Unfortunately, no. Monthly strata fees are used by your strata corporation to pay common expenses, which include those for amenities such as our pool and gym. Their closure in response to COVID-19 has not reduced those expenses. In fact, unexpected repair costs for the pool have pushed us over budget this year.
Pool/gym closure is definitely an inconvenience. But it does not practically allow a reduction in strata fees. A budget shortfall this year would simply translate to an increase in fees next year.
When will the pool/gym reopen?
We don’t know. Your council has sought legal opinion and consulted City and Provincial guidelines in deciding when it might be practical to reopen. Given the recent spike in COVID infections and the added costs that appropriate scheduling, disinfection, and monitoring would entail, we have decided to delay reopening for the foreseeable future.
Yes, other buildings have opted to reopen, some instituting user sign-up and monitoring based on the honour system. Unfortunately, some PP2 residents who refused to comply with safety recommendations while the pool was still open (in one case, with a pool party) have put us at risk in the past. A COVID outbreak is something we wish to avoid at any time, even more so if it could jeopardize our remediation project.
These are difficult times, and we thank you for your patience. We will reopen our amenities as soon as we feel it is both safe and practical.
Pacific Point 2 Community Website 
Thank you strata council. I think you are making prudent decisions for our health.
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It’s time to make haste with the opening. Stage 3 Covid re-opening is here and now strata is stalling by claiming some more work needs to be done on pool before opening…
Bad project management. Open the pool. We had to endure a record high heatwave without it. All construction focus should be on accelerating the opening of the pool for summer.
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We understand that residents may be frustrated with the delays in reopening. Your strata council members are residents too, and just as eager to regain access to our amenities. These delays are in no way the result of bad project management. Indeed, we have been very happy with how RDH has managed the project to date. Work on phase 2 has only just recently begun, and is progressing reasonably on schedule. The pool and gym are part of phase 2. A number of problems, particularly in the pool area, have made predicting when access will be restored difficult. Excessive corrosion of metal studs was discovered once the walls were opened up. This requires much additional remediation, resulting in window replacement delays.
Simultaneously, excessive moisture has corroded the electronics that provide FOB access to the area. Until FOB functionality to that area is restored, we cannot provide access. Those repairs are in progress. Additional shoring in the pool area to support the scaffolding overhead has also made that area particularly unsafe. That too we are working with RDH to resolve.
Finally, the pool boiler has died. Replacing it is a major undertaking, requiring the draining of the pool. We are waiting on MegaHydronics to source a replacement and schedule the work. Access to the pool and gym will be restored as soon as possible.
Again, we thank residents for their patience.
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“Excessive corrosion of metal studs was discovered once the walls were opened up.” – with recent building collapses in the news, this is extremely concerning as a resident of the building. Is the building structurally sound to live in with corroding studs in addition to the additional weight of scaffolding…
Furthermore, why did phase 2 (pool and gym restoration) only just begin in July, 2021, 9 months after construction began. This seems like extremely poor time management/planning for an 8 figure project to fix this decaying Bosa project.
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Let me deal with each of your comments individually:
“Excessive corrosion of metal studs was discovered once the walls were opened up.” – with recent building collapses in the news, this is extremely concerning as a resident of the building. Is the building structurally sound to live in with corroding studs in addition to the additional weight of scaffolding…”
I had Cam contact RDH, and this is their response: “We can appreciate this concern in light of recent events in the news. We’ve been able to collect a fair amount of information as it relates to the building structure during the rehabilitation project, if warranted we would bring potential structural concerns to the attention of yourself/Council if further review or action was necessary. That being said, phase 1 steel stud repairs and upgrades have generally been completed and steel stud work in phase 2 is progressing well. With respect to the comment about scaffolding, the loads from the scaffolding were evaluated, which led to the re-shoring in the parkade as an added measure.”
“Furthermore, why did phase 2 (pool and gym restoration) only just begin in July, 2021, 9 months after construction began. This seems like extremely poor time management/planning for an 8 figure project to fix this decaying Bosa project.”
Phase-1 started on the lobby and lane sides of the building because the materials for the entire project come in and then up the scaffolding via the front driveway, and out via the chute on the lane near the garbage bins. Because of this, some of the lower level of the Phase-1 scaffolding will remain in place until the end of the entire project, even after Phase-1 has been completed. Demolition begins at the top of the building, working down to ground level, after which window replacement moves from the bottom up. It takes three to four months per phase just to erect the scaffolding, and demolition cannot begin until the scaffolding reaches the top of the building.
Breaking the project into two phases allowed demolition to begin on Phase-1 while the Phase-2 scaffolding was still going up. Phase-2 demolition could not begin until the week of March 15, once its scaffolding had reached the top floor. The pool and gym are at the bottom of Phase-2. Demolition did not reach that level until well into April, whereupon the steel studs on the exterior of the pool/gym were found to be particularly corroded and required considerable upgrading. Consequently, window replacement on that floor is behind schedule due to the particular challenges of the windows in that area.
In any case, the pool and gym had to be closed due to COVID restrictions for the past year. And though provincial restrictions are slowly being lifted, our pool boiler died last month and needs to be replaced. MegaHydronics is sourcing a new boiler and trying to schedule its replacement while the area is closed due to construction. As a result, the pool will likely not be reopened before next January.
In addition, corrosion has disabled FOB access to the pool/gym area. We are working to have that repaired as soon as possible. We plan to reopen the gym as soon as its windows and finishing have been completed, and once we have FOB access again. But that could still be a couple of months away.
I did not approve your comment or post my responses because the Residential Committee does not meet until next week, and I only got the information that I shared with you above from RDH today. I think that all owners would benefit from answers to your questions, and I did not see any value in posting your comment until the Committee has a chance to review the latest feedback from RDH and agree on how best to respond so that all owners have as much information as is practical.
I understand your frustration, but your Residential Committee members are all volunteers with limited time. This remediation project has been a strain on all of us. All the committee members are residents of the building as well and we all have a vested interest in seeing that this project is completed on time and on budget, but also that the work is of the highest quality. To date, we have been very happy with how RDH has managed the project. We knew there would be challenges when we discovered mould and made exploratory openings some two years ago, the full extent of which we could not predict until the walls had been opened. So on top of the normal day-to-day responsibilities faced by all Stratas, we are dealing with a considerable volume of extra construction related communications with owners. With the added burden of our ongoing litigation with Bosa and other parties, we ask that our residents be patient and trust that we are doing our best to move the project forward on schedule and on budget, while minimizing inconvenience.
I hope this addresses some of your concerns, and we will continue to try and respond to residents’ questions in a timely fashion. That being said, Cam Caruthers is still the best first person to contact whenever you have a question or concern. I have copied him on this reply.
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