Discussion addressing concerns about grilling

 

A few resident owners in The Elizabeth have asked me to write something about acquiring, installing, and using grills on our patios. People feel their concerns have not adequately been addressed. Below is a detailed discussion of the various issues related to the proposed grilling project.

 

LIABILITY RISKS and SAFETY CONCERNS

Condominium associations may be held liable for injuries or damages that occur in common areas, and grilling accidents are not uncommon. According to a study by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), grills cause over 10,600 home fires each year, with gas grills responsible for 84% of these incidents. The Elizabeth grilling project intends to use propane gas. The big question is who will monitor and enforce safety rules?

Currently, The Elizabeth is part of the secondary insurance market, which results in significantly higher insurance premiums compared to the primary market. Should a fire or personal injury occur, leading to substantial costs for the Association, we could risk losing the opportunity to return to the primary insurance market. This loss could also jeopardize our Master Condominium insurance coverage.

 

CLEANING and MAINTENANCE

Safety rules for use of grills begins with cleaning the grills after every use. I understand the Committee plans to draft safety rules for grill use, and cleaning. Grills require time to cool down before they can be cleaned.  Who is going to monitor that grills are maintained and properly cleaned after each use?

There is already concern regarding cleaning responsibilities within the building. For example, some pet owners do not clean up after their dogs in elevators and on marble floors, leaving these tasks to the staff. Grilling is likely to take place after work hours and on weekends, adding to the workload of the cleaning staff, who already have many responsibilities.

 

PESTS

Grills can leave behind food debris and grease.  This attracts mice, rats, insects, and birds, which increases our need for pest control, adding to operational costs, especially because not all residents consistently follow proper procedures.

 

THE COST

The estimated cost of the grilling project, as reported at the August Board meeting, is approximately $10,000. Given other pressing needs, such as replacing the front canopy (where mosquitoes currently nest due to the canopy’s age and indentations), wouldn’t we be better off financially and health-wise to take care of more important projects first?

 

NUISANCE FACTORS

We live in a smoke-free building. While the smoke from a grill may not be as noxious as tobacco smoke, it is annoying, especially to people who live on the lower floors where the smoke can enter an apartment and get into the fabric of curtains and furniture.  To people with allergies and respiratory illness, smoke from a propane grill can be a serious irritant.

In our apartments, we are all asked to use our exhaust fans when cooking.  The odor of meat cooking on a grill cannot be vented away from the building. We live in a community where some people are opposed to eating animals. I doubt that vegetarians or vegans would like to have that smell in their apartments.

 

GRILLING ALTERNATIVES

Let’s get behind opening Paige Park which is down North Park Ave and have grills returned to that site. Also, Rock Creek Park has various sites available for grilling.

 

YOUR COMMENTS ARE INVITED

Your comments are encouraged about installing outdoor grills at the Elizabeth. Send them to the full board so they can take your concerns into consideration when making this important decision.  Here are their email addresses for your copy-and-paste convenience:

 

cjsn@verizon.net

attorneykra@gmail.com

francinejkerner@gmail.com

jeremy.r.siegfried@gmail.com

Ellen@kolodnor.com

freebirdtony@yahoo.com

karin.bues@gmail.com

 

Your Disappearing Services at the Elizabeth

 

The General Manager (GM) at the Elizabeth has decreed that the Association WILL NOT

 

—recycle batteries & light bulbs

—dispose of small, broken household items like rollerbags, lamps, mops, etc. that can’t be sent down the trash chutes.

 

Instead, residents are being told to get rid of these items by themselves. This means the residents are supposed to drive these items to the Montgomery County dump which is about 40 minutes away or hire a company to haul the unwanted stuff away for them.

 

Initially, our GM said to throw the batteries in the trash, which is both an environmental hazard and, worse, a way to ignite a fire. I am the one who immediately advised our GM that this advice was a bad judgment call.

 

If we lived in a house instead of a condominium, we could call for a pick up of unwanted items. The county doesn’t do that for individuals who live in big buildings like ours.

 

How many of us are going to make runs to the Montgomery County Dump? Not me and think about how inefficient that would be for over 350 units having to drive their small number of batteries and broken items to the dump. We would be adding a ridiculous amount of vehicular pollution to our environment.

 

What can be done about this?

 

It’s time for residents to come to the board meeting and voice preferences for keeping services we have always had. OR write to the full Board now. You can do this through BuildingLink.

 

And by the way, move the batteries/bulbs recycle bins so the bins don’t sit next to the stairway. Put a trashcan there.

 

Also,  the following services have been discontinued by our GM. These are services that should immediately be reinstated. 

 

1.        Residents are now being told that the Elizabeth will no longer snake stopped up drains/toilets. Instead, residents are being told that they must hire a plumber to do this.  Another was told that the snake was not long enough to snake her pipes, yet I am told that the Elizabeth purchased a new longer snake when Barry was here.

 

2.        Since the building has existed, staff has always been willing to boost cars with dead batteries.  When Richard  Springer was here, he even purchased a new, improved hand-held battery charger. Sadly, people are being told that we are no longer providing this service.  This service has always been provided to our residents and guests, and only takes a few minutes to perform. 

 

3.        If people are putting the wrong things into the composting bins, then post a list of what is allowed in the bins AND put a memo under the doors to educate people. One board member told me that some people have been putting dog waste in the composting bins.

 

4.        Breaking down boxes is something management can ask people to do voluntarily, but there are plenty of people living in the building who just don’t have the hand strength to do it. This is a service we should continue. Our cleaning people are here to work for us.

 

Finally, our GM should NOT be making unilateral decisions about our services. It affects the quality life here in the Elizabeth and eventually it will affect our real estate values. This should be a Board decision in consultation with Association members, just like any other changes to House Rules. We pay high condo fees, and we should get the kind of services that make the Elizabeth a good place to live.

 

More on Mosquitoes

 One of our Elizabeth neighbors sent this comment:

Thank you for the note and the alert. 

 

My second professional career is as language interpreter. In this capacity, soon after I arrived with my family in the US from Australia in 1998, I went to work for a local DC language services company. One of the first jobs I was assigned to was the family of an 8 year old boy who had contracted West Nile virus as a result of a mosquito bite in their family yard. 

 

The boy was paralyzed though fortunately intellectually intact. He spent months at the (then) Hospital for Sick Children after spending weeks at Children's Hospital. A team of medical experts, nurses, social workers, hospital administrators, and health professionals, in addition to his agonizing parents met regularly for diagnostic purposes,  and held special meetings to organize the return of the child back home in DC. This required building a door to street ramp, re-arranging the inside living space of his parent's home, and getting special equipment (bed, hospital style monitors, etc.) and training the parents to clean and change regularly the artificial feeding tube he had on his tracheotomised throat. 

 

This is an extremely serious condition for adults. For children it can be crippling and life threatening. 

No-one should dismiss this and anyone seeing a mosquito should immediately alert those able to spray and control the pest. 

 

Kind regards,

Montserrat 

 

Mosquitoes

 

Some of you know that the Nation’s most prominent infectious disease doctor Anthony Fauci was hospitalized recently for six days with the West Nile virus. Dr. Fauci lives in Bethesda and he thinks the only plausible explanation for how he came to be infected by a mosquito carrying that incurable disease with no vaccine for prevention is that the mosquito bit him in his backyard.

 

How does this apply to us living here at the Elizabeth?

 

Perhaps you have noticed that we have mosquitoes flying around in our building, particularly the lobby. Just ask the concierge on duty if he or she has been bothered by these insects. Maybe you have seen them waving around a device that looks like a tennis racket—it’s supposed to help kill these insects or at least chase them away.

 

How are they getting into our lobby?

 

They come through our front doors which have significant spaces between those glass doors and because we have an electric door opening option which keeps the doors open longer than if a person opened the door manually. Furthermore, the mosquitoes breed in the flower pots  and garden areas that are outside our doors.

 

What is management doing about this problem?

 

If you ask our General Manager, she will tell you she has asked our contracted exterminator to treat the area outside the doors. Obviously, this isn’t working. AND this problem happened last year too. I wrote about this last year.

https://theelizabethcondo.blogspot.com/2023/08/mosquitoesare-you-getting-bitten.html

 

 

What else can be done?

 

Other condominiums have hired a contractor who specializes in this problem and comes more frequently during the mosquito period to ensure that the problem doesn’t persist.

 

Discuss this problem which will persist until the first frost with your neighbors to make sure everyone understands that this is a serious health problem that can be solved easily.

Highlights of ECA Board Meeting June 26, 2024

 

 Board Present: Joe Bucherer (president), Francine Klein, Bob LaRossa, Tony Ortiz, Carmine Spellane

 

Board Absent: Karen Bues, Jeremy Siegfried

 

Others Present: Lee Ann Weir, General Manager; Jeremy Tucker (ECA Legal Counsel, Lerch Early & Brewer), Two Elcon Contractors (associated with elevator renovation)

 

Elevator Renovation

 

Contractors provided a tutorial on why the garage elevator renovation came to a grinding stop and another expert contractor must be used to dig the hole required to set up the new hydraulic system required. Joe Bucherer authorized a large payment associated with this work without first calling a special meeting to get approval. The approval was accomplished in this meeting after the fact.

 

Comments from Attendees:

 

Regarding the frequent fire alarms, Al Muller suggested strongly that a $100 fine be levied against residents who cause the fire alarm to go off unnecessarily.

 

Kathryn Avdrizzone made a plea for better security in The Elizabeth after an intruder entered her unit late Saturday evening June 22. Concern was also expressed that the concierge did not act on two requests that the police be called. (Discussion ensued later in the meeting relative to the Arcade door needing to be locked at 9 pm and reopened at 5 am.) This intruder also exposed himself to a woman using the lobby level restroom.

 

Other comments included problems of birds nesting on balconies and the request to tell residents not to feed the birds. A request for board meetings to resume in person. A query about why there is only one bin for composting on each side of the building. (The GM said bins were not full and she thought it would save some money by using one bin.)

 

Legal Report

 

Jeremy Tucker discussed properties in The Elizabeth involving two units that were combined into one apartment. To sell or transfer that particular property it required approval from The Elizabeth Board. This was granted to Charles Bressler. His son Marc will gain legal ownership as his father can now transfer the property to his son. Another person asked about getting that legal designation for his joined apartments and whether Jeremy Tucker can help facilitate that for him and others who might share some of the expenses.

 

A pending issue concerns the plumber who was accused of causing the last massive water damage to many apartments in the East Tower several months ago. If a deal isn’t agreed upon, then The Elizabeth might file suit.

 

Pool Renovation

 

Without Association-wide discussion, the Board approved renovations to The Elizabeth pool that would include converting it to a salt water pool, updating the steps, and renovating the chair lift for disabled users of the pool. Three bids were reviewed. Specialty Pools was selected. Renovation is estimated to take one month and be completed before Labor Day. One question lingers and that is, why was this a priority given the worry over additional costs of our new master insurance policy?

 

Community News

The next three months expect long backups on River Road due to utility work involving Washington Gas.

 

 

This Board Meeting was attended by 72 people. It helped that the GM re-sent the link just prior to meeting time.

URGENT: Upcoming Board Decision Will Affect You!

 

On September 26, 2023, I spoke with our General Manager Lee Ann Weir to understand what is involved in the Maintenance Contract that the Board will vote on Wednesday evening, September 27.   Lee Ann explained the following:

 

·      The contract is slated for a company named Tolin.  Tolin would find and interview candidates for the engineering positions for our building. (This means the new engineers would be on contract with Tolin -- not employees of The Elizabeth. It also means that once Barry Blanton leaves, we would lose our institutional memory.)

 

·       The engineers most likely would NOT live in The Elizabeth.  (This probably means that they would be here Monday through Friday during normal working hours, but be on call evenings, weekends and holidays.)

With so many problems involving water, heating, ventilation, air conditioning, plumbing, building structure, and other issues that are part of an aging building, live-on Engineers are critical, and the Chief Engineer is perhaps our most critical position.  Please consider this:

·      Water damage, not fire, is the #1 cause of high insurance claims in condominiums.  In emergencies, response-time is critical to prevent serious damage.

·      Outside contractors mean delays in attending to critical situations. If water is pouring into an apartment, every second counts. In 30 minutes, a flood on a higher floor can wreak havoc, affecting neighboring units on the same floor and on the floors below, including the common areas. 

·      Such water damage can easily result in hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance claims, including loss of insurance, as The Elizabeth experienced a few years ago.

·      If contract engineers are only here Mon-Fri, what happens in the evenings, on weekend, and holidays when a flood occurs? 

o   Even assuming they will respond to calls, and they can get here in 30 minutes, how much water damage will be done in 30 minutes? 

o   How many of our residents know where the water turn-offs are in their unit? 

o   Even if we explain where the cut-offs are, how many are able to get down on their hands and knees to turn off the water?
 

o   Will those with arthritic or weak hands be able to turn the knobs?

o   What about flooding that originates in an apartment whose owners are away?

 It is important to point out that not only does this position require a license, it requires a Class I Stationary Engineer License because of the size of our largest chiller. Barry Blanton has a Class I license. Breach of these requirements can result in fines and jail time. (This requirement cannot be waived.)  Refer to FAQs on Maryland Department of Labor website at https://www.dllr.state.md.us/license/stateng/statenggenlfaqs.shtml (Questions 6, 7, and 8) 

 

Please feel free to share this blogpost with others in the building who may not receive this.

Mosquitoes—Are You Getting Bitten?

 

 

Recently I stood outside the front door here at The Elizabeth and got several mosquito bites on my ankles and legs. Have you noticed that our night time concierge covers up not only his arms but also his head?  While opening the front doors allows mosquitoes to fly into the lobby, with the large gap between the doors, mosquitoes can get in regardless.

 

Many of the mosquitoes in our area bite all day and some of them are known to carry Zika and Dengue Fever. https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/mosquito/species.html

 

We need the exterminator to treat the outside flower beds as well as our lobby and garage now. This problem typically persists until the first frost which might happen in October.

 

Do your part and let our Board of Directors know you want the mosquito problem addressed now. After all, we pay high condo fees and deserve quality service to ensure we are not plagued by rodents or insects like roaches, spiders, and mosquitoes.

 

Karren Alenier