RA to Stifle RELAC Users--RA to Vote Tonight

                                       The View From Over Here

The Board of the Reston Association is on a roll, and it is not a good one.  This week RA notified members on the RELAC chilled water air conditioning system that RA proposes to make it impossible to get relief from the often ineffective and unhealthy system .  This is the RA Board leadership’s second amendment of the restrictive covenants in the last six months favoring RELAC in a manner not only negatively impacting members, but also acting as a disincentive in improving this monopoly utility’s service to 400 households. 

RELAC was bought for a song a year and a half ago by three area men from Aqua American, a corporation with no interest in operating the utility.  Most of us hoped the change would be an improvement.  In one sense the new owners have done better.  They are more responsive to complaints. But, to date they have done nothing to make fundamental improvements—promised cooling towers are nowhere to be seen, new chillers and distribution pipes not even mentioned.  They seem unable to provide the major systemic investment needed for competitive cooling.  Customers see the same outrageous prices but no improvement.

As a result RELAC has been losing customers, including several of my neighbors, with legitimate medical needs.  RA leadership is stepping in to bail out RELAC by barring the exit. In doing so, RA again fails to act in the best interests of their membership and fails to take action, appropriate under the governing covenants, to get the utility to bring service up to a competitive par.  

Briefly, the proposed amendment to be voted upon by the RA Board TONIGHT AT THE 7:30 PM MEETING AT RA HQ on Sunrise Valley Drive combined with the May 2013 amendment would:

          -require not only that a household get a doctor’s certificate as proof of the negative health impact of the damp, mold-generating chilled water system on a resident, but also that the resident be legally classified as a handicapped person;

          -void the certificate after one year, requiring annual recertification.  The temporary certification will lapse if there is no longer a resident handicapped (not just allergic or having breathing difficulties!) person; OR, IF “the RELAC cooling system [becomes] is adequate to provide sufficient cooling and humidity control to remove the need for supplemental a/c..”  The latter seems a clear admission of the RELAC’s inadequacy and unhealthy condition.

          -allow only “supplemental” a/c.  That is, it prohibits shutting down the failing RELAC service in order to switch to functioning conventional A/C.  To date, users approved for relief from RELAC switched to conventional systems, shut down RELAC and stopped paying for a service no longer used.  They will continue to do so in fact, but now they will be required by RA to keep paying for an unused RELAC “service”.  This will present RA with an interesting enforcement task.  Surely this will be challenged in court--requiring payment for nothing in return!??

One wonders what is motivating Reston Association Board leadership not only to fail its membership in favor of the corporate interest, but also to ignore the concomitant environmental damage inherent in the system.  RELAC operations are wasteful and damaging to our environment.  At present, users are charged punishingly high rates for an ineffective service which must be run 24/7 to get barely adequate cooling service in lower-mid levels of our townhouses.  There is no incentive to turn down, much less turn off the system under these circumstances.  Furthermore, because of its inadequacy and damp air, many users constantly run dehumidifiers and fans simultaneously with the a/c. 

The Reston Association Board should reject not only the covenants amendment under consideration this evening, but should rescind the May amendment as well.  RELAC is losing customers because it’s service is not up to par.  The new owners need to fix that problem to make it unnecessary to seek relief.

If they cannot, RA members’ only lasting remedy is to get the petitions going again for a referendum to allow the indentured servants of this monopoly free choice, one that RA cannot tamper with so easily.