Election Watch 2026
Preventing the Next Building System Failure Starts With Who You Elect
October 11, 2026
A board that keeps patching old equipment instead of replacing it is a red flag at any condo building. At 175 E Delaware Pl. HOA, that board is on the ballot. That leadership approved up to $525,000 for elevator door work on cars past their useful life, while plumbing stacks and trash chutes overdue for replacement keep waiting. Owners vote October 13. Here are four candidates to skip, and why checking all 25 boxes matters.
Brought to you by Drew McManus, your neighbor in 7908.
Before You Vote
Your Home Is on This Ballot
On Tuesday, October 13, you decide who controls what happens to your home for the next two years. Here is what you are living with right now:
- Your money: Your assessments pay to patch equipment that still has to be replaced. When it finally is, every dollar spent on patches is gone.
- Your unit: When a shared plumbing stack backs up, you can be fined for a blockage the building admits it can’t trace to anyone.
- Your daily life: You ride elevators so old that parts are no longer made.
- Your home’s value: A building that keeps putting off replacement is harder to finance and harder to sell.
Four candidates on your ballot helped lead the approach that put you here. Below is what it is costing you, who they are, and how to make your ballot count in full.
Throwing Good Money After Bad
Paying to Patch What Needs Replacing
Our elevators, plumbing stacks, and trash chutes are all well past the point where they should have been replaced. Instead, the replacement projects keep getting deferred, and the expenses keep coming anyway. How is this good fiscal judgment?
- Elevators: On the Engineering Committee’s recommendation, the Board approved up to $525,000 to upgrade the door equipment and passenger safety sensors on 12 elevators. The work is required because the equipment is so old that parts are no longer manufactured. None of that money carries over or holds value when the cars are finally replaced. But we’ll spend it anyway instead of beginning critical work on modernization.
- Plumbing stacks: These are the shared pipes that carry waste from multiple units at once, and they are failing at an increasing rate. Instead of doing the hard work of replacing them, leadership wrote House Rules that fine owners for putting items into the plumbing that cause problems. Board President Scott Timmerman even admitted it can’t reliably trace a blockage to a single owner so the rule is effectively useless. It shifts owner attention to behavior instead of replacement and upgrades.
- Trash chutes: These are in the same condition: past due for replacement and still deferred.
Some will argue safety work can’t wait. They’re right, and that is the point. Wait this long, and owners pay for repairs that can’t be skipped on equipment that still has to be replaced.
44th Floor Renovation
Same Pick, Same Approach
The 44th Floor common area renovation project was only recently announced, and Board President Scott Timmerman has already chosen who leads it. His pick has led every major capital project in the building over the last several years, including the pool renovation and the ground floor lobby renovation. All of them went over budget and over time or left us with hundreds of thousands of dollars in legacy expenses for annual repairs to botched work.
While Timmerman’s pick isn’t on the ballot this year, the lobby renovation shows the approach. That project did not include a restroom for employees even when it was the one thing employees asked for and the Association could have easily afforded. Front desk staff still have to go up to the common areas or to their locker room, which takes them away from the desk for extended periods. In some instances, they have to find a public restroom.
That approach shows up across our shared spaces. Owners aren’t allowed to bring food or drink into any public space. Club 44 is set up to accommodate board meetings, not to serve as a lounge owners actually use. Under this leadership, it’s easy to see how someone could think our common spaces have been designed around the belief that owners shouldn’t be using them, and every design choice works to limit how much they do.
Without a change in leadership, you can count on that same approach carrying straight into the 44th Floor: owner input gets shut out, costs run over again, and the finished space gets used less when it should bring neighbors together.
Candidates to Skip
You Deserve Better Than These Four
This isn’t an election about incumbents and challengers. It really comes down to just four owners. In fact, you can vote for any incumbent or challenger on this ballot and be better off than voting for these four individuals.
One fact connects each member: every one of them sits on the Engineering Committee, the committee responsible for the building systems that keep getting deferred. Most serve as handpicked committee chairs by Board President Scott Timmerman.
As long as you skip these four, you’re doing the most you can to bring about positive change for yourself and your neighbors.:
1. Scott Timmerman: current Board President. Lack of judgment, lack of transparency, and lack of ethics. He chairs the Ad Hoc Management Committee, sits on six others, and appoints all committee chairs directly without oversight.
2. Judith A. Aiello: Part of Timmerman’s inner circle of current leadership, with seats on seven committees, including Engineering, Finance, and Timmerman’s Ad Hoc Management Committee.
3. Jacob Lopata: Technology Committee Chair and Engineering Committee member, behind costly decisions that don’t deliver for owners.
4. Duncan Kime: Treasurer, Finance Committee Chair, and Engineering Committee member. He is a key figure in the budgets that keep deferring replacement.
My Platform
What You Should Be Able to Count On
My full platform is at 175delaware.com/platform. These three commitments protect you from the problems above:
Vote Like A Boss
Check 25 Boxes, Every Time
The election rules Timmerman champions make it easy to waste most of your vote without realizing it. That’s frustrating. It should be something that gets under your skin. But you can still beat it by using every vote you have.
Your vote carries weight equal to your unit’s ownership share, and every box you check gives that candidate your full share. You can check up to 25 boxes, one per candidate. Any box you leave unchecked is lost; that weight does not move to the candidates you did pick. Check one box, and only 4% of your voting power counts.
There are 47 candidates for 25 seats. 24 incumbents and 23 candidates who are not currently on the board. If you want change sooner than later, check the following 23 change candidates.
For your final two boxes, I recommend the following incumbents, in order of value. Beyond these, any other incumbent not among the four above is an equal choice:
6106 Pamela A. Francis
Contact Election Judge Jeremiah Querubin of Condo CPA at 630-832-2222 x125 or jr@condocpa.com, and they’ll walk you through changing your vote. Even if you ask on Monday, October 12, a new ballot must be provided in time for you to cast it before voting closes on Tuesday. The same contact works if you’ve lost your ballot.
Important: Before you turn in your ballot, handwrite the number of votes you cast at the top of the page. Example: “I voted for 25 candidates.”
Then print your name and unit number and sign it on the bottom half.
How to return your ballot
- Drop box: Use the locked voting box at the Management Office during regular business hours until 5:00 pm on Tuesday, October 13.
- Mail: Use the self-addressed envelope that came with your ballot.
- In person: Bring it to the Election Judges at the Annual Meeting, 7:00 pm on October 13 in the 44th floor Party Room, before voting closes.
