It’s Time We Know
How the Sausage is Made

At the 2023 Annual Meeting, an owner urged the board for greater transparency in their financial reporting and operations. Incumbent & then President (now Treasurer), David Bunning, in an effort to deflecting their reasonable request stated, “no body wants to know how the sausage is made”. The owner, both confused and dissatisfied, just sat down.

Sadly, this reaction to the board majority’s approach to unit owner’s concerns is all too common and has led to a sick building. Property values have declined sharply: the average sales value in 2017 was $1,500/SQF while, in 2024, the average resale price is approaching $1250/SQF. Sales volumes are also down, which coupled with a drop in average resale price, are signs of clear reluctance from buyers to invest in the building.

As the lawsuit with Ms. Davina Oliver points out, the building has certainly developed a reputation. Any diligent buyer examining board minutes would see that we have had a turn-over of 6 board presidents within the past 7 years. This includes the current board president, Betty Chiao, whom the board majority internally re-elected back as president in 2023 after she was previously removed in 2021 for malfeasance. It also includes candidate Jonathan Morris who resigned from office after news of his own troubled management style disseminated within the building post Iowa Sport’s resignation in 2017.

The lawsuit also blueprints their management strategy and how they deal with dissenters: this past fiscal year, Mr. Davidson Williams, longest serving board member, was completely marginalized for being the sole dissenter among the board and for refusing to sign a confidentiality agreement that conflicted with board member(s) fiduciary duties:

Mr. Williams had questioned and brought to attention the alarming increase in staff turn-over (between post pandemic, 2021, to present 2024); with at least six people cycling through the management office, more than a dozen changes in health club staff, and over 20 employees fired or resigning, that we are aware of (from our front desk & maintenance division). On a multitude of occasions, Mr. Williams had also requested to review from the residential manager’s standards of conduct manual that he, the residential manager, often referred to when making disciplinary actions. It turns out that this document did not exist but was cited multiple times by the Residential Manager when making disciplinary action(s) with staff.

And near the end of his term, Mr. Williams was phased out of meetings and critical bid discussions. In particular, the selection of our new health club operator, Elite Amenities, and onsite management vendor, Douglas Elliman, which increased our annual operational budget by roughly $350,000. Mr. Williams was never made aware of the interests of the board majority to change vendors until less than an hour before he was asked to vote on decision(s) to make these changes. In fact, the vote to change the health club operator came August 13th (in the August Board Meeting), after the building made the announcement that it would be changing the health club operator from URBN Playground to Elite Amenities August 5th. Coupled with Mr. William’s experience, these are tell-tale signs of canned board meetings.

When they marginalize board members, either by exclusion or targeting, the majority of the board, our elected fiduciaries, have effectively chosen to destroy control mechanics intended to prevent loss in form(s) such as damage, waste and fraud, and chosen to replace them with ones that serve their self-interest(s). Sadly, transparency can no longer solve this problem as it is now an issue of trust and lack thereof in this “Majority of the Board”.