My time as President of the Board is officially at an end. My unit was sold. I cannot serve on the Board as per our Condo Documents. I would like to thank our remaining Board Members for their help and hard work, and it really was hard work! Everyone I spoke to told me that a concrete restoration job is the hardest job for any Board to handle. As we know it is expensive, loud, dirty and EXTREMELY intrusive. The majority of our owners were understanding and some were very helpful. Unfortunately, there are several owners who have been nothing but trouble due to their lack of understanding. If you live in a condo, there needs to be a “we” attitude, not an “I” attitude. I took it upon myself, with the blessings of the Board, to send a weekly update including ALL of the information that was given to Board Members throughout my term in office. . This is Update #239 since I started. If you feel you are uninformed, then YOU should have been reading the updates. I can send it, but I cannot make you read it. We have 134 units. We have emails for 121 of those owners. Some of the owners who did not have an email had a friend or child contact me and I added them to our email list. Essentially, if you wanted updates, they were available. When our former Board Member, Ron Zeller, set up and figured out with Ali how our website worked, I started posting there. I gave 2 months notice that this was happening. I posted each week that if you needed help Ali would help you set up an owner’s log on including an email automatically sent to you when information was added to the website. If you did not follow directions that was your choice.
I would be totally remiss if I did not thank the members of our Board. I would like to remember Bob Walsh who joined the Board at my request and helped us tremendously with our discussions with our engineers.
Herb Gloutney, our Secretary has performed his responsibilities flawlessly and I greatly appreciated his ability to point out issues that I walked past 10 times and never noticed. He became my eyes for those issues.
George Brennan graciously agreed to be appointed to Ron Zeller’s spot on the Board. He brought us 10 years of experience as a Board President in New York. I know the building he was President of. My brother-in-law lived there. It IS a luxury building on the beach in New York. During the short time we were on the Board together he gave me great advice which came from experience.
Our Treasurer, Steve Segal, has worked his butt off trying to keep our books in order, coordinated with the Accountant and Insurance people. During our Budget Meeting several weeks ago, he admitted to being cheap. He is actually only cheap with condo money and that is actually a good thing. I can’t tell you how many times I got a call from him asking me if I was crazy spending that much money! He surely kept ME from over spending and in many cases it was simply a matter of waiting a month until the funds were available.
Our current acting President, Pete Wilsens, was a God send. He was a Marine combat veteran, a Dentist, a building owner, and by virtue of his being a Dentist he was a small business owner with an understanding of business. While Ali and I ran point on the current construction, which took up so much of our time, he was there when we needed him to back us up. He also told Ali and me that he would start the ball rolling with the State Mandated ELSS law. The fact that he picked up the ball and ran with it has put us way ahead of the game. We have been grand-fathered into requirements that will save us money with what needs to be done down the road in work and permit costs. Let’s not even consider how long it takes to actually GET the permits once they are applied for.
Last, but certainly not least, I must talk about Ali. Ali was hired upon the exit of our former President and previous manager. Ali and I began together and tried to re-invent the wheel. As we found contractors that were unresponsive, we switched to new ones. When we questioned fees, we found new vendors. Once the concrete restoration began, NO ONE could have been more involved than she was. She spoke to the engineers, the foreman and the project manager daily. She supervised when units needed to be entered for necessary work. Ali never watched the clock. There were days I threw her out at 5 or 6 PM because “something had come up.” Ali reached a point where she could run the building pretty much on her own, with occasional phone calls to Steve, Pete or me to approve an expenditure or unforeseen construction issue. I know I have told you this before.
There is a rumor going around that Ali is leaving. It is not a rumor. But even with this, she arranged not to start her new job until January so she could be here to help with the necessary transition.
Your acting President, Pete Wilsens asked everyone to respect how important Ali is to the running of the building and to treat her with respect. Obviously, if she is running the construction and arranging to repair someone’s leak, she cannot stop and talk to you right away. It was a huge job. One day, an owner who does not live in the building, but rents his unit, told her to sit down he wanted to talk to her. She called me very upset afterwards telling me in short that she felt totally disrespected by his demeanor and insinuations. She told me that as a result she was quitting. I spoke to her for a long time and calmed her down and got her to re-think her decision. Unfortunately, several days after that another owner came to the office to “talk” to her. There were several witnesses to this conversation. Neither of them, nor Ali would tell me what he said. One witness, a personal friend of mine, would not tell me what he said, but stated, “He spoke to Ali in way that no man should ever speak to a young woman.” As close a friend as I consider him, he would say no more. I know from emails I had with this owner that he felt that we did not know what we are doing, but his unit watcher did and told him what was really going on. I must point out that he has been in the building for about 2 weeks in the last 3 years. How he could be more versed in our construction I have no idea.
I made many good friends during my time at the Aristocrat. I could not just get up and walk away from them and drop the construction into someone else’s lap. Since I am no longer on the Board, nor am I an owner, I offered to stay on and help manage the concrete project as long as I am needed. I requested to be hired as a “consultant” for $1 per year. I promised out “cheap” treasurer that if the job is done in 6 months, I would return 50 cents. I was also asked to assist in reference to the Board’s search for a Management Company to replace Ali. As Peter told everyone, keeping Ali was a key part to the welfare of the building. We worked hard to get Ali to the point where she could essentially operate the building on her own. This would especially have been true following the ongoing construction. We have all worked too hard to start over from scratch. The shame of it is that Ali had been trained. Luckily, she will be moving on to a better job. That is the Aristocrat’s loss.
I have no doubt that this current Board can lead the Aristocrat back to the position of a Luxury Building by the Sea.
PS-I will still be sending construction updates.
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