Worth Noting Meet the Board

Doug Urban is the President of the Meadows of Walden Condominium Association. Get to know him better with this little Q&A.

WHERE DID YOU GROW UP?

BY MIRIAM CONNER

century modern architecture and the natural beauty of the community.

WHAT DO YOU ENJOY ABOUT LIVING IN WALDEN? We enjoy all four seasons, the Club, the pool, the restaurants, the social life, and the walking paths. It’s absolutely the best place ever. It’s like being on a permanent Staycation because, from morning to night, you never have to leave Walden!

ACTIVITIES/HOBBIES: Club Walden, swimming, working out, golf and yoga.

I grew up in Medina, where my parents owned an Open Pantry Food Mart and Dairy Knoll ice cream stand just off the town square. Later, we moved to Brecksville, where I attended Brecksville/Broadview Heights High School.

EDUCATION: I went to Kent State University, became a Resident Advisor at Twin Towers, and graduated with a BA in Marketing.

CAREER: I began my career in 1985 at P&G as a Field Section Manager located in Pittsburgh, where I achieved Bronze Club for outstanding sales achievements. Later in 1997, I changed careers, joining Nestle USA at the Solon HQ as a Customer Development Manager for the Club and Channel businesses, and a Customer Shopper Development Manager for Toll House, Carnation, and Libby’s brands. I am currently a Sales Operations Manager for the Frozen Stouffer’s & Lean Cuisine Meals Retail Division, where I lead the Sales Business Planning Process for over 440 retail representatives and act as the primary interface between the Nestle Retail Sales Organization and the Nestle Marketing Division for the Frozen Meals Category and Brands.

FAMILY: I met my wife, Denise, at Kent State University when I was a senior, and she was an incoming freshman. We will be celebrating our 37th wedding anniversary this year! We have two adult sons and a growing number of grandchildren.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU LIVED IN WALDEN? We have lived seven years in The Meadows.

WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO WALDEN? After our sons graduated from college and launched into their adult lives, we decided to “right-size” our home. In looking for the perfect condo, we fell in love with Walden’s mid-

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN PRESIDENT OF THE MEADOWS? Five years. I joined the Meadows Board in 2017 as Vice President, became President in 2018 and recently began my third term this year.

WHAT HAS BEEN ACCOMPLISHED UNDER YOUR PRESIDENCY? Actually, a lot (LOL). The Meadows Board and I have been very busy implementing our five-year strategic plan that follows our reserve studies capital replacement schedule. The schedule is created to provide our association a roadmap to address the inevitable: the Meadows’ aging infrastructure.

The largest and most challenging project to date was redesigning and rebuilding the lake’s retaining wall between the Meadows and the Gardens, which needed to be done to protect the foundations of the condo buildings adjacent to the lake. The old lake wall was in desperate need of replacement since it was bowing and beginning to collapse.

The project took over two years to complete, beginning with hiring a civil engineering firm to evaluate and design the retaining wall for long-term structural integrity. Based on the engineers’ recommendations, we researched and interviewed several contractors that had capabilities for such a large-scale project and invited them to bid on the project following the engineers’ directions.

The lake wall project was completed summer of 2022 using 5,000 stone Allan blocks, 12 tons of rock, four cement drainage pipes, an overflow dam and a vault to retain the water and regulate the flow to the lower lake along Walden Blvd.

In addition to maintaining the overall property elements, the association is also required to repair exterior building elements specifically outlined in our governing documents. Over the past five years, we have completed many other projects. Just a few are listed below:

• Stained/painted all 52 units, including repairing/replacing the cedar siding, as needed

• Resurfaced and sealed all of the Meadows’ private roads, driveways and visitor parking areas

• Shared in the expense of re-milling Ridgeway Drive, which is not a public road but a private drive for the residents and guests of the Meadows, Concord Downs, the Willows, High Point, and the Barn

• Systematically replaced or eliminated the use of railroad ties

• Rebuilt failing masonry chimneys

• Rebuilt collapsing catch basins (the Meadows has more than 72!)

• Raised our tree canopy to preserve and extend the life of our shake roofs

• Aerated and overseeded the grounds while expanding our landscaping and grounds maintenance contracts to include both Common and Limited Common areas, essentially 360-degree landscape coverage

Continue to improve our units and the Meadows’ property while remaining fully funded. This is a delicate balancing act that requires realistic, long-term strategic planning that follows what our association is required to do, based on our governing documents, while still being responsible fiscal stewards for the residents. Moving forward, the Meadows Board’s mission over the next 12 years is to continue to aggressively save reserve funds to address future scheduled capital projects, such as replacing 52 units’ roofs and re-milling our roads.

Martin Moleski (Claridges) took this photo of a sun halo on January 29.

A sun halo is caused by the refraction, reflection and dispersion of light through ice particles suspended within thin, wispy, high-altitude cirrus or cirrostratus clouds. As light passes through these hexagon-shaped ice crystals, it is bent at a 22° angle, creating a circular halo around the sun. The prism effect of light passing through these six-sided ice crystals also separates the light into its various color frequencies, making the halo look like a very pale rainbow, with red on the inside and blue on the outside.

TRIVIA

Name the type of bird migrating 600 miles to return to Northeast Ohio this spring, each weighing the equivalent of four paper clips.

Walden Life magazine celebrates its second anniversary with this issue! Thank you to all of our readers and business partners. Here’s to a wonderful Year Three!

Answer to last issue’s question: February is the month with the most record snowfall in Aurora. Not this year, though!