Change of Staff

Apparently there has been a change in the Property Management staff. I do not yet know all the details, but Beth G. is reportedly not in the office anymore, and there have been changes in the maintenance crew.

More details will be provided as they become known.

Office Closure Feb 15th - 22nd

I stopped by the office to follow-up on the wild rumor that the property management staff had quit. Taped to the front door was the message that due to an internal financial audit the office is to be closed for a week.

I have no further information about this situation other than to say that I do not recall this having happened before. I mean, is this a standard operating procedure, or this an extraordinary measure that signals the existence of a significant problem?

Update From BOD Member Paulette Watson

The BOD settled on a candidate, Charles and interviewed him. Because of a conflict of interests, we could not further entertain hiring him at this time. We did not have another candidate that seemed to fit our community at this time.

In the meantime, our office is in good hands and is running as smoothly as possible with all of TaJ's daily and any on-going problems, many inherited from the past. Beth is, of course, still working in our office.

[Editor's note: I have heard many share their opinion that Beth G. is a dedicated worker who works tirelessly for the good of the community.]

Tree trimming will start again in about a week. We look forward to having the rest of the palms and other trees touching buildings trimmed before hurricane season takes hold. A cherry-picker will be rented as well as a mulcher to be used to get rid of the cuttings, helping us with clean up and giving us some needed mulch in the bargain. Our trimming of the trees, instead of hiring an outside company, is saving our Association thousands of dollars.

I would like to applaud the unit owners who picked up their brooms and rakes and helped out the last time by sweeping their driveways and even giving our staff some clean-up help. It certainly made our clean-up go faster. This is community togetherness at it's best.

Building Captains are passing out voting ballots for the staggered term for board members. It would be nice if we could have the unit owners fill them out and drop them off to the office or their building captain.

On this note, we have building captains for more than half of the buildings. And they are a great group of helpful people looking to make our community better. At a meeting held about two weeks ago, the building captains came up with many positive ideas - packaging any fliers, passing them out to their building as well as taking buildings with no captains to help our staff use their time for other necessary work, getting votes for whatever is needed, dispelling rumors and passing along information of use to other unit owners, wanting to be our "events committee" for things like organizing garage sales events, Easter and Halloween events for our community's children, maybe even a get together for adults with music provided free from Dave Muri's band ( a building captain for bldg 11), I've never been at a more positive and energizing meeting of a group as I was with this one of the building captains. They deserve our many thanks and cooperation.

We still have buildings with no captains and hope that others will join the committee. Co-captains for the buildings we have covered would help out as well. Unit owners who are interested in joining this group can sign up in the office or email pauletttewatson@bellsouthl.net or call 954.472.2283.

Paulette Watson

[Editor's note: I wish to express a special thanks to Paulette for providing the above information. All BOD members and unit owners are invited to share their information, thoughts, questions, and even complaints. Even though all are invited, only a few ever take the time to share. Thanks, Paulette!]

Property Manager Progress

There is no news to announce about a new Property Manager, except to say that the Human Resources Committee has been hard at work and has presented the BOD with some excellent candidates. The BOD met with some of those candidates and that is as far as the process has gone. We are all hoping that the BOD can come to a decision and hire a good leader to help guide the Association.

Property Manager Project Making Progress

The Human Relations Committee has been making progress toward finding a property manager. Four candidates were interviewed by four members of the committee last Saruday, and the field was narrowed to three strong choices.  Those three men have been scheduled for face-to-face meetings with BOD members. 

The HR committee is comprised of W2ndi H1ll (President of BOD), Mark Morgenstern (BOD member), Elliot Schertzer (former BOD member), Steve Frahm (former BOD President), Valerie DeRoy (Committee Chairperson).

The goal is to have a strong Property Manager in place for the new year.  Here's hoping for that and many other good resolutions to begin in January 2009.

BOD Meeting 15 May 2008

Una traducción española está disponible en Web site: www.TAJWatchSpanish.blogspot.com

The meeting began at 7:45pm, with BOD members WH, Dan Vermut, John Lovell, Mark Morgenstern, and Ben Odebralski. About 16 owners eventually joined the meeting.

The Agenda item was to approve, by BOD vote (it was unanimous), the hiring of a new accounting firm: Miele Brothers. The BOD reported that the new accountants claim to have over 30 years of experience and that they currently do the bookwork for Gingerwood properties in Plantation and Century Village in Pembroke Pines. They stated that their specialty the maximization of collections of delinquent accounts through personal phone calls to unit owners. Other information about the firm includes that they have no CPA on their staff, that they will provide a specific person dedicated to the TAJ bookkeeping needs, and that the BOD believes that they have a staff large enough to accommodate our needs. They are also believed to have been in the business of property management and landscaping. A google search of Miele Brothers does not return a website dedicated to Miele Bothers.
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The BOD determined that it was okay to add to the meeting Agenda if the BOD voted to do so (thereby avoiding the need to give the normal 48 hour posted notice of agenda items), so they voted to add the item of considering recent BOD resignations.
**Dan Capobianco's resignation was accepted with a nice speech of appreciation from John Lovell and a round of applause by the other BOD members and the unit owners who were present. John explained that Dan's departure has to do with deeply held differences between him and the BOD.
**Yvonne Fabazzio's resignation is in some dispute. John Lovell stated that she had been reprimanded by other BOD members for 1) being verbally abusive to the office staff, 2) for ordering a maintenance man to cut his hair, 3) for ordering the office manager out on a golf-cart to inspect the property as if she were the property manager. He went on to say that "I cannot work with her at all -- she is abusive" and recommended that the BOD accept her emailed letter of resignation.

Other BOD members countered with the thought that even though she did say she resigned in her email, since then she has continued to act in the capacity of treasurer and therefore maybe she is not serious about her resignation. Dan Vermut said let's give her the benefit of the doubt, WH stated that they would have a conversation with Yvonne with the attorney present (therefore it could be closed to the public) to see if she would agree to change the way she treats the office staff. Ben and Mark voted to wait and see about the resignation. So, as of now, there is one vacancy on the BOD and possibly two, but it is still up in the air.
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Another item that was voted to add to the agenda was the hiring of another attorney to represent TAJ in addition to Beth Lindie. The firm of Weinberg and Black was unanimously agreed upon. At least we think that is the name of the firm. There was no paperwork, no contract, no business card available for review by the BOD members or unit owners. Dan Vermut promised that the firm could be retained without cost to TAJ. He also said that any contract or agreement that was going to be signed by the BOD would be reviewed by his own personal litigation attorney, Athony J Titone (sp?) [It is unclear who is paying Titone for his service -- TAJ or Vermut]

WH said that we need another attorney in addition to Beth Lindie because of all the construction concerns that we have. Dan Vermut added that in the future Beth Lindie might possibly have a conflict of interest, although he did not go into specifics.
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Another item added to the agenda, brought by a unit owner, is the creation of a Yard Sale Day on June 7 & 8th during daylight hours. On those days it is okay for individual unit owners to have yard sales in front of their own units. Ideas of how to advertise the sale were discussed.
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Another piece of information that came to light is that apparently Lue, the current office manager, is preparing to take her CAM license and will at that time be promoted to the position of property manager.
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I left the meeting at 8:30pm to attend to other business, and the meeting was still on-going.

Helping Out

This story was first published in the TAJ Newsletter
Una traducción española está disponible en Web site: www.TAJWatchSpanish.blogspot.com
by Steve Frahm
In the absence of a Property Manager, BOD members and unit owners have been helping out in the office. Office staff has credited the whole BOD and unit owners Jan Johnson (Building 1) and Phyllis Fabara (Building 2) for donating their volunteer efforts. At the March 24th BOD meeting Yvonne Fabozzi reported that she has been putting in many hours going over the Association books. To all the BOD members and unit owners who are lending their expertise and time in the period of personnel shortage, the Association owes their collective thank you.