Post by BagLady on Feb 3, 2014 7:43:52 GMT -5
To answer the other specific question about an engineer report, I'm not sure if an engineering report was submitted from the contractor that did the latest camera work. I really don't think it is an engineering report that is needed at this time. Anyone can look at the videos and they will say, “yep” that sure enough looks like water coming in to me.
Then this is the answer i.e. that you do not know. The next reasonable step might be to say "I will find out and get back to you". However, it seems to me that you don't think an engineering report is necessary. I beg to disagree; under the circumstances of the recent engineering opinion on the "all clear" on the sewer lines (and by "sewer lines" I mean all peripheral tube-like structures which contain and direct all fluid waste product to the processing intermediary lift stations and plant for treatment), along with the only man-made variable which has occurred in the interim--the water lateral work and paving (both conducted by the same vendor at the same time WITH known engineering deviations from standard practice with regard to compaction) it is my opinion that an independent engineering report is prudent and reasonable to determine the full scope of the problem." An engineering report from the contractor doing the technical camera work is not an engineering report of the scope needed and is certainly not an independent expert opinion.
At the very least, it is known by SLohA "where" the failure locations are on the property. This information has been requested too--and unanswered. Since you have addressed this unofficially for the board in this way, might you assist in the acquiring of this information either for Everyone's information here or for One person's information from an Official Records Request. Demonstrating a willingness and effort to be honest goes a lot further toward overcoming a long, sad history of secrecy and exclusion than simply protesting "I don't lie".
Again, to use the allegory of the physician managing the heart patient, relying on a technician's single abnormal EKG and then proclaiming "Ah it's obvious to anyone that the arrhythmic electrical conduction needs to be corrected with a pacemaker" is a short-sighted and foolish conclusion. Any physician adhering to a standard of care would gather a comprehensive body of qualitative information before coming to an "obvious" conclusion and forming a treatment plan. Likewise, SLohA should, under the known circumstances, protect the owners from "maltreatment" and "undertreatment" and the costs of same by employing an independent consultant to gather more information about the locations and hydrogeologic and structural forces that were responsible for causing such failures.
While a review on hydrogeologic forces is interesting and certainly an appropriate baseline of knowledge to acquire, it does not account for the enormity of the sudden and expensive failure which you attribute to the capriciousness of nature. Summer rain, with accompanying fluctuations in water table, is a well-known and enduring seasonal weather pattern. Don't you think you have a duty to get an in-depth expert opinion to protect the owners in SLohA from a huge financial burden that conceivably was caused, in some measure, by the activities of a vendor?
Seems to me we may be looking at another swimming pool fiasco or Annex leak fiasco but we need to get in front of it with a professional and independent study of the problem and solution rather than "Anyone can see we need to plug up these leaks, a S-bag approach which too often results in do-overs. That was also the strategy on the Annex which led to its demise.