The Truth about Peter:


Is Peter a Soviet Spy?  No, and in fact the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1989.


Does Peter harass other Owners?  No. The Constitution and the right to free speech still applies at Edgewater. Unfortunately, the Board took down the large community bulletin board open to everyone and substituted their locked bulletin board. Further, unlike the Board, regular Owners cannot spend Association money for mailings to make their opinions know. Therefore, regular Owners need to resort to leaving notices on doorsteps and occasionally knocking on doors. Board members an their supporters have done the same. If anyone asks not to get those notices or not to have a particular Owner talk to them, that would surely be honored.


Is Peter the source of all opposition to the Board’s plans?  No. The Owners who worked on the Alternative Documents with him include a retired executive with Bayer Pharmaceuticals and General Electric, two retired teachers, two small-business owners, a PhD in Biochemisty who was a Yale professor, and a regional coordinator for the the Connecticut Department of Emergency Services. More than half of Owners signed a petition in opposition to the Board’s first draft of the Documents. The Board’s second draft was opposed by 60% of voting Owners. It is insulting to all those Owners for the Board to imply that they are somehow tricked or controlled by Peter.

In addition, the Board has fixed a few of the problems and “clerical errors” that he pointed out in the Documents (although they left many more unaddressed). Perhaps the Board should thank him for pointing out their oversights. No, the real problem with the Document project is that the lawyer produced her standard Documents, the Board never read them, the Board stubbornly refused to make the changes a majority of Owners petitioned for, the lawyer could not seem to fix all her clerical errors, and she could not believe that Edgewater Owners would challenge her ideas about what is best for Edgewater Owners.

Peter supported this Board until they lost his confidence. Peter publicly supported their first proposed budget. (It was nearly identical to his, which they voted down.) Below is an excerpt from his seven-page sign-out letter he sent to every Board member when he turned the presidency over to Ms. Yourk. The Board responded to his cordial and helpful letter by mailing their first unkind letter about him to all Owners in 2009.


Did Peter cause the Property dispute with some properties adjoining Edgewater?  No. For about 10 years prior Boards had not enforced the southeast property line with about 8 adjoining neighbors, allowing them to make use of about a half an acre of Edgewater land, including parking in our emergency access road. If that continued a few more years, those neighbors could have made successful claims to that land under “adverse possession” laws. Recognizing this, Pete’s Board had the land surveyed, consulted with the association lawyer, and sent letters to those neighbors to secure our claims on that land (see documentation of attorney and Board approval below). The letters were cordial but firm.

One neighbor immediately responded that unless Edgewater signed over the land to him, he would sue to claim it and later confirmed he was going ahead with the lawsuit. The Board unanimously opposed doing so. Peter then sent him a very firm letter, again approved by 4 Board members (including Tony Grammatico, still on this Board - see below) to try to get him to drop his suit.

Thereafter, that non-Edgewater neighbor was the first signer on a letter sent to all Edgewater Owners, full of falsehoods and distortions about Peter, probably in an effort to get a new Board willing to sign over the land. The current Board continues to circulate that letter and posted it in their bulletin board as recently as this month. Why would a non-Edgewater neighbor take the trouble to send a letter with false accusations to all Unit Owners one week before an Edgewater election? Obviously they thought he was standing in the way of their taking over part of your property. On that score at least, they were right.

Below see a letter from Jeff, a prior Owner (that Board members surely saw) that states that the worst allegations made against Peter were false and some of the other things they accuse Peter of were Jeff’s responsibility. Further, Attorney Anderson’s associate, Attorney Leff can confirm that as recently as last year, Peter has been helpful in defending Edgewater against that land claim, including submitting himself to a deposition.



Does Peter have an home office in his garage using Association electricity? Even the Board’s lawyer questioned him about it during an Owner meeting. No! See photos below. Tours are available by appointment. He does have a couple of power tools that consume at most 25 cents of electricity in a month. He would gladly pay that back to the Association, but where does that end? Association charges for electric garage door openers? Taking more than one shower per day?   Is Peter a bootlegger, who is digging a tunnel from his garage to Canada?  No, and in fact Prohibition ended in 1933, long before he was born. (This is for Great Gatsby fans.)



Did Peter neglect Edgewater while on Board?  No. For the four years he was president he put in on average  of eight hours each week on Association business. He and his Board oversaw 11 watermain repairs, did the first 10% of roof replacements, cut Association routine annual spending by 30%, oversaw paying off a $165,000 construction loan left to his Board, and increased Association net cash assets by $390,000. Each watermain repair was done properly with about 50 ft of copper pipe at a fraction of the cost that the Association has paid for 1-foot plastic pipe repairs. This ended the 4-6 expensive repairs we had been been paying to repair the same pipes, one foot at a time, each year.  See finance summary charts by clicking here.

The savings he and his Board built up reduced the special assessment we each paid for 2010 roofing project by about $3800. The Property was in good shape when he left office. The Beach did not have sand piled on the curb and broken beach fencing for 13 of the prior 18 months. Back then Edgewater still had “curb-appeal.”

Compare this to the current Board. In the last two years they increased routine annual spending (does not include the roofing/paint project) 70% from what Pete’s Board was spending. That means that they have not increased Edgewater savings for future project by one penny. In fact, savings for future projects, (the Reserves) have decreased about $10,000 per year. (Compare increase of $100,000 per year under Pete’s board). That means that fees will need to go way up or Special Assessments will cost each Owners thousands more than they need to.

LIVING AT ...
EDGEWATER OF BRANFORD

NAVIGATE THIS SITE:

 

Excerpt of cordial and helpful sign-out letter Pete sent to this Board when he left office

Board approval, including Tony Grammatico, of a second letter sent to the neighbor to try to dissuade him for a suit he said he was going ahead with.


He said he would sue right after Edgewater sent him the above  letter that blocked his claim to Edgewater property under the 15-year adverse possession rule.

An honorable Unit Owner explains how he was responsible for the some of the things a neighboring property owner accused Peter of and that  worst of the accusations never happened. The Board is still circulating and posting that “slanderous” letter Jeff refers to.

Here is that letter (Neighbor1) sent to neighbors. You see it was approved by the Association attorney (above), approved 4-0 at a Board meeting (above), and then Board members again given the chance for final comment before being sent out (above).

Multiple approvals by attorney and Board of letter sent to Edgewater neighbors regarding the property issue.



<-attorney approval

<- Board meeting approval; Includes approval by Tony Grammatico, on this current Board.

<- Board members get final

     chance to proof-read

<- August 25; letter forwarded

    to prop manager to send out

PETE’S GARAGE


<-Messy? Yes.

     An office? No.


Storage (Xmas decorations, flower pots, camping gear) under the eves. Again, NOT an office->