I accept your explanation without question. I did not mean to imply that there was any sort of embezzlement going on or anything like that. In any case the Champlain Towers was about to start a multi million dollar refurb so the money had to come from somewhere. I merely meant to say that that was a lot of money paid in dues over the years and surely there should have been some sort of increase in the cost of dues or other mechanism to purchase extra insurance or make loan payments or what have you to get the refurbishment done before the whole thing came tumbling down.
I didn’t take it that you were suggesting embezzlement. My guess is the board simply delayed work too long or did too many less expensive temporary repairs instead of fixing problems before they became major. At the time I’m sure they made their decisions with good intentions. Unfortunately, when it comes to a structure, over time cumulative bad decisions can result in disaster.
Funding should not have been a problem, even if reserves were insufficient. Condo boards can borrow money against the value of the building. The value of those buildings should have been sufficient to borrow many millions. They could have borrowed and then raised the dues to cover the payments.
It would make a good investigative journalism story to determine why the needed repairs were not undertaken on a timely basis over the years. Such knowledge might help the legislature to improve laws regulating condominium governance in the state. However, with all of the lawsuits being filed, the people who could shed light on the story are most certainly going to clam up.