PLAZA EAST ASSOCIATION
MINUTES Of A SPECIAL MEETING OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
SEPTEMBER 14, 2005


1. CALL TO ORDER AND PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

President Terry Marcum called to order a duly constituted special meeting of the Plaza East Board of Directors on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 at 6:38 PM in the Recreation Room.

2. ROLL CALL

Present: Ismet Baker, Charlotte Gazzana, Richard Loarie, Jerry Marcial, Terry Marcum, DiAnne Shumard, and John Toklucu. Also present were Willy Lopez, Manager, and Richard Madey, Secretary.
Absent: James Brady and Tim Smith
Quorum? Yes

3. QUESTIONS/ANSWERS WITH DESIGN FIRM CASA CONDE AND GENERAL CONTRACTOR

Eugenie Moriconi, Chair Lobby Refurbishment Committee, introduced Cesar Conde of the Cesar Conde Design Firm and his proposed General Contractor, Brock Andrews. The Board members were given a copy of Cesar Conde’s standard Design Agreement.

3.1. QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSION WITH DESIGNER, CESAR CONDE

The following is not an all inclusive list of questions, answers, and comments:
Q1. Haykov: Has there been a vote by owner to proceed?
A1. No. The Board has only voted to select the Design Firm.

Q2. Haykov: How many entrances will the building have?
A2. Three.

 Q3. Loarie: Contract, section 12, should spell out trade discounts for purchase of materials and these trade discounts should be passed on to Plaza East.
A3. Conde: No problem

Q4. Baker: In dealing with suppliers, a Board member should be available. What is your overall price?
A4. Conde: Depends on hours worked and the budget. The General Contractor Brock Andrews will contract directly with Plaza East at the level of $40,000, which does not include unanticipated problems that may be found when Brock inspects ceilings and assesses everything.

Q5. Baker: What would be your cost to paint the entire lobby? The recent in house painting of the lobbies cost us about $3,000.
A5. Loarie: A trade price would be much higher because it depends on the area to painted, the number of coats of paint, the amount of surface preparation, the finish level desired,…

Q6. Toklucu: Your standard contract must be improved for us. Your rate of $150/hr is too high. If you come in for one-half hour, you would charge us $150. Can you give us a total cost?
A6. Andrews: We wouldn’t know the total cost until we open the ceiling, inspect, and assess.

Loarie: It is necessary to access pipes, junctions, and a/c units in the ceiling. Code allows a/c units in the ceiling, and they are there now.

Lopez: We don’t want to remodel the mechanical part of the building because of excessive costs. The costs for mechanical remodeling in a neighboring condo (Fountain- head) started at one million and increased to about three million.

Andrews: We must check electrical connections.

Loarie: We are not changing electrical because we are not changing electrical loads.

Q7. Loarie: Re trade discounts, would you provide the list price and the discount price plus 30%.
A7. Conde: Not all proposers show the discount explicitly. Retailers do but wholesalers do not.

Q8. Moriconi: Would you discuss the possibility that your preliminary design for lobby 2 contained too much furniture?
A8. Conde: We eliminated two lounge chairs from lobby 2. It is necessary to maintain balance between scales. It is an esthetic issue and it must look right.

Q9. Baker: Plaza East is not a hotel. Should we not base the amount of furniture on our expected usage?
A9. Conde: I will propose what I think will work best.

Q10. Loarie: Would you estimate your hours expected, and build these hours into the price? And then put in a provision for paying a premium for hours above the cap.
A10. Conde: I have no problem with that. Re $150/hr, we want to do the job.

Q11. Toklucu: Have you ever had a problem/dispute that caused you to leave the job?
 Madey: We need a default provision in the contract.
A11. Conde: I am flexible.

Q12. Gazzana: One designer was willing to work for a flat fee, and he would send invoice for purchaser directly to Plaza East to by pass the 30%. Will you consider a cost plus fixed fee contract? We need a set number to go to owners for a vote.
A12. Conde: I can give a flat fee, and bill extra for hours that exceed the estimate.

Q13. The indemnification paragraph, section 6 of your standard contract, requires Plaza East to hold you harmless. The way that paragraph is written does not give Plaza East any recourse.
 A13. Conde: We are responsible for anything we order. The General Contractor is responsible for anything he does. Conde is not responsible for the activities of outsiders who may be hired by Plaza East.

Q14. Marcum: Does your budget include your design fee?
A14. Conde: yes

Q15. Marcum: Can you break out design fee?
A15. Conde: We will show the design fee in individual documents.

Q16. Marcial: Does your budget include any landscaping?
A16. Conde: Exterior is not included in the budget.

Q17. Madey: Contract is not clear how intellectual property issues will be resolved in the event of a dispute.
Q17. Conde: Contract protects our firm.

Q18. Suppose code issues arise when the ceiling is opened. How would you deal with these issues?
A18.Conde: We will cross that bridge when we come to it.

Q19. Marcum: Electrical work connected with chandeliers may be an issue.
A19. Andrews: I just phoned a Ft. Lauderdale building official. He sees no problem if we change only the ceiling.

Q20. Does the contract have any plans for accessories?
A20. Conde: No. I would like to integrate some existing sculptures.

Q21. Gazzana: Because the majority of the wiring is aluminum, does it have to be changed?
A21. Andrews: No. Aluminum is used.

Q22. Gazzana: Does the city agree?
A22. Andrews: I don’t know of any reason they won’t.

 Q23. What is the cost for all three lobbies? At $113/sf the total cost for 10,000 sf is $1.13 million. Backing out your 30% fee, I obtain $261,000 for your fee – which is too high.
A23. Conde: ?

Q24. Does your design include the recreation room and bathrooms?
A24. Conde: It will.

Q25. Will the price be in the same range?
A25. Conde: Hopefully, it will.

Q26. How will you do the job without accessories? Accessories are the jewels.
A26. Conde: We had limited time to work on the project. I would like to include accessories.

Q27. Toklucu: Suppose we gave you a budget of say $800,000, could you work with that?
A27. Conde: Absolutely

Loarie: Recently, the lobbies have been upgraded from a concrete floor to porcelain tile. We can leave it this way or pay for upgrading. The most expensive lobby in Paris cost about $4,000/sf; the lobby at the Marriott Marquis in N.Y. cost about $2,000/sf. The Designer’s cost for lobby 2 is $113/sf for a total cost of $ 230,000.

Marcum: Extrapolations the $113/sf for lobby 2 will reach a cost for three lobbies of 1.3 to 1.7 million depending on what we want.

Dave: Plaza East was the crown jewel of the Galt 38 years ago. Plaza East still has the potential to become the crown jewel again. We must pay to restore pride in our building and our home. (Audience clapped)

Q28. Haykov: Are you changing exits?
A28 Conde: No. Lobbies are used for exits now. Passageways will not be blocked.

Q29. Haykov: How accommodate existing floor?
A29. Conde: Proposing two lounge areas and two area rugs. Will redo some grout.

Loarie: Grout will gray no matter what you do.

Q30. What is your time frame?
A30. Conde: I will get back to the Board after I meet with the General Contractor Brock Andrews.

Q31. We need a plan to prioritize several issues.
 A31. Marcum: We made a preliminary schedule in a letter sent 4-5 months ago. The letter included a three-year cost analysis. We have a 3-5 year timeline for the deck. When we start depends on how much we plan to spend and over what time period. We can do interior lobbies and elevator cabs independently.

Q32. Jean: Will the Board have lawyers look at the contract before signing it?
A32. Yes.

Marcum: All the Board Members shall provide suggestion revisions to this agreement by Monday to Fouzia. We will compile prior to sending back to Conde.

3.2. QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSION WITH GENERAL CONTRACTOR BROCK ANDREWS
 Brock Andrews is president and founder of an S- corporation called Inpros, Interior Professionals. He has been in the construction business in Ft. Lauderdale for about 30 years. He transformed the Moonraker into Yesterday’s restaurant. He has been working with custom interiors in condos and homes for about the last 15 years. He reconstructed 62 single family homes after hurricane Andrew. He is a state licensed General Contractor. He hires skilled tradesman such as electrician, plumbers,…(as subcontractors).

Q1. Can we see something you did with Cesar previously?
A1. Conde: Yes, did a large restaurant. We never did a condo lobby before.

Q2. Marcum: Are you planning to give a budget per square foot?
A2. Andrews: I gave a budget of $44,000 to Cesar Conde based on what he wanted me to do. Cesar added 30% to their budget, which increased the amount to $65,000; but because the plan now is for Plaza East to contract directly with the General Contractor, the 30% will not be applied.

Stan Rothenberg: Currently, there are water leaks from the ceiling to the lobby.

Lopez: It is prohibitively expensive to bring A/C down from the ceiling to eliminate leakage. The water leaks result from poor maintenance of the drain lines of the A/C system in the individual apartments.

Andrews: Are there no overflow pans on individual units?

Lopez: Yes. Some owners still have 20 year old water heaters, and the pans are corroded.

Loarie: There was a strong backlash from some owners when Plaza East suggested that owners replace 20 year old water heaters.

Lopez: Plaza East has worked with certain contractors: Hill York installed A/C; Moore Plumbing has serviced Plaza East for 20 years; and Gammon Electrical has dealt with the main electrical lines for each stack.

Andrews: I will take bids from any contractor.

Lopez: We discovered that lobby windows leaked during hurricane Katrina. These windows are not designed for 150mi/hr loads.

 Loarie: The floor of the Recreation Room is 22 feet above sea level.

Moriconi: Cesar has worked with the original architect of Plaza East.

Haykov: With regard’s to Marcum’s recent letter about windows, would you explain what is wrong with the windows?

Loarie: Windows do not meet code.

Marcum: I will add a discussion of windows as an agenda item for the next regular meeting.

4. ADJOURNMENT


MOTION: Shumard (Loarie) moved (seconded) to adjourn at 8:14 PM.

Respectfully submitted


Richard Madey
Secretary