While I should be writing my review of Turandot, I thought some folks who were not at this evening’s (May 26, 2009) board meeting on professional management might want to know something about what happened.
It was a full house in the West Lobby. ECA Woody Cunningham made interesting opening comments. He said we have been operating like a family business with a management team that is out of control: no policy on hiring and firing, no training for our employees, no performance reviews, no backup for engineering, a five year plan that is a sham, and reacting to one crises after another. He answered the allegation that this Board is not transparent by saying that this has been a Board much more open than the previous Board that hired Ed Polite (operations manager) in secret. He said this had not been a rubber stamp board.
Next came comments from those in attendance. There were comments from 18 people that I noted including one man who did not live or own in the building. Comments included such suggestions as presenting comments in a civil manner, postponing the vote, how much Legum and Norman (L & N) are bonded for, how personnel who will be let go will be treated financially, what yardstick we will measure L & N performance, costs that might go up over time from L & N, more time to consider big decisions, outright desire not to change things as the stand, what happens if the building is left to deteriorate.
Board Members followed Association members and stated their comments and which way they were voting. The most surprising statement came from Jeffrey Axelrad who said The Elizabeth had been cited for a building code violation by the County for failing to fix some structural problem. Yes, we really need some proactive building management!
The vote was 4 for professional management (Woody Cunningham, Jeffrey Axelrad, Judi Barth, and Al Muller. Three were against: Charles Bressler, Monique Fridell, Alexander Kielty. Fridell said she wanted to restructure the personnel and would have done the plan herself except the Board rejected her offer. Both Fridell and Kielty vowed to work with the Board no matter if professional management was voted for. Bressler said he had a fiduciary responsibility to the owners and wanted the vote on professional management postponed.
Judi Barth provided information about L & N, a 40-year firm that manages 125 building representing over 70,000 units. She said they took one year to study many professional management firms. The most interesting set of comments came from Al Muller who pointed out that we must keep our condo competitive in the current buyer’s market. He reaffirmed that the cost of hiring L & N had been evaluated by a third party (our accountants DeLeon & Stang). He said we will realize lots of cost saving in the next few years but we need a team effort meaning everyone in the Association, the Board and the staff. Muller said when he was on the Friendship Heights Village Board, people said they didn't want the Village bus service and later they didn't want the community center. He asked did anyone want to give up those things now? Alexandra Kielty was mostly concerned with things she didn’t understand in the contract and got those questions answered by our condo lawyer Jason Fisher.
Ok, now I am free to think about why Puccini’s Turandot would kill so many men who sought her hand. Fear of change! Time to find the love.
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