Condo Media - March 2015 - 46

Volunteer Spotlight

The Homeowners' Advocate
Barbara Reilly Gives Voice to Unit Owners' Concerns
When Barbara Reilly decided to downsize from
her large home to a smaller place in Providence,
R.I, she had a vision of carefree living in which the
manager served as a kind of concierge.
"I had no idea that condominium living was shared
ownership," she laughs.
She quickly learned, however, the importance of
being involved in how the association is run. "If you
don't want to get involved in the running of the place,
then you've got an awful lot of faith in your neighbors,
because they'll do it for you," she points out. When
Reilly, as she puts it, "stumbled into" a board meeting
at her new home, the Conrad Condominium Association, she not only joined the board, she eventually
became president.
At the time, the association was so poorly financed,
one board member had to pay the monthly fee in advance in order to retain an attorney to handle a unit
owner with a bad debt, and most of the units were not
owner occupied.
Today, Conrad Condominium not only has a
healthy reserve fund, it also has a majority owner
residency and units are usually snapped up as soon
as they hit the market.
"For a lot of people, it's their first time in the
condominium way of life, so educating them is
a task," says the association's property manager,
Pattie Turner, who also serves as controller for
Clarkin Real Estate of Warwick, R.I. "Working with
different clientele and being able to adapt to different personalities and still stay on task is a great gift
Barbara has."
After six years, Reilly stepped down from the board
at Conrad Condominium-but not from giving voice to
unit owners. She joined the board of the New England
chapter of Community Associations Institute (CAI).
Her volunteer activities with the chapter are endless
and have included everything from helping out with
the annual golf tournament, assisting at chapter
programs, taking the homeowner's role at conference panels, and writing a regular column for Condo
Media magazine, in which she hopes to educate others
through her own experiences.
"Barbara brings an understanding of association
homeowner issues to the chapter and a perspective that
is invaluable to CAI's efforts in developing important

46

CONDOMEDIA

BARBARA REILLY
Community Association Volunteer
resources for this membership group, which represents
the largest proportion of CAI members," says Chapter
Executive Director Claudette Carini. "We are fortunate
to have a volunteer who is so committed to her community and the industry and who is taking an active part in
making a difference."
"She has empathy for the unit owner and never
misses an opportunity to help another unit owner with
a problem," adds Frank Lombardi, Esq., principal of
Goodman, Shapiro & Lombardi, LLC, from the law
firm's office in Lincoln, R.I., and immediate past president of the CAI New England chapter. "She presents a
great perspective from that side of the table." He should
know, having represented Conrad Condominium during her tenure as president of the board and as an active
volunteer with CAI himself. "I've always found Barbara
to be very informative, very diligent, and very committed to her association," he observes. "She's very smart,
and she's a sweetheart. She's just the kind of person you
want to have around."
Condo Media - March 2015

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