there will be folks that are not familiar with the budget shenanigans involved in this scheme, that will vote for this because they have been told that the assessment was to balance the budget -which is not the absolute truth.  Obviously I'm not going to support it.  In fact I am going to recommend that THE VOTE ON THIS  DISHONEST ASSESSMENT SHOULD BE NO!  We need to send a message to Janet and Kimberly that we will not be taken for granted!  If they want our vote for a balanced budget assessment, then do it right!

What's next?  My suggestion in going forward is fairly simple.  First, cancel the Special Board Meeting.  Second, set up a regular Board Meeting  within the time frame to allow for Board consideration of a special assessment.  As we now have an acceptable bid for the stairwell repairs, the Board should vote to approve the contract proposal with Lizotte and add $4,000 for adequate funding for the painting that will be needed after the repairs are made; set the assessment for stairwell repairs  at $26,000.  Set a figure for balancing the budget at $22,000.  Have a Board vote for an assessment package at $48,000.  Boards certainly have the power to assessments - it's been done before and certainly can be done again.  Make the assessment in whatever easy pay plan that seems appropriate even if the assessment has to go into the next fiscal year.  I believe that there will be enough support from the owners to pass this assessment plan.

With this assessment plan, two critical problems will be resolved.  There can be little doubt that the stairs must be repaired/replaced.  And we need that $22,000 to adequately to address the budget shortfall.   We can go forward with only the drain problem before us.

It is up to the current management to make the decision whether to implement the above compromise plan or not.  They could dig in and hope that they will get enough votes for their plan to pass.  They have to hope that the 29 voters that voted no for their first version of this assessment will change their minds and vote for their second.  I don't believe that will happen.   The compromise plan that I have suggested is workable, solves a couple of our issues and will pass the test of our owners.  Now the ball is entirely in the hands of Janet and Kimberly.

The Other Assessment.   The vote on the first assessment failed miserably - 28 opposed, 10 in favor. It failed because  the process was done with the 4 p's:  pi-- poor prior planning!

Reimburse the General Operating Fund.  A cute but a very feeble attempt to balance the budget and pad the reserves.  You need money to balance the budget - then do it.  Don't muck it up by throwing in a very controversial item like this stupid "Reimbursement Scheme".

Rear Stair Repair.    Except for info provided by Janet about the 26 steps in need of repair/replacement - nothing.  Nothing here to provide us with the kind of information that we need to make an informed judgment.   $46,000 is a ton of money for a project that we know little about.  An easy no vote.

The Drainage Issue.  When Resource sent out their assessment packet, it was the first time that most of us have heard about this issue.  The  Janet letter to support this assessment contained even less information than the stairwell repairs.

This assessment was a big wasted effort - not even a nice try.  And think of the postage and paper for which we are paying for that wasted effort.

The Current Problems.

Stairwell Repair.  There definitely is a problem with our stairs in the rear of the buildings.   When I mentioned the amount of this assessment for stairwell repairs ($46,000) to Jane Griffin, President of Elmwood,  - she was amazed!  They had recently encountered the same issues with their stairwells and had a contractor complete their job for an apparently good price.  She gave me the name of the contractor:  Lizotte Welding.

I spoke with Lizotte on the 24th and set up an appointment for some time later in that week.  At the Board Meeting of the 25th, I mentioned what I had done and wondered why Kimberly had not contacted Lizotte herself.  Kimberly admitted that she had attempted to get a proposal from Lizotte but was unable to have a meeting with them because of her busy schedule, time constraints or whatever.  This is the contractor that did the repair job on Elmwood,  the one contractor that had prior experience with this problem and was recommended by the President of Elmwood.  And Kimberly wouldn't put out the little extra effort to get a proposal from them!

On Saturday, October 29th,  Janet and I were with Todd Lizotte while he reviewed our stairwells to determine the scope of work and offer us a proposal..  The proposal that we received came in with a total of $22,700.  That proposal included replacing 49 steps at $19,600 and other items to reach the total price.  This does not include the costs for sanding and painting repairs that will be required for some of the steps that did not need to be replaced, work that could be done by a competent handyman.  Mr. Lizotte did a thorough job with an eye to doing the things that are needed now and may likely need to be done in a couple of more years.  I am completely satisfied with his proposal; Jane Griffin's referral, attests to the quality of work that the company does.



The Drainage Issue.  We've seen the evidence that there is, in fact, problems with drainage as the issues with 104, 105, 110 and 113 attest.  We've heard complaints from some of the owners on the first floors of our buildings that mold and mildew have been encroaching into their units.  We need a committee of competent owners that could look at the drainage problem and develop a strategy to handle it.  We don't need to throw $20,000 at the problem and hope it works.  Remember Laub, the contractor hired in 2014 whose work on 104 and 113 failed and cost us $5,200?

The Mansard Assessment. 

Word came out from Janet and her minions,  that the assessment our Board passed in 2015, to get shingles replaced on the mansards, was illegal.   Apparently a knock at me because, in my Blog, I did not support their first assessment.   They said our Board vote was illegal because it was not put to a vote by the owners.  This issue was raised repeatedly during the assessment debate and we asked our attorney if, we as a Board, could approve the assessment without an owner vote.  On February 26, 2015, our attorney, Anne Hathorn, a noted condo expert, sent an email to Randy Unwin, who was our  Ameri-Tech Property Manager at the time.  Her opinion is reprinted below.   This gave us a legal basis for what the Board did.  The fact is, the Board, in good conscience, did vote for approval of the assessment based upon the best information that we had.  With the new aluminum shingles, the appearance of the Circle has appreciated significantly; we are better off for it.  I make no apologies.

"As you may also know, there are some exceptions to the requirement that an owner vote is required to approve a material alteration.  That is, even if a proposed change would constitute a “material alteration,” a vote of the owners is not required, for one reason or another. When an association must replace an item and decides to use newer, better and/or more technologically advanced materials that would extend the life of the item and reduce future maintenance, the law creates an exception to the material alteration rule and allows the Board to make this change as a maintenance item, rather than as a material alteration.  If you have documentation that the aluminum shakes would do this, it is my opinion that the Board could replace the cedar shakes with aluminum shakes, without the consent of the unit owners."

The Future.   

We're facing some serious financial decisions here at Aspen Circle.  The next Board will determine how we go about solving the real problems we are facing.  Not only that, the next Board can have a significant input into the new budget for the next fiscal year.  I believe it is imperative that we take a sound, reasoned approach to solving these issues and get our budget on track.  That means that we have to put a strong Board in place next February.  We need owners to get involved and participate in the proceedings or we will be relegated to more of the same knee jerk management that we have experienced in the last few months.

During the assessment debate, we heard more of the: "if you can't afford to live here, then you should leave" mantra.   Most of us have heard that.  It is very likely that the ten owners that voted in favor of the $105,000 assessment, represent that view.  Remember those owners next year when it comes time to elect a new Board of Directors.  Their willingness to throw money at a problem without a well reasoned analysis, is what we don't want.   Those folks have champagne tastes while most of us are on a beer budget. We simply cannot afford for a majority of those folks to take control of our Board. 

Owners will pay for an assessment when they are presented with a well thought out and documented plan.  Even well off owners, however, do not want their money wasted on real or dubious projects, like the foolish $66,000 "Paint the Buildings".  

Further, we are not well served by our current Property Manager.  Resource was great when Gary was around - everybody loved Gary.  But we have Kimberly who has really imposed herself on the Circle and not in a good way.  She rammed through the roof repair contract on Building C -  a ten year repair option rather that a 20 year full replacement which cost $10,000 less; because of that, we're going to have to look at that roof again around 2026 and fork out more money (perhaps even before if the drains on that roof go bad).  She was too "busy" to get a contract proposal from Lizotte, a contractor with the right experience to take care of our stair repair problems; and whose proposal came in well under the $46,000 that our management was going to assess.  She mucked up the assessment with the "Reimbursement Scheme"; you may recall, she started this in May when the "Unbudgeted Maintenance" was first observed in the financial reports.   We still have the "Toth" tree (Building F) whose roots are making a mockery of the sidewalks near it and threaten the integrity of that building's slab - a tree that our Board, in March, asked Kimberly to get a contract to cut down.  And she mucked up the second attempt to balance the budget.  She should go.

We should also take a fresh look at our contract with Resource.  We are paying a large, monthly premium - about $785 per month.  This is expensive compared with the cost of other management companies in the area.  Are we really getting premium service for this premium price?  I don't think so.  It appears to me that we are getting what might be termed decent service and that is being kind.  Now it is likely that another management company may not be any better.  But if  "decent" service is the benchmark, I would suggest that we can that kind of service at less cost than we are paying Resource.  If we can get a manager for $200 per month less than the price we pay Resource, and I think we can, then we're saving $2,400 per year - money that we can be better used to trim our palm trees.

It has been pointed out, by my detractors,  that we have had 3 management companies that I have been associated with and I didn't get along with any.  Well, it's just possible that I have some pretty high standards and those companies failed to meet them.   I view management companies as a necessary evil.  But I will support a management company whose value is worth the money we pay them.  That management company is not Resource!

Cooperation and Communication.  

I was ripped at the meeting because, apparently, I didn't immediately run right over and inform our management team of what Jane Griffin had told me about Lizotte.  Janet followed with a plea that we should all work together toward the objectives of meeting the issues facing the Circle.

Now I am all for everybody rowing the boat together in the same direction.  But doesn't that start at the top??  When Janet was up north making grand plans for the Paint Building project, the Stairwell Repair project and the Drainage project, what did, we, as owners hear?  Yes, the President reported in May, that we were facing a large assessment for various projects but where were the details?  Did we get a memo or a newsletter to let us know what she was thinking?  Anything?   I understand that Janet keeps the other Board Members informed on a fairly regular basis.  But what of the owners that have to pay for those grand plans.   Maybe we would be more cooperative if there was better communication from above.  It's a two way street - cooperation comes with the price of communication.

And Finally.   I've been described as a bitter ex-president with an axe to grind.  A crotchety old obstructionist that  uses this Blog to dwell on the negative, deals in lies,  fabricates innuendos and general falsehoods.  Personally I don't see it that way but so be it.  

What I would like to see is a blog(s) from the defenders of the present management team so I can find out where I've gone wrong.  Tell me why the Paint Building Project is really so important and how that $66,000 cost was developed.  Tell me why we couldn't/wouldn't get the proposal from Lizotte which can save us $20,000 for the stairwell repairs.  Tell me why we should go along with the $20,000 assessment to take care of the drainage issues.   There are many questions and so few answers and I really, really would like to know.  The rationale for some of these projects would make for entertaining reading.  Here is my email address if you start a blog:  ajohn727@live.com.  Please make sure I get a copy!

Just my opinion!

Andy Johnson