Co-op City Times 06/25/16

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Co-op City’s official newspaper serving the world’s largest cooperative community. © Copyright 2016 Co-op City Times

Vol. 51 No. 26

City approval expected soon for pre-paid carrying charge program BY JIM ROBERTS

Shareholders who expressed an interest in joining Riverbay’s pre-paid carrying charge offer will be receiving a letter this week advising them of progress in getting the program started. Riverbay is close to receiving final approval from New York City to convert more of its residential buildings over to the Multifamily Conservation Program (MCP) that allows residential housing companies such as Co-op City to pay a fixed cost for water and sewer based on the number of apartments in the building. Approval by the city for this additional enrollment of more Co-op City buildings in the MCP would allow Co-op City to prepay New York City

Lower energy costs, higher revenue build Riverbay’s cash in the bank

Saturday, June 25, 2016

water and sewer charges for several more buildings and townhouses, thereby saving the community and its shareholders another $1.4 million, or 12%, on annual water charges. Riverbay will raise the funds needed to prepay the water bills with money that shareholders provide to prepay their carrying charges for one year and then share the water bill savings with those shareholders. Under the voluntary pre-paid carrying charge plan led by Board President Cleve Taylor, any shareholder who prepays their carrying charges for one year will receive a one-time 6% discount on their carrying charges for a

25¢

BY JIM ROBERTS

Riverbay’s currently available cash bank account has reached approximately $27 million this month due to significant energy savings, income from the cogen power plant, higher than projected equity and apartment revenues and decisions by the Board of Directors to ensure the financial health of the company.

In the recently completed fiscal year, Riverbay spent $11 million less than the budget called for to pay for oil and natural gas to run the power plant. Lower energy costs are continuing this year, according to Riverbay Finance Director Peter Merola. “We expect to see more energy (Continued on page 2)

(Continued on page 9)

83-year-old man found stabbed to death in his Co-op City home Person of interest taken in for questioning Friday morning BY BILL STUTTIG

As of deadline Friday afternoon, police were questioning a “person of interest” who is suspected of the violent murder of an 83-year-old man, a Building 21B resident, found cut and stabbed repeatedly inside his (Continued on page 9) home late Thursday afternoon.

Riverbay employees begin training on handling an active shooting scenario BY BILL STUTTIG

Keappock said. “Basically, we are trying As part of a joint initiative between to make the employees aware of how to Riverbay’s Public Safety and Human respond if an active shooter situation Resources Department, Riverbay emp- occurs here. They should have a strategy loyees began attending seminars last week on how to recognize and survive an active shooter situation. Captain James Keappock, Commander of Patrol for the Department of Public Safety, said that the initiative for bringing such periodic training to Riverbay began approximately a year ago, long before the recent horrific attacks by shoot- Instructors from the NYPD’s Counter Terrorism ers on soft targets in Paris and Division came to Co-op City last week to teach about methods to survive and active San Bernardino, California and employees shooter incident in the workplace. The educational most recently, Orlando, Florida. program is a joint venture of Riverbay’s Public But these most recent shootings Safety and Human Resources Departments and will offered to additional employees in the near have made the training even be future. Photo by Bill Stuttig more necessary and relevant. “We had our own active shooting situ- of what to do as soon as they think they ation here years ago and, unfortunately, hear the first shots and know the places incidents such as that have become much, where they can get out quickly. They are much too prevalent here in the United (Continued on page 4) States and elsewhere since then,” Captain

Riverbay’s current bank balances in New York Community Bank shows an available operating account balance of $29,943,100.71. There is approximately $2,800,000 in checks outstanding against it, which leaves a net operating cash balance of $27,100,000.

Last week to participate in Survey If you would like to have express bus service to lower Manhattan during morning rush hours, this is the last week to participate in the survey. Please take two minutes to complete the survey at http://www.surveymonkey.com/r/coopcitybus.

Section 2 Fun Day!

5th Annual SUMMER FUN DAY…Children cool off under sprinklers at last Saturday’s 5th annual Fun in the Sun Day held in Section 2. The summer celebration offered a variety of activities for the entire family. See more on pages 3 & 5. Photo by Lauretta Jaysura


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