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JANUARY 2020 941.349.0194|ISLAND VISITOR PUBLISHING, LLC
REMEMBERING ADRIENNE The family of Adrienne Feltman cordially invite you to a memorial and concert
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HOLIDAY PARTY
Record turnout for the 2019 LRC holiday party
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HOLIDAY GIFTS
The generosity of The Landings residents and our community retailers this year has been a smashing success!
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VOLUNTEERING Residents love volunteering at Selby Gardens
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FLORIDA DUCKS Very few of Florida’s waterfowl are native and one is being hybridized!
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LANDINGS ARTISTS Annual Landings Artists Exhibition at the Landings Racquet Club page
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TEEN SCENE
Meet Amaal Jamjoon, 18, Freshman at State College of Florida
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www.THELANDINGSOFSARASOTA.com
LMA 2020 Annual Meeting and Board of Directors Election The LMA Annual Meeting will be held February 6 at 7 p.m. It will be immediately preceded by the normal monthly meeting which will begin at 6:30 p.m. The primary agenda of the annual meeting is the election of board members. The Presidents of the constituent associations, or their designees, vote for the board members. The representatives have to be present to vote so please encourage your president to attend and the constituent associations should discuss their candidate preferences in advance. A meeting will be held at 7 p.m. on
Wednesday, January 15th, in the LRC Poolside Room for the Association Presidents to meet and interview the candidates. It is requested that all Presidents or their designees attend. The three goals of this year’s nominating committee have been: 1) to improve the gender board representation, 2) to enhance year-round resident representation and 3) to have candidates who have specific skill sets for a well-functioning board. Since there are six candidates for five open seats, there is a “contested” election. The six highly qualified candidates and their biosketches are included herein. The board
responsibilities have been discussed with each of them. Additionally, any resident owner interested in serving should contact a member of the Nominating Committee as soon as possible. Qualified nominations received by the association manager (George Niel at Argus Management) in writing thirty days prior to the meeting will appear on the ballot sent to the presidents beforehand. Your support of the LMA election process will really be appreciated.
Bios of each LMA Board candidate begin on page 20
The Landings Free College Schedule
By Irv Kushner
The Landings Free College is about to launch another interesting and informative season. Classes will be held again on Thursday afternoons at 2:30, beginning January 9th. There will be talks by a number of our neighbors in The Landings; several fascinating speakers from the outside world, and repeat appearances by some of the outstanding speakers of previous years. We are happy to announce Judy and Tara will graciously be hosting refreshments immediately following the opening and closing presentations. • January 9: We represent a veritable United Nations here at
The Landings, with literally dozens of residents who were born abroad. Many of them can be found in the exercise room. A number of them will tell us their eventful life stories, and describe how they got to The Landings. We will also honor Jack Kahgan, now 100 years old, who, with Ralph Ricapito, started the Roundtable Discussion Group, a precursor to the Free College, a decade ago. Plus: refreshments by Judy and Tara. • January 16: Karen Hicks, Law Enforcement Deputy, Crime Prevention, a representative of the Sheriff’s office, will tell us about how to deal with the challenge of identity theft. We all need to know this. Continued on page 5
Tantri Kidder from Indonesia, Duneska Grant from Columbia, and Eva Damian from Poland were the inspiration for the January 2nd program
Xfinity Solicitors Trespassing in The Landings The security committee reported that there have been many complaints from residents who have found literature at their doors soliciting business from Xfinity. Please report to the gate/security if you see anyone distributing literature or going door-to-door soliciting business. We do not allow soliciting door-to-door within The Landings and violators will be reported to the police as trespassing. Obviously service calls, repairs, installations are not an issue. However, please notify the gate if you are expecting vendors to your residence. The Xfinity solicitors were distributing literature from the Bradenton, University Parkway branch. It took us many hours of computerized answering machines at Xfinity, in an attempt to get the phone number of the Bradenton office. We were never successful. I was told, once I reached someone on their chat link, that they do not publish the branch phone numbers. I explained that all I wanted to do was to let the manager of the branch know what happened and that we will call the police next time. Still no luck. Finally, after multiple requests, I got to a supervisor who could not give me a phone number nor a number to call at the corporate office. I finally told the supervisor to have someone with authority contact me so I could report the problem.
I finally got an email... not from the corporate office but from an executive customer service representative somewhere in South Florida. Sounded like a clerk with no authority. She told me that she needed the addresses of every house that received the literature. I explained we have signs posted stating no solicitation at our entrance and there was no way I was sending her as many as several hundred addresses. I told her the gate address and name of our community was the only thing the branch manager needed to educate their staff. She said she was following instructions from her supervisor and insisted that they needed the addresses. I blew my top (somewhat) and explained that I would be going public with the insanity of such poor communications and lack of access to their offices. She finally got back to me and said the supervisor would ensure that all Xfinity solicitors would be told not to enter The Landings. I told her that we WILL call the police and have any Xfinity trespassers arrested. And with this article, I’m keeping my promise of going public. Norman Olshansky: President Landings Management Association
Do you know some Landings resident who is performing some amazing volunteer work in our community? If so, please let Steve Poyta know and we can highlight this volunteer and the organizations they volunteer with. Steve can be reached at (941) 822-0751 and/or poyta@verizon.net