NY Cooperator November 2020

November 2020 COOPERATOR.COM continued on page 9 Even bottles of pure isopropyl alcohol and glycerin gel became scarce as citizens resorted to homemade concoctions and alternative topical disinfectants—a method neither recommended by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) nor endorsed by this publication, it should be noted... but desperate times call for desperate measures. Whether the supply chain got its act together or the public heeded the exhortations of the CDC (and pretty much every credible medical profes- continued on page 8 As we know, climate change has far- ranging effects on everything from polar ice caps to coastal shorelines to expand- ing deserts around the world. The steadily warming planet also affects man-made structures, including the buildings we live in. All the materials that go into building construction—bricks, mortar, steel, and glass, as well as sealants, coatings, and a huge array of other structural and weath- erproofing elements—are all designed with climate in mind. In the deserts of Arizona, for example, engineers designing and choosing building materials must take into account that temperatures there can easily reach 120 degrees during the hot- ter months. By the same token, develop- ers in Miami and other coastal cities must consider how to reinforce their properties against increasingly frequent, increasingly violent hurricanes. But what about the flip-side of this equation? We may be adjusting how we construct housing in the face of a rapidly changing global climate, but how have our previous choices of building materi- als—and the ways in which we maintain them—contributed to climate change and its acceleration? What can we do to both lower the impact of buildings on climate change and to protect them from the ef- fects of it? Chicken or Egg? Fred Goldner is president of Energy Management and Research Associates, an engineering firm located in East Meadow, New York. He believes the problem of sorting out and reducing the environ- mental impact of multifamily residential buildings is more complex than a simple analysis of a given building’s carbon foot- Even though the world has been contending with COVID-19 and its consequences for nine months and counting, the routines and practices we’ve adopted to prevent its spread and mini- mize personal risk of infection are still evolving. With new data come new recommendations, adaptations, and inventions. If nothing else, this pandemic keeps us on our toes. Though they might seem like opposing qualities, vigilance and flexibility both have equal importance in the global effort to restore some form of normalcy in our lives. So it is with cleaning, especially in multifamily buildings and communities where comings and goings through common areas are unavoidable—however limited they may be to reduce social proximity and interpersonal contact. According to the website of the Centers for Dis- ease Control and Prevention (CDC), “Communal spaces, community activities, and close living quarters in multifamily housing increase the risk of getting and spreading the \[corona\] virus”—which makes the cleaning and sanitation procedures in these settings all the more im- portant for the health and safety of the approximately 74 million Americans who live in such homes, according to the Community Associations Institute (CAI), as well as the staff who sup- port them. Those responsible for keeping these areas clean and free of hazards—including viral pathogens—have to contend with the ever-changing protocols, products, and processes in place to protect the public—and themselves—from the spread of COVID-19. But even in the midst of a pandemic, is there a point where cleaning and disinfection can go overboard? Sanitizer Insanity In the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, hand sanitizer became such a hot commodity that the federal government took to usurping shipments headed for hospitals and hard-hit areas because supplies were so limited and demand was so high. If you were lucky enough to even lo- cate a bona fide product with the CDC-recommended percentage of alcohol content (the CDC recommends that a hand sanitizer with at least 60% alcohol be used in situations when soap and water are not available), you would be faced with usurious markups and strict quantity limits. In multifamily housing associations and cooperatives, the annual meeting of own- ers or shareholders is a legally mandated opportunity for a community to convene, learn, share, and exercise their essential duty—to vote. The lead-up to the election of directors and other matters before the own- ers or shareholders can amount to an entire election season—spring or early summer for many multifamily communities—that includes mingling events, campaigning, and informational meetings. This year, boards, managers, and their legal counsel had to face the unprecedented challenge of conducting these processes safely in the midst of a pandemic while complying with both the law and their own governing documents. For some, it meant adjourning the meeting to some future point when the world might resume some form of normalcy—which of course has yet to happen. For others, it meant acquir- ing and adjusting to new, virtual systems of gathering: the online meeting platforms of Zoom, Google Meets, Microsoft Teams, and the like with which, for better or worse, we have now all become intimately familiar. Holding the Remote In many states and municipalities, the legislature offered some solutions in the early days of the pandemic. Scott Smiler, attorney with the New York firm Gallet Dreyer Berkey, tells The Cooperator that the Business Corporation Law (BCL), which governs cooperatives as corporations, was amended “specifically \[to provide\] that meetings can be held solely by means of electronic communication, and that the platform or service will be deemed the place of the meeting….So whether your bylaws provide it or not, we can now look at that specific BCL section to give us the author- ity.” Smiler mentions that this provision ap- plies only to co-ops—not condos or HOAs, which are governed by Real Property Law— but that courts would likely apply a similar thought process to condominiums as well if challenged on the matter. An additional ca- veat is that the order expires on December 31, 2021. (As Smiler says, “Hopefully, we’re not in these conditions at that point.”) Cleaning Through COVID Maintaining Sanitation—and Sanity—in Multifamily Housing BY DARCEY GERSTEIN Virtual Governance How Co-ops & Condos Hold Meetings Distantly BY DARCEY GERSTEIN Climate Change and Building Maintenance: The Chicken and the Egg BY A.J. SIDRANSKY 205 Lexington Avenue, NY, NY 10016 • CHANGE SERVICE REQUESTED continued on page 10