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Property Improvements
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You might be thinking ... Why add this page now?
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Basically, for two reasons:
- Ownership of our 16 Condos are by individuals who mostly view their Condo as a "legacy" to pass down to their family member(s), and
- Aligning with that thought, almost half of our Bookings year round are from "Repeaters" (who return year-after-year) and another 18% are friends or family of "Repeaters". Hence, a "family vacation place".
These two factors contribute strongly to our extraordinary Booking performance, and our Owners' motivation to maintain their individual Condo and Siesta Sands common property in "top knotch" condition.
The actions described below and achieved during the past six years, support such legacy notion, and the ensuring that Siesta Sands continues to be viewed as a "Vacation paradise you'll yearn to return too."
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A Bit of History -- Our four buildings, built 63 years ago, have stood up well under harsh conditions expected from being located directly on the beach. In fact, from the middle 1980's until the mid-1990's (a ten year period), at high tide, beach surf slapped against our seawall. Occasionally pounding so hard against the seawall, water would be hurdled onto our Sundeck -- and a few times, onto our roofs resulting in the breaking of windshields of automobiles parked in our lot (our roof back then contained a stone pebble base where little pebbles would eventually become lose). The northern stairs over the seawall had long been storm-destroyed prior to the middle 80's causing Guest beach access during high-tide to shift to the street at the south end of our property ... which today is County Beach Access 3B.
What follows below are five major projects undertaken by our Owners during the past six years. Each project was approved by our sixteen Owners and with unanimous vote of "FOR" (except for item 3, which was limited to Board vote).
Each Owner was required to spend many thousands of dollars in special assessments, including forgoing thousands of dollars each of rental income, resulting from "shut-downs" necessary to accomplish the project.
- Siesta Sands Building Upgrade Project (SSBUP) launched September 2018,
- Siesta Sands Stairway Replacement Project (SSSRP) launched September 2020,
- Siesta Sands American-With-Disabilities-Act lawsuit launched March 29, 2022,
- Siesta Sands Parking Lot Soil Pipe Replacement Project (action in preparation of item 5) launched August 2023, and
- Siesta Sands Parking Lot Replacement (SSPLR) with stone pavers launched September 2023.
The fourth project was to spend-ahead to eliminate risk of needing to physically access soil pipes running under our newly paved parking lot for all buildings.
Siesta Sands Building Upgrade Project (SSBUP) in September 2018 The largest and most expensive project was supposed to begin late September and finish in six weeks. A County "Stop Work Order" regarding window installations caused the work effort to not be completed until first week of January. It more than tripled the planned "shut-down" period resulting in a major impact on Bookings and Owner Rental Income.
The key components of work were:
- Replace all exterior doors and windows with high efficiency glass.
- Gulf-side glass to meet Turtle Protection Standards.
- Remove all loose stucco (close to 90 percentage loose).
- Fill all cracks in concrete block walls to prevent water intrusion.
- Replace all rusted distribution boxes and make neat.
- Double seal all exterior concrete block walls for stucco application.
- Re-stucco all concrete block walls (almost 90% of wall surfaces).
- Make neat all cables, electrical, and Fibre Optic cablings where mounted/attached to buildings.
- Paint all stucco walls with two coats of ten-year warranty paint.
- After all buildings were completed, move work on to Sundeck and Seawall.
- Repair all Sundeck damaged areas, seal, and paint with special deck paint.
 Siesta Sands Stairway Replacement Project (SSSRP): The eight concrete staircases, constructed of assembled concrete components, were now 63 years old and exceeding useful life. The rebar aiding there attachment to each building were seriously failing, permitting gradual separation of components ... all staircases had supporting lally-columns added over the years beneath each stringer to ensure safety from failure. This Project, also planned in September, our slowest month, included a three-week "Shut-Down".
New staircases are now surperior to the original ones -- as each are a "single-pour" staircase producing a soid piece of concrete, heavily rebarred, to ensure structural integrity. Their design matches well with the Spanish architectual motif look, and accommodates and adapts very well to the up-to-code doubled hand railings.
Siesta Sands American With Disabilities Act (ADA): On March 29, 2022 Siesta Sands was served a Summons by United States District, Middle District, Tampa, charging Siesta Sands with operating a website not in compliance with the ADA. The suit was by a handicaped person who stated he was an ADA "Tester", and who had dozens of active cases going on in FL and GA. Siesta Sands argued in mediation and litigation that Siesta Sands is not able to accommodate the public anywhere close to that provided / offered by a typical hotel, motel, conference center, Inn, etc. The website complaint was further addressed by adding a comprehensive page describing Siesta Sands existing ADA compliance and non-compliance conditions.
After ten months of continuous litigation, and tens of thousands of legal fees incurred by the Owners, the Plaintiff's attorneys filed a motion with the court offering voluntary dismissal of the case, with prejudice, as they concluded a dismissal served them better than continuing the litigation (the typical fee to settle with this "Tester" was $7 to $10k ... he received zero payment). The Judge accepted their motion. Siesta Sands anticipates such dismissal and added ADA page to our website togeter will deter future ADA law suits.
Siesta Sands Parking Lot Soil Pipe Replacement Project: Seen to the left of the PVC clean-out and elbow, is the 63 years old cast iron pipe (now permanently sealed off with a rubber membrane and clamp to sustain non-use). Its path had turned to run under Condo #52's Courtyard Decking, under its side-walk entranceway, then under the berm and fenced in re-cycled container area separating our two properties, before connecting up with 110 Beach Road's soil pipe. This 63 years-old connection was legal when installed because the two properties were one property 63 years ago.
Note: Research on cast iron soil pipe useful life is known to be 50 to 100 years. However, in Florida its useful life is much shorter and failure often occurs after 25 years. This happens because FL has high salt content in its soil causing pipes to rust from outside in.
Siesta Sands Board of Directors saw this situation as totally different from the one of infringement described below, and one of high liability to let continue once known. Siesta Sands has experienced many soil pipe blockages by all four of our buildings, especially during the last ten years. It is our Manager's worst nightmare when one happens. Especially when she is 100% Booked. She must help the Guest locate a booking and pay for it. But now this is all fixed with PVC pipes!
COMMENT: The green "Beach Front Rentals" sign, almost all of the white fenced recyle bins area, and a good portion of the shrubbed / grassy berm belongs to Siesta Sands and is a property infringment ... County Sewer TAPS marker is likely to be not more than two feet onto the 110 Beach Road property. The photo is taken at an angle, so it's impossible to conclude where the line is from the photo ... best sighted from the opposite end by standing in the entrance area to Condo #52's courtyard deck, and imagine extending that concrete wall all the way down to the street (most accurate boarder line).
Such infringments causing little harm between good neighbors occur all the time, and normally are ignored until it becomes important to address them. This is almost always when either party's property is to be sold, causing the infringement to no longer remain in the dormaint stage. There is also the matter of whether an infringement ceases to be one after permitting it to happen beyond so many years.
Siesta Sands Parking Lot Replacement Project: Finally, the work has begun -- a phased approach where the southern half of all Asphalt is being removed for preparation to receive the stone pavers. Eighty seven palates soon to arrive. Also, all soil pipes have been re-routed and changed over to PVC replacing the 63 year old cast-iron pipes.
Stone pavers have arrived ... the whole operation well chorigraphed!
THE FINISHED PRODUCT! Gone are the days of walking barefoot on "blistering" black Asphalt. Also, no need for white lines to be painted periodically on black Asphalt to control parking positions.
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