Winter 2015 Paddington Green Newsletter |
Season’sGreetings from your board of directors. Wow what a great fall. Due to thekindness of Mother Nature, we have been able to save some money on our snowclearing budget. We hope this trend continues through 2015 and into 2016. Itcontinues to be a struggle to keep expenses down while trying to maintain thisproperty in the condition, we can all be very proud of. By now, you havehad an opportunity to review the 2016 budget information, we sent to you inlate November. On page 2 of 6, we listed the major changes of the 2016operating budget in comparison to the 2015 budget. As you can see many of the anticipatedexpenses have risen much higher than the cost of living. Most of these arebeyond our control. Those that are within our control are: a) We budgeted for a $5,000.00 surplus. This is just good business as wecannot continue to operate in the red. b) The $5,000.00 ground maintenance for upgrades is needed to deal withaging trees and shrubs. Most of thesewere planted far too close to the building and have not been properlymaintained for many years. They have reached the end of their life cycle andneed to be replaced. We are working on a short and a long term plan.Fortunately we have an owner with some experience in this matter and sheoffered to assist us with some of the planning. Thank you Janine. Hubert, Edand I have done some work ourselves and we will continue to do so to save moneywhenever we can. We most recently removed two Cherry trees in front of building#140 and #142 on the parking lot side. These trees were infected with BlackKnot; were dropping cherries that tracked into the buildings, units and stainedthe carpet and their roots were causing us sewer blockage issues. Removal oftwo trees like that would have cost us $250 - $300 each. Despite thereduction in the snow clearing budget based on actual expense over the pastcouple of years, things can change in a heartbeat. A snow storm similar toApril 1997 could cost us thousands of dollars for just the one storm. At the AGM, Iindicated we could have a serious problem with the sewer drain in the visitorparking area. Once the area was excavated and the contractor could see theextent of the damage, it was determined that although serious, it was not aworse case situation.
All work done tomaintain and upgrade this property is charged to either the repair ormaintenance operating budget or to the reserve fund. What can and cannot becharged to the reserve fund is governed by the condominium act. Based on thereserve fund study done in 2013, dollars have been allocated year by year for certainmajor repairs and upgrades. We have found this study to be very inaccurate.When this study was done, the original board of directors, Sunrex and thecompany that performed the study had almost no history to work with and wereforced to guess at much of the information. Being onsite and having becomefamiliar with our complex, we are also able to understand the needs much betterand we have therefore reallocated much of the money set out for upgrades toeither another time frame or taken budgeted dollars and moved it to morecritical projects. This reserve fund study needs to be redone in 2018 and wefeel confident the new study will closely resemble the needs of this property. Inthe meantime, we will continue to spend reserve fund dollars in a responsibleway as to make the best use of that money. We will continue to improve ourcomplex to the conditions; we all expect and at the same time watch the balancein our reserve fund grow. We had hoped to reach the ideal balance in 5 yearsbut it will likely be 8 years. On February 1,2015, the new condominium act came into effect. Edith has been working veryhard to insure that Winnipeg Condominium Corporation #85 known as PaddingtonGreen is correctly aligned with the new act. This is an extensive process Edithhas taken on and we would like to take this opportunity to thank her. We’d like to end with a few housekeeping items. This seems to be prettyeffective as the items/issues we have brought up in previous newsletters haveeither been corrected or at least improved. Thank you for your efforts to keepPaddington Green looking nice. 1) Under no circumstances should anyone drive on the grass EVER. 2) Do not walk on the grass. Paths are being worn where some are walking. Pleasestay on the asphalt as it’s only a couple of extra steps. 3) Please keep your balconies / patios clean and tidy. If an item was notmeant to be on a patio it probably shouldn’t be there. Balconies / patios arenot for storage and definitely not for garbage. 4) There has been some improvementwith items left around the garbage bins and recycling but I think we could dobetter. We have had issues with the pickup of the recycling. If and when thishappens and the blue plastic carts are full PLEASE either save your recyclingtill they are emptied or put it in the garbage bins. Don’t pile it on top. Someone left a car battery on the ground nextto the garbage bins. WHAT WERE YOU THINKING??? 5) We have had complaints of the laundry rooms being used late at night.Please try to be considerate and try to operate within the times posted. Weknow that sometimes you just need to do laundry and it runs late. PLEASE, turnoff the fan at the end of the job. We know some of these fans are noisy and sodo the people being kept awake due to them running all night. Be courteous. 6) Just a reminder to clean the lint traps. Nobody wants your lint when theygo to use the dryers. Take an extra 30 seconds and do a good job of cleaning itout. 7) When you are done: Dryer doors should be closed, washer doors and soaptrays should be left open and the fan and lights should be turned off. 8) Reminder: Owners/ Tenants from buildings (130, 132, 134 and 138) moving in / out of their unitsor moving large items need to give at least 4 days’ notice and makearrangements with Brenda Collins, our Property Manager to have the Gate / ChainFence opened. ATTENTION: Please be advised that if you choose to lease / rent outyour unit, you (the owner) are obligated to notify the Corporation in writing ofyour change of address and within thirty (30) days after entering into atenancy agreement, must notify the Corporation in writing of the tenant’s name.This should be done by completing the Resident Information form. In acondominium setting, tenants are required to comply with the Corporation’sDeclaration; By-Law’s and Rules. It is the owner’s responsibility to ensurethat their tenant is aware of the rules and provide them with any applicableinformation and documents. Tenants are bound by the same rules as we theowners. In the pastyear, we have had three (3) tenants move in with pets, which were notregistered with the Board and in one case the pet did not meet our regulations. Morerecently, a tenant has moved in with two (2) dogs, this is unacceptable. In this situation, there are ramifications notonly to the tenant, dogs and owner but also to Paddington Green. PLEASE DO YOUR PART!!! If you needa Resident Information or Pet Registration form or new Landlord informationpackage because you are planning to rent out your unit, please contact Liz atSunrex. Thank you for your anticipated cooperation. We close off by wishing you all:
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Your Board of Directors
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