Questions are frequently raised about how reliable charitable organizations are when it comes to making proper use of donated money for disaster relief. Phil Underwood, a writer with the Phoenix Signs of the Times Examiner undertook his own little local investigation into religious charities and makes some interesting observations that we might do well to learn something from....
Now comes the tricky part. The board of directors had hired these engineers, accepted their report, bid out the project, and negotiated a back loan for the project. The only step left was for a vote of the community to accept the loan. So they had invested their time, many thousand of dollars, and their credibility in the work of these engineers. The two unit owners I was serving believed that most of the unit owners were going along with the board. Could this be turned around?
The board scheduled an informational meeting for all unit owners to attend to listen to the board's engineer, property manager, attorney, preferred contractor and vinyl siding salesman and to ask questions. Three unit owners gave me power of attorney to speak in their behalf and ask pointed questions. It was very awkward and the board's limited me to only a few questions with which I tried to sow seeks of doubt for other owners. My clients and I came out of that meeting not thinking we had made any great inroads.
Next, my client owners invited all the other owners to their own meeting where I was able to make a full case for not believing the engineers. We reinforced the argument with a report from the cedar expert and an evaluation from a home improvement contractor. About 20 unit owners showed up and the meeting lasted about three hours. They all seemed convinced to vote no to the loan and the project. We encouraged them to spread the word to other owners.
Finally, the board scheduled a day for the vote. My clients called on other owners imploring them to review the facts and turn down the project. But all along it was very difficult to know if we were really having an impact.
Well, the vote was held yesterday. Last night I could stand it no longer and sent an email to my clients asking if they knew the results. Late at night they wrote back to me that the vote was an overwhelming 40 - 18 to reject the loan and the project! Sometimes the truth prevails!
So the project will likely be changing the making the minor repairs to the cedar siding where needed, replace pine trim boards that are in worse shape than the cedar, and putting the buildings on a good rotating painting schedule. But I wonder about those engineers. They market their services to lots of condominium communities and they claim to "investigate roofing and exterior siding systems, of all types, for specific analysis of defects, installation techniques and replacement or repair alternatives." If their work for other communities is as shoddy as what they did here then there are lots on boards wasting engineering fees and construction costs on unnecessary and ill-advised work. As I wrote in a previous blog about some architects: How do they get away with it?
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Rinks.Scattered championship banners, a worn-down scoreboard and graffiti-ridden walls are what’s left of the building that was once a popular roller skating and ice hockey rink. The building’s new owners hope to transform all of that.
“Indoor hockey was a big thing in the 90s, so we were able to find something in Milford … now we found something similar and we hope to do the same with this one, the same vision,” said new tenant Gustavo Flores.
Flores, along with his three partners, was the lone bidder of the space. They have agreed to pay $1,500 a month in rent and renovate the two rinks that have become the target of vandals in the last few years.
The Board of Alderman approved a 10-year lease and Mayor Mike Jarjura made the deal official on Monday.
“It’s going to bring opportunity to all the people of Waterbury that wasn’t available to them,” he said.
The company will build a full-size artificial turf field for indoor soccer or flag football and a fully-enclosed boarded rink for inline skating or lacrosse
. It will cost United Athletic $600,000 to $800,000 in renovations.
The sports complex is scheduled to open to the public as early as this year.
© 2009, WFSB; Hartford, CT. (A Meredith Corporation Station)
POSTED: 7:49 pm EDT September 21, 2009
To see the web page go here:
http://blog.uniqueuniquedesign.com/pool-house-or-not/
To see more photos of the pool house project go here:
]]>The development is an upscale residential condominium in southern Connecticut that is about 25 years old and has cedar clapboard siding. The association let the exterior maintenance slip and now the buildings really need attention. Some owners want to remove the cedar and replace it with vinyl. Some owners want to repair and restain the existing siding. Others are interested in alternative siding like fiber cement as long as it’s not vinyl. Now they look at me and want some guidance based on facts and not just my opinion or personal preference. They are concerned about longevity, continuous maintenance, initial costs, and the effect on their property appraisals and resale values.
What I have been amazed to find out is how little unbiased information is available on this subject. Siding materials are probably the most popular, highest produced, and greatest income generating products in the residential building industry, yet, I can’t find that anyone has bothered to do real head-to-head comparisons to find out which is the most cost effective, best performing product out there. Sure, the Vinyl Siding Institute will tell me their members’ products are the best thing since sliced bread! Of course, the Western Red Cedar Association will tell me how cedar will stand up, is easy to maintain, refinish, green, and overall the absolutely best thing ever.
As an architect I am left to sift through biased information and distill it to come up with a real comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of these products and arrive at a well reasoned conclusion. How do I do that and feel comfortable that I have given the best recommendation possible to my client? Maybe there isn’t much market for it and not much money to be made doing it, but it seems to me there ought to be some kind of “Consumer Reports” for construction materials and products where owners and professionals can go to get relatively unbiased information so that we can make educated choices on what products are best for what applications. Technology, the proliferation of synthetic and composite materials, and increasingly stringent building, energy and sustainability codes make it rather hard for an architect to give a strong recommendation to a client without knowing that opinion is limited by our own personal experience and preferences.
Who will step up and help us?
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Now one might say this is an isolated event and we should not draw broad conclusions. But hearing about this got me thinking about the continuing erosion of honesty and ethics in our profession, all professions and society in general. Notice an interesting observation made in AWAKE! magazine:
Older persons can remember a time when, in many places, people did not lock their doors. They did not think of stealing from others or of cheating them. If they borrowed money, they felt honor-bound to repay it. And their word was ‘as good as gold.’ True, there was dishonesty, but it was not all-pervasive. Today, however, stealing, lying, and cheating are commonplace throughout the world. And many dishonest acts originate with so-called respectable people who live and work in nice neighborhoods, dress well, may have a religion, and consider themselves good citizens. Indeed, dishonesty has become notorious among officials of government and business. (Nov. 15, 1986)
The Apostle Paul wrote: "We trust we have an honest conscience, as we wish to conduct ourselves honestly in all things". (Hebrews 13:18)
It seems everywhere one turns today we must navigate through a dishonest world. Owners that don't want to tell the truth on permit applications about the construction cost. Clients who want to pay cash or use other means to bury money so they don't have to pay taxes on it. Clients who offer us cash if we keep accounts off the books thinking we would likewise not report the income for taxes. Owners and contractors who don't want to take out permits for the construction. Employment candidates who inflate their credentials. I could go on and on.
Architecture is a noble profession but it does not appear that it is any more noble than others when it comes to ethics. How many architects have read the AIA Code of Ethics or the rules of ethics written into their state's practice regulations? What meaningful education on ethics, honesty and honorable practice is really given to architecture students? I just make a random check of the listing of courses for a prominent university's school of architecture. Not one class on ethics in practice or honesty in life. That says plenty.
Why has honesty and ethics in society and our profession become so unimportant? We create environments to promote the well being of humans, to lift their spirits, and bring them comfort combined with guarding their health, safety and welfare. How could we cheat on anything having to do with our profession?
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