I’m very pleased to report that International Village has passed the first phase of its 40-year certification with flying colors. The City of Lauderhill has certified that the association’s three oldest buildings – the Bordeaux, the Yorkshire and the clubhouse – do not pose any safety-related structural or electrical issues that need to be addressed. That means that – contrary to what the old guard had led us to believe – there will be no need for a special assessment to pay for costly repairs on these buildings. (The association’s nine remaining buildings have not yet been placed on notice for the 40-year inspection.)
This clean bill of health is in dramatic contrast to the alarmism of the previous Board of Directors, which had used the community’s upcoming 40-year anniversary as an excuse to award Miami-based Criterium Inspection Engineers a $22,000 contract in 2012 to perform a premature and highly flawed engineering report, although the building inspections weren't due yet and wouldn't have to be performed until the city gave us its official notice. (Until recently, we had reason to believe that wouldn't happen until 2019, but the inspections were accelerated by five years due to the actions of a disgruntled cabana unit owner and those who had been pushing the Criterium report.) To make matters worse, Criterium's report falsely asserted that International Village needed to perform more than $1 million in repairs to pass the 40-year certification. The 2012 Board led by former Directors Charles Fitzpatrick and Marvin Tow then approved two huge special assessments – a “Part 1” assessment to serve partly as a “down payment” on repairs, and a $1.4 million “Part 2” assessment to pay for the balance of the projects. Fortunately, the Part 2 assessment was put on hold following a major outcry from owners. Otherwise, we would have been stuck footing the bill for completely unnecessary repair work at bloated contractor prices.
As you may recall, last year I raised serious questions about the reliability of the Criterium report and demanded that we get a second opinion before beginning any work on the buildings. You may also recall the April 2013 town hall meeting in which Fitz Harris, a local professional engineer and 40-year certification specialist, informed us that the Criterium report did not follow the format of a 40-year inspection (see video starting at 8:04) and that most of the work it recommended was not necessary to pass inspections because it dealt with cosmetic issues and not safety problems, which are supposed be the sole concern of a 40-year inspection as explained in the law that governs the County-mandated program. We now know that in April 2012, just two months before the previous Board hired Criterium to perform the inspections at International Village, Criterium’s president Douglas Mercado was issued a citation by the state for using an unlicensed subcontractor to perform concrete restoration work at a Fort Lauderdale beachfront condo.
Fortunately, after International Village received the city’s official notice a few months ago that our three oldest buildings were due for the 40-year inspection, we got the second opinion we needed by hiring respected professional engineer Murat Kizikli, who works as a structural building inspector for the City of Boca Raton and is the owner of Ace Flood & Inspections, which performed International Village’s insurance inspections two years ago. For a small investment of $1,500 per building to obtain the required professional re-inspections that needed to be filed with the city, the association ended up saving more than $220,000 – which is approximately what we would have spent on unnecessary work on just those three buildings if we had relied on Criterium’s report. (See the cost comparison chart prepared by our Property Manager David Friedman HERE.)
Last Tuesday, the Board of Directors ratified the re-inspections and formalized other actions taken during our summer hiatus. (See 9/9/14 meeting video). In other actions, the Board:
This clean bill of health is in dramatic contrast to the alarmism of the previous Board of Directors, which had used the community’s upcoming 40-year anniversary as an excuse to award Miami-based Criterium Inspection Engineers a $22,000 contract in 2012 to perform a premature and highly flawed engineering report, although the building inspections weren't due yet and wouldn't have to be performed until the city gave us its official notice. (Until recently, we had reason to believe that wouldn't happen until 2019, but the inspections were accelerated by five years due to the actions of a disgruntled cabana unit owner and those who had been pushing the Criterium report.) To make matters worse, Criterium's report falsely asserted that International Village needed to perform more than $1 million in repairs to pass the 40-year certification. The 2012 Board led by former Directors Charles Fitzpatrick and Marvin Tow then approved two huge special assessments – a “Part 1” assessment to serve partly as a “down payment” on repairs, and a $1.4 million “Part 2” assessment to pay for the balance of the projects. Fortunately, the Part 2 assessment was put on hold following a major outcry from owners. Otherwise, we would have been stuck footing the bill for completely unnecessary repair work at bloated contractor prices.
As you may recall, last year I raised serious questions about the reliability of the Criterium report and demanded that we get a second opinion before beginning any work on the buildings. You may also recall the April 2013 town hall meeting in which Fitz Harris, a local professional engineer and 40-year certification specialist, informed us that the Criterium report did not follow the format of a 40-year inspection (see video starting at 8:04) and that most of the work it recommended was not necessary to pass inspections because it dealt with cosmetic issues and not safety problems, which are supposed be the sole concern of a 40-year inspection as explained in the law that governs the County-mandated program. We now know that in April 2012, just two months before the previous Board hired Criterium to perform the inspections at International Village, Criterium’s president Douglas Mercado was issued a citation by the state for using an unlicensed subcontractor to perform concrete restoration work at a Fort Lauderdale beachfront condo.
Fortunately, after International Village received the city’s official notice a few months ago that our three oldest buildings were due for the 40-year inspection, we got the second opinion we needed by hiring respected professional engineer Murat Kizikli, who works as a structural building inspector for the City of Boca Raton and is the owner of Ace Flood & Inspections, which performed International Village’s insurance inspections two years ago. For a small investment of $1,500 per building to obtain the required professional re-inspections that needed to be filed with the city, the association ended up saving more than $220,000 – which is approximately what we would have spent on unnecessary work on just those three buildings if we had relied on Criterium’s report. (See the cost comparison chart prepared by our Property Manager David Friedman HERE.)
Last Tuesday, the Board of Directors ratified the re-inspections and formalized other actions taken during our summer hiatus. (See 9/9/14 meeting video). In other actions, the Board:
- Appointed unit owners Colbert “Carl” Simmonds, a retired database manager for Citibank and Vietnam veteran; and Richard “Rabbit” Young, a former equipment and machine design engineer for Sylvania, to fill two of the Board vacancies created by the recent resignations. Please join me in welcoming these two highly respected and involved owners to the Board; their experience and expertise will be a huge asset to the association.
- Appointed Director Simmonds as Board Secretary to replace Wendy Hernandez following her many unprofessional and unethical shenanigans.
- Terminated the association’s collections contract with Alliance CAS due to the company’s dismal performance since 2012, when it was hired by the Fitzpatrick-Tow board to take over collections – resulting in a dramatic increase in our delinquency rate over the following two years.
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