General Manager’s Update

Dear Landings Association Members,

My congratulations go to the recently elected Landings Association Board Directors Bill Bina, Cary Shapoff, and Herman Stone, as well as to the three other candidates willing to stand for election – Mary Lee Beach, Carol McCarthy, and Victor Shernoff. Everyone who gives of their time to help our community should be applauded for their service.

The Association has dozens of such volunteers on our various committees. We rely on your expertise and input to help drive continuous improvement in our organization. There are many opportunities to get involved. Click here to learn how you can help.

The 2022 Budget development is nearing completion. To date, our Reserves Subcommittee has held three meetings to review projected revenues and expenditures over the next several years for the repairs and replacements of our capital assets. The Association works in conjunction with our contracted Professional Reserve Analyst to ensure we follow industry standards, trends, and best practices. The good news is our Capital Reserves Fund remains strong. The bad news is inflation’s impact on our big-ticket items, eroding our buying power. Concrete costs are projected to be 20% higher than they were earlier this year, which increases the costs for our community paths program. Asphalt, with petroleum prices at or near all-time highs, is projected to cost 11% more next year, which greatly impacts our road resurfacing program, with around $1.5 million currently scheduled in 2022. We are working to continue our current service levels while maintaining our vital infrastructure, but the inflationary pressures we’re all feeling in our personal lives has arrived in full force for the Association.

This comes at the same time our older storm drains are experiencing failures. The Association recently completed an emergency storm drain replacement that cost an unbudgeted $175,000. Our street sweeping crews routinely conduct inspections and clearing of storm drains, while contractors perform video camera inspections of those drains scheduled for planned repair and replacement. To improve control and management of the storm drain system, your Board of Directors just approved the purchase of a pipe crawler camera system. Rather than having to pay a contractor for such services, in-house staff will use this submergible camera to document our storm drains’ conditions and create a video inventory that will enable us to proactively identify and prioritize storm drain repair or replacement before failures. The camera purchase will pay for itself in fewer than three years versus contractor payments.

Staff recently attended Community Association Institute’s Large-Scale Workshop. This allows us to benchmark against large scale communities similar to The Landings, with topics ranging from strategic planning best practices, to communications, to technology improvements. We bring back the learnings and begin the process of determining how we can enhance the life of our residents at The Landings.

More than 1,400 residents completed the Community IT Providers survey! We’re now reviewing the responses for consensus and trends so that we can create actionable steps toward community technology improvements based on your collective responses. Connectivity no longer is an amenity; it’s a necessity.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!