Pound the Table: ECA President Lends an Ear

On July 23, 2017, ECA Board President Zlatan Beca invited members of the Association to a free-for-all gripe session.  He had hoped by naming the event “Pound the Table” that he would attract some younger and newer residents living at the Elizabeth.

Nope. Same folks who attend such events, including the monthly board meetings, showed up and, without any rules stated, proceeded to beat dead horses by mindlessly repeating their complaints as if no one else had not already discussed their topics of choice. Additionally, some people used the time as if it were a therapy session wandering aimlessly from one thought to the next.

After running out of patience, I left after 45 minutes. Others, including a couple of Board directors, had already started slipping away. Among the topics addressed:

—Discontent with the neighborhood developer's briefing and how they are offering nothing of interest to Friendship Heights.

—Cigarette smoke has been detected wafting into the pool area through the open doors.

—Motorists continue to park in the circular driveway.

[Z said action is being taken soon to paint the curb yellow and to line up towing.]

—EPipe put us in debt.

[No one mentioned that the Association was going to lose our insurance if such an action had not been taken.]

—The Association needs options for income to erase debt and continue to build our reserve fund. Coupled with this were gripes about the large condo fee increases. Some people said they prefer an assessment but no one said they would work on the bylaws that keep us from successfully imposing an assessment.

—The community at the Elizabeth needs an attitude adjustment.

[Note: while I was present, most people were polite and appropriately behaved.]

—People are leaving carts that belong at the front door of the lobby on their floors without regard to returning them to their proper station.

—Owners are failing to clean up after their dogs.

—Hallways are a disgrace and are keeping our property values down.

[There are 16 apartments currently on the market and about 1/3, according to Z, maybe people who can’t stand the bad behavior of our community members.]

—The swimming pool has seen better days.

TIME TO REPLACE YOUR OLD HVACs

The reason I came to the meeting (but I never had a chance to speak) was to urge owners who have not updated their HVAC systems to give D&A their business. After twice rejecting contracts with Quality Air for replacement of my heating and cooling units, I was pleased by D&A’s service and price.

I also wanted to commend our Engineering team—Chief Engineer Ricardo Castro, Hollis Alleyne and Marcel Straker. For over 6 weeks, I had a leak in my apartment during the high humidity periods we have been getting this summer. This problem also happened in my apartment about two years ago and was never resolved. This time Marcel suggested trying dye to trace the water’s path. The dye helped Hollis find broken water run off lines under an old HVAC system two floors above me.

Ricardo said if folks would replace their old HVAC systems, we would suffer fewer problems with leaking related to condensate lines and the old water pans and hoses under those old HVACs.