Winter's Still Ragin' in These Hills

Snow from a relentless winter melted from rooftops of the detached condos at The Hills of Monroe long ago, but ice damming caused when water seeps under tiles and freezes has led to severe water damage in 139 units.

Residents crammed into the Ehlers Meeting Room of Edith Wheeler Memorial Library Thursday night to attend a condo board meeting to discuss a one-time special assessment of between $1,000 and $2,000 per homeowner that is being proposed to pay for the damages.

But an opening statement from board vice president, John Lewendowski, got things off to a rocky start.

"We have changed the agenda to just have a vote on the budget and on two open positions on the board," he announced. "We took the special assessment off the agenda. We don't have enough information to answer all of your questions tonight. We'll have another meeting for that."

"I just want to note that you wasted our time," said one disgruntled resident.

Lewendowski apologized and Bill Pappas, the board member in charge of finance, started to go over the proposed operating budget.

"I think it's disingenuous to put such a controversial thing on an agenda and take it off the day of the meeting," said Chris Catropa, a Town Councilman who lives at The Hills of Monroe. "If they didn't have all the information, how were they able to come up with the cost estimates? I question their motivation."

Pappas said ice damage added up to $92,276 to remove snow from roofs and haul it away.

Connie Fassaroli of Consolidated Management Group, Inc., which is in charge of maintainance for the condo complex, said of the conditions, "Guys were out there with chisels and shovels. It was not normal. The repairs are money. The money comes out of you guys. Your reserves are limited. The money can't come any other way than from you."

Budget talks covered tree work, the painting of decks and the installation of new lights on the buildings and patios. Pappas said the lights cost $4,330.82 for the materials and $25 a light to put them up.

Some audience members became rowdy upon hearing that Lewendowski did some of the work, claiming it is a conflict of interest for a condo board member to be paid for doing work there.

"I have a construction company," Lewendowski explained.

"I don't care!" one woman snapped. "I think it's unfair to have someone on the board be paid for something we don't need."

Lewendowski argued that the new lights were an upgrade from what was there before, adding there have been a number of compliments on how nice they look.

"What did we pay your company?" another woman asked.

"It's all documented," Lewendowski replied.

"You can go over the ledger," Pappas offered.

The Elephant in the Room

Later in the meeting, Michael Martinoli, a board member, explained why the special assessments were taken off the agenda.

"One reason we want to wait on the assessment is to have a further breakdown on the exact costs," he said.

There was a hold up to see what kind of insurance coverage unit owners could get and for assessments of the damage.

One point of contention was $10,272 the condo association plans on paying David Wick, who was hired by Consolidated Management Group as an adjuster. Several neighbors complained that Wick was in and out of their condo in 30 seconds and could not have come up with an accurate estimate of damages, and one man claimed Wick declined an offer to go up into his attic to see if there were roof leaks.

Wick was not there to defend himself, but Fassaroli assured residents that Wick is qualified and knew what he was doing.

A woman told Patch that Wick is affiliated with CMG. An article on CMG's website announced that Wick was appointed as vice president of Guardian Maintenance, CMG’s property maintenance and repair division.

An Historically Harsh Winter

Money was at the root of all arguments over the assessments. Some whose units were not damaged did not want to pay an assessment for someone else, others had insurance adjusters tell them damage was the condo association's responsibility when it was not.

An older resident contended that better maintenance of the buildings could have prevented the water and ice damage in the first place.

"We called three weeks ahead and nothing happened," she complained. "If it had been attended to, none of us would be here. We made calls and e-mails."

But Fassaroli said it was not that simple.

"There were so many snows they could not keep up with it," she said. "At some point we had to make a decision where it was not economically reasonable to send someone out."

Fassaroli said CMG was swamped with phone calls requesting snow removal and that qualified contractors to do the work were in short supply due to the volume of their workloads.

Tempers cooled down later in the meeting and one woman thanked Martinoli for his explanation on the need to understand the finances in greater detail and to know how many homeowners plan to use their own insurance before making any final decisions.

One thing everyone agreed on was that snowfall last winter was one of the worst on record.

"It was a winter that never happened before," Fassaroli said. "And hopefully won't happen again in a long time."