December 18, 2012 – A $2.78 million project to upgrade the lobbies of Marina City’s residential floors is not without critics, one of them being the co-chair of the condo board’s design committee, who has resigned over disagreements with the plan.

Recent upgrades have included new doorplates, a model floor on which changes could be previewed, and a remodeled elevator lobby on the 20th floors of both towers, each leading to common areas such as laundry rooms. Plans by the condo association at Marina City to spend $2.5 million upgrading its 80 residential floors, plus $280,000 on the lower level lobbies, has unit owners afraid a special assessment will be needed to pay for the changes. Some unit owners, including at least one member of the association’s board of directors, do not believe there has been enough discussion of the proposal.

At a meeting on December 4 of Marina Towers Condominium Association’s design committee, about 20 unit owners heard plans to tear down the honey-colored travertine walls lining each floor’s elevator lobby and replace them with white glass panels on one wall, blue glass tiles on the opposite wall, wood slates on the ceiling, and granite floors with blue carpet down the middle.

Renderings displayed on Friday by Marina Towers Condominium Association of proposed changes to the elevator lobbies on residential floors (left) and the main lobby of each tower (right). (Click on images to view larger versions.)

Marc Straits, an interior designer and co-chair of the committee, objected to tearing down the travertine, which he says is worth about $500,000. He suggests the walls be repaired, cleaned, and polished. But the design committee was setback when a meeting scheduled for December 11 was cancelled and its co-chair resigned. In a letter to the condo board and unit owners, Straits said he was stepping down due to “certain professional liability concerns” related to the lobby-remodeling project.

Among his complaints was a lack of discussion about whether MTCA is using the appropriate materials, lack of any professionals qualified to oversee the project, and what he says is insufficient oversight by the condo board of the remodeling budget. “At the meeting where the board was presented with a vague budget outline that was admittedly incomplete,” wrote Straits, “the motion to vote was made prior to completing a discussion about documentation and budget.” (Left) Mark Straits at a House of Blues event in 2011. Photo by Diane Alexander White.

Mark Ulaszek, a former MTCA treasurer, says the project’s financial impact on unit owners should be part of its due diligence. “Their fiduciary responsibility,” wrote Ulaszek on Marina Watchdog, a blog for residents that he moderates, is “to make sure the projects are well funded and not put undue hardship on the association or owners.”

Ulaszek (right) points out that in 2008, a two-year project on the 20th floors of both towers, renovating laundry rooms and adding a fitness room and meeting room, was estimated at $495,000 but actually cost $820,850. “In addition, we ran out of money and had to lease all the washers and dryers. Put another way, the project was 65 percent over budget and we don’t own any of the equipment.”

He says cost estimates of the new project are coming from Marina City’s residential property manager, David Gantt, but says Ulaszek, “he is not a project manager and his estimating skills seem to be way off the mark.”