Meet your Neighbors BBQ

This Sunday will be a good opportunity for International Village residents to meet their neighbors. Jorge Navarrette will be hosting a "Community BBQ" on March 24 from 4 to 7 p.m. in the picnic/barbeque area next to the tennis courts. Cold soda, condiments, plates and hot grill will be provided, along with music. Residents are asked to bring their own grilling foods. For more information, call (954) 673-3463.

Show of Solidarity

I want to thank every unit owner who showed up at the last Board of Directors meeting this past Monday, especially those who spoke up to express their disapproval of any proposed new special assessment. You packed the room, and the Board took notice of your show of solidarity. Now owners need to keep the momentum going by continuing to show up in large numbers at meetings and staying vigilant, because we are still not out of the woods and some on the Board, including Board President Marvin Tow, are still gung-ho on a big special assessment, as he made clear in his remarks.

Several owners with experience in construction and engineering who had time to review the $22,000 engineering report (see summary) pointed out that most of the deficiencies listed in the report can easily be handled by our own maintenance crew and don’t require the Association to hire a contractor. In fact, most of these issues wouldn't be a problem in the first place if the Association had been doing proper maintenance all along. I requested our property manager Jason Levy to create a maintenance schedule to address every maintenance-related issue in the report, indicating how often they will be maintained (monthly, semiannually, etc.) so they don’t become problems again in the future.

Jason told us that Criterium Engineers, the company that prepared the report, has agreed to update the report in the future at no cost so we don’t have to pay to commission another one when and if the city requires us to begin our 40-year certification process. Criterium said they will put that agreement in writing. Stay tuned.

The bottom line is that unit owners don’t want another special assessment, and we don’t need one. There may be a very small number of items that present a safety issue and require a contractor, but we can pay for these without busting our budget if we learn to live within our means and stop wasting money on things we don’t need. Case in point: $3,588 to install a wheelchair-accessible automatic door in the Marseilles building at the request of a handicapped resident. The Board approved this item based on our management company’s advice that it was required under the Americans with Disabilities Act. I did a little digging, talked to an attorney and found out that the ADA doesn’t apply to condos. The relevant law is the Fair Housing Act, which allows reasonable modifications for handicap accessibility, but places the financial burden on the individual requesting them, as explained in this statement from the Justice Department and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. I am trying to see if we can get the Board to reconsider this item. To be continued…

Other highlights of the meeting included Collette Goslin telling Jerry Mirrow “F… you” and the totally illogical perpetuation of a rule banning bicycles on balconies, meaning that yours truly will continue having to make his bike part of his living room décor.

You can watch the meeting here.

No rush to complete big projects

On March 7, I attended the first meeting of the Special Projects committee, informally known as the "40-year certification" committee. (See meeting video here.) The big news from the meeting is that the city has not asked us to begin our 40-year certification, a county-mandated process that calls for safety-related inspections and improvements to buildings that have reached the 40-year mark. That's good news, because it means there is no need for a special assessment anytime soon to carry out the more than $3 million in building repairs and improvements outlined in the 2-inch-think engineer's report the Board of Directors commissioned last year. The bad news is that we didn't have to spend the $22,000 it cost to produce that report. Somehow, the fact that the report wasn't necessary until we receive a 40-year citation letter from the city, and that such a letter had never been sent, was not clearly communicated either intentionally or unintentionally, and the Board unfortunately jumped the gun and spent money we didn't need to. Clay Parker, a Sunny Isles building official who was invited to speak about the certification process (and who was actually one of the carpenters working on the construction of International Village back in 1971), said we probably won't hear from the city until October of this year at the earliest. The question is whether by that time the report, which is based on a July 2012 inspection, will be considered too outdated to rely on, thereby forcing us to spend another $20,000 or so to commission another one.

This is another example of how we need to be more prudent in spending unit-owners' hard-earned money, but let's not make matters worse by rushing to complete these big projects for no other reason than to justify the unwise expenditure of money on this report.

This issue will be discussed at our next Board of Directors meeting on Monday, March 18 at 7 p.m. at the clubhouse. I urge you all to attend and make your voices heard, especially if you aren't ready for another huge special assessment.

Thank you

Let me take this opportunity to once again thank all the unit owners who voted for me on Feb. 26 to represent you on the Board of Directors. I am humbled and honored by the confidence you have placed in me, and I hope to prove worthy of your trust. But I need your help to keep me informed of issues on your mind, and I am asking for your continued involvement and input so we can work together to make our beautiful Village a better place to live.

As I said during the campaign, I was motivated to run because of my concern about the rising maintenance fees and assessments and their financial impact on unit owners. In the current economic environment, I believe the most prudent course of action is to postpone any major projects that would require another assessment or maintenance fee increase on top of what people have already had to pay. Let's give people some time to get their finances back in order as the real estate market continues to recover, which will bring more buyers and maintenance revenues to International Village and help our budget situation without raising fees or assessments.

I also want to encourage unit owners to get more involved in volunteering their time and energy to join committees, plan social activities and carry out beautification projects that don't cost the association anything but foster a greater sense of community and improve our quality of life in the Village.

Once again, I want to express my gratitude to everyone who supported me in the election as well as my sincere hope that you will stay involved and connected.