LARCA Board Rejects Call To Commit $45K By Dec. 1 Deadline For Beautification Project

RESTON, VA — A proposal by the Gupta Family Foundation to beautify Lake Anne Plaza in Reston could be headed for derailment, with the president of the Lake Anne condo association saying his board won't be able to meet the foundation's Dec. 1 deadline.

When Margaret and Dr. Shashikant Gupta unveiled their beautification plan for Lake Anne Plaza at a Nov. 18 community meeting, they had one stipulation — they wanted community buy-in. For the project to move forward, Lake Anne of Reston, A Condominium Association (LARCA), which represents the residential and commercial property owners at the plaza, needed to commit to contributing $45,000 to the project by this Wednesday.

"If LARCA says we're not putting in a dime, then we'll say we're not going to do this, because we're not going to go out and ask the community to participate in something that LARCA is not participating in," Margaret Gupta told Patch.

George Hadjikyriakou, who was elected LARCA president at the beginning of November, said he appreciated the Guptas' offer.

"I respect what they're trying to do," he said. "I respect their initiatives to help us with cleaning up the plaza and the sculptures. I applaud them for coming to us to help us out."

However, Hadjikyriakou told Patch on Monday the board was preparing an email that would inform the Guptas that LARCA would not be able to commit to the project by the Dec. 1 deadline.

"We, as a newly elected board, at the time they proposed this to us, had not even seen the new budget for 2022," he said. "So of course, we could not commit to their requirement that LARCA commit $45,000 towards the plaza cleanup and landscaping project that they had identified in their spreadsheet."

Although the LARCA board wouldn't be able to meet the Dec. 1 deadline, Hadjikyriakou said the board still welcomed assistance from the Guptas or others.

"I am still in support of any outside efforts that will help us fund improvements to our community," he said.

Proposed 'Lake Anne Rising' Budget Set At $250,000

The Guptas' intention in bringing the beautification proposal to LARCA was to identify a small project that could be paid for mostly through donations rather than relying solely on LARCA funding.

"The plaza is really enjoyed by everybody," Shashi Gupta said. "It's not just the owners. So we thought we could get some funding from different organizations, which might happen. In addition, we could raise money from the wider investment community. Then we could do something that gives hope."

In order to get the ball rolling, the Guptas contributed a $25,000 grant from their foundation as seed money for the beautification project, which they dubbed Lake Anne Rising.

"We loved the concept of Lake Anne and we've seen it deteriorating," Shashi Gupta said. "They have this infrastructure issue, but it's the spirit of the population that actually either takes you in a good direction or in a bad direction."

The proposed beautifications would include filling the plaza's 15 planters with new plants, cleaning concrete and bricks, installing a sign at the entrance of the plaza, and restoring both the Pyramid Park sculpture and the Fonseca Monolith.

Related: $25K In Seed Money Dedicated To Cleaning Up Lake Anne Plaza

The foundation proposed a budget of $250,000, which would be raised with the following funding program:

• Gupta Family Foundation: $25,000
• LARCA: $45,000
• Reston Community Center (RCC): $50,000
• Reston Association (RA): $25,000
• Community Fundraising: $105,000

With the exception of the $25,000 grant, the other numbers in the foundation's presentation were characterized as aspirational.

A Dec. 1 approval by LARCA would allow enough time to raise the necessary money and to complete work on the Lake Anne Rising project in time for the May 1 opening of the Reston farmers market.

"The schedule looks tight, but in our business career, our clocks go at a fast pace," Sashti Gupta said. "Anybody who works with us is comfortable with that."

LARCA Board Focused On 'Fiduciary Duties'

The LARCA board has until the end of this year to pass its 2022 budget to ensure that each property owner will receive their annual booklet on time with the updated condo fees.

Hadjikyriakou said the LARCA board would not be doing its fiduciary duties if it rushed through a budget item in order to meet the foundation's deadline while the 2022 budget was still being reviewed.

The new board is also facing a number of financial challenges that the proposed beautification project would not directly address.

In September, a report from the Fairfax County Department of Public Works and Environmental Services and architectural firm Samaha Associates identified $37 million in significant infrastructure issues at Lake Anne Plaza.

These included damage and distress to concrete surfaces and brick exteriors, as well as mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems that dated to the mid-1960s. The most notable of these was when the Quayside condominiums went without hot water for several months last winter.

"We're still facing incredible amounts of infrastructure problems that are causing several unit owners not to be able to live in their homes right now," Hadjikyriakou said.

For example, some residents were forced out of their Chimney House units in September when rainwater backed up into their condos, causing black mold to accumulate and floor tiles to buckle. The displaced residents are waiting for the new LARCA board to make repairs so they can move back into their homes.

"And now we're facing an issue where half of the Chimney House has been without heat for over a month," Hadjikyriakou said. "We're still waiting for a boiler to be delivered to us and installed when it should have been done before the winter."

The new LARCA president said the board was focused on addressing these immediate, critical needs rather than committing money to landscaping and beautification.

The Guptas said the condo association's failure to meet the Dec. 1 deadline would affect the foundation's ability to raise funds through donations or sponsorships. For this reason, they would not move ahead without LARCA's commitment.

Related: $37M In Repairs Needed To Lake Anne's Aging Infrastructure

RCC Executive Director Leila Gordon told Patch the community center was awaiting sponsorship documentation from the Gupta Family Foundation and confirmation that the project was going to occur before moving forward with the proposed $50,000 sponsorship.

"As the presentation made by the Gupta Foundation on November 18 indicated, if the funding can’t be assembled, the project will not occur and subsequently, RCC would not be a participating sponsor," she said, in an email.

Mike Leone, RA's director of communications, told Patch the association has made no commitment toward the $25,000 as proposed in the Guptas' presentation.

"No presentation has even been made by the foundation to the RA board of directors," he said. "Before any funding could even be appropriated and allocated by RA, that request would need to be presented to the RA board of directors and they would have to vote on that."

With the December RA board agenda already set, Leone said the earliest the board could consider such a proposal would be January or February.

Although the Lake Anne Rising project proposal doesn't address the ongoing infrastructure issues, Margaret Gupta still sees it as a positive step for the Reston community to take.

"A beautification effort of the public space that kind of lifts it up, doesn't address any of the big infrastructure, doesn't address all those millions of dollars, but this sort of lane that says for a sum of money that's reasonable, right now, let's make this place look pretty, so it feels like there's some energy," she said. "Then maybe that will juice other thoughts about the bigger infrastructure issues."