Notes on the Concerned Owners of Aquarius document to the Board

Bhagwan Buck Gupta (804S) and Nathan Weinstein (807S) have contributed their feedback on the document “Concerned Aquarius Owners Write to the Board,” referenced in an earlier post.

We wish to clarify that the document is still in the process of collecting signatures. With approval from the Board of Directors, the complete list of signatories will be disclosed publicly. Describing the document as “anonymous” at this time is inaccurate and premature, as transparency remains a priority once formal authorization is granted.

Thank you for your understanding as we follow due process.

Bhagwan Gupta 804S   wrote 

To all my neighbors:

If I did not know any better, I would think that Mr. Weinstein has been designated as a Public  Information Officer (PIO) for the current Board. No matter what the nature of enquiry is, he has the ability to spin it in such a way that a reader would be easily distracted to the past now three plus years old without addressing any current issues.
In regards to the so called transparency, there is not a single item mentioned in the letter that can be refuted with facts. 

The Town Hall meeting did not give out any valid information for the progress of the Phase One issues raised by the impacted residents living in line 4 & 5 . We have been suffering with no access to our balconies for nearly 5 months and with no relief in sight. We are still waiting on LTM staff to decide on a product to be used for filling cracks in the balconies.  It should come as no surprise that a product should have been identified prior to even going out to bid, as part of the specifications for  the stated purpose to be used  by the contractor.

In the case of making a claim for not having initiated the proposed Stairway to the Brach Project, which is now  4 years old,  there has been no details shared with the unit owners stating that the City of Hollywood had rejected the submittal. These drawings were developed by a licensed engineering firm, who were paid for delivering a set that would result in  receiving a permit from  all governmental agencies.  Instead of approaching the responsible party for making the necessary changes to get the permits, it was decided to simply trash the fully paid drawings.  Again, was this fact ever shared with the unit owners? We are still waiting to see any conceptual drawings for the proposed stairs . Is this called being transparent by the current Board?

Please address the issues raised in the letter, instead of beating the old drum, by blaming everything on the previous Board.

Signed by BGupta, Unit 804-S

Nathan Weinstein, 807S  wrote:

From Concerned unit 807S owner response to “concerned unit owners”.

I wasn’t going to respond to incognito owners insinuations at first but since it was distributed to all owners I decided to address some of their construed concerns.

Before I do it let me just briefly point out a few examples from the former boards “achievements” :

I do agree that the Aquarius buildings were neglected for a longtime until current board was elected:

• As far as I’m concerned we didn’t pass the 40 years recertification as it was required by the state because: the columns work repairs and roof replacement (roof was w/o insurance for more than ten years) was done only later during current board. We all know that we did obtain a signature on 40 years recertification completion, but I can’t explain how and why.
• The elevators and the AHU’s on the roof serving common areas and corridors, were purchased by the previous board, and were the worst possible selection of cheap and faulty equipment choice and companies to install them. There is not much current board could do now but to keep constantly repairing many costly break downs. It’s now easy to blame this board but if you are knowledgeable and fair you would know who should be blamed.

Now let me address just a few unfair and ridiculous claims:

“Lack of management causing major delays in Phase I of the construction project…”

• The recent Town Hall with contractor and engineer presented clear and detailed account of current construction phase and all owners’ questions were addressed. It should be understandable to everybody that the 50year recertification project is conducted under daily supervision by contractor’s supervisor and fully and daily managed by engineering company. You should remember that the former board didn’t hire a management company for a $15 million assessed 40 years recertification project. As a result of that the association overpaid additional $5.2 million w/o any approved change orders. Currently with new assessment we are paying for lots of repairs to installations done under previous board rein: balconies, columns, structures, etc.

“overdue completion of the new beach stairs, ramp and access door;”:

-The stairs replacement that is certainly long overdue does have a history:

 some may remember that about four years back under previous board at one of the meetings board announced that the stairs work portion cost about $175K would be removed from contractor scope of work explaining that it could be done at a lesser cost. The funds, we were told would be set aside until new contractor selected. Unfortunately stairs were never installed and money disappeared w/o any explanation to the owners. Therefore in the current assessment, that we are paying now, funds were included again to get stairs work done. As a member of engineering committee I was partially involved with that work and can inform you that the previous engineer stairs design that we paid for was rejected by the city. Current engineer company LTM had to redesign the stairs, the door, etc. and get the city approval. Currently we are awaiting the environmental agency lengthy delay in approval and only than work can start.

I am not going to respond to all claims in a disgruntled owner’s letter because they don’t have any merit. However I certainly need to touch on ridiculous “Total lack of transparency”.

 Current board is fully transparent on any and every action, work, etc: board monthly meetings present all pertinent information about new and existing problems, projects and financial standing; town hall meetings for roof installation project and current ongoing project were new form of reporting to owners, providing a complete and unique way to enlighten and explain interested owners.

In conclusion from my standpoint I feel lucky that we have now this responsible board that already made so many substantial improvements to Aquarius buildings and grounds. They had to work hard and spent their personal valuable time and a lot off efforts to make necessary improvements especially mandated by the state lows. All our board members are real altruists and I can’t understand our “concerned residents” who instead of praising board work and offering any help to improve their home and community, they coming up with untruthful accusations in a  smear campaign.

If anybody has any questions regarding my standing on the issues brought up and require more explanations, I can be easily found and will be happy to explain and discuss anything that I know further.

Just for you to know I treat Aquarius as my house and won’t be easily swayed away from reality with baseless claims and accusations.

Concerned owner,

Nathan Weinstein, 807S

.o0o.