About the system
“25 Problems” is part of a set of information products maintained by Roman Kowalczuk. In 2023 and through early 2024 the views expressed were mostly his (ergo "my" - Roman).
I owe a lot of thanks to "Substack" authors like Jennifer Alexander ("The Etobicoke Voice") and Sabrina Nanji ("Queen's Park Observer").
This project stems from recent experiences with aging buildings and their management in the Don Mills area - as land prices have soared, managers have come and gone, buildings have flipped and developers are out in force. And one or two of the councillors have been doing some strange stuff, eg. why would you vote for a sky-scraping tower when there are zero available school spaces, and buyers will have to sign a contract to the effect that children will be bussed to destinations unknown???!
At one recent (late March 2023) planning meeting city staff even spoke of a real pressure from developers "to go higher" with new builds... except nobody around here has any real experience doing anything like this, and EXISTING condominium complexes are crumbling!
Anyway, I thought it might be handy for condo boards, tenant associations and building managers to have a list of issues to consider. And a few years ago I attended an un-advertised consultation with the police who had come into some millions of dollars and they wanted to buy shiny new surveillance systems. I took issue with their approach, and I said that the area needed a technology portal... and, well, here we are and (SURPRISE!!!) so is A.I.
Also the "Hi-Rise" newspaper publisher Valerie Dunn passed away, and some of her domains went down. So there was a bit of an information gap that developed in the area circa 2022-2023 say.
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Technical support for this installation of phpBB was provided by Marc M... the back end is a lot more complex than my old bulletin board system (that's an external link) used to be, but I think it's a toss up as to whether the web provides better access and functionality overall. In particular privacy issues have increased in scope and there's the whole issue of cookies, so be sure to read the privacy policy. Heh - privacy! Something that a lot of building managers pay lip service to!
If you have any questions please send e-mail to "admin" at 25 problems dot com (no spaces)
Suggested reading
I owe a lot of thanks to "Substack" authors like Jennifer Alexander ("The Etobicoke Voice") and Sabrina Nanji ("Queen's Park Observer").
This project stems from recent experiences with aging buildings and their management in the Don Mills area - as land prices have soared, managers have come and gone, buildings have flipped and developers are out in force. And one or two of the councillors have been doing some strange stuff, eg. why would you vote for a sky-scraping tower when there are zero available school spaces, and buyers will have to sign a contract to the effect that children will be bussed to destinations unknown???!
At one recent (late March 2023) planning meeting city staff even spoke of a real pressure from developers "to go higher" with new builds... except nobody around here has any real experience doing anything like this, and EXISTING condominium complexes are crumbling!
Anyway, I thought it might be handy for condo boards, tenant associations and building managers to have a list of issues to consider. And a few years ago I attended an un-advertised consultation with the police who had come into some millions of dollars and they wanted to buy shiny new surveillance systems. I took issue with their approach, and I said that the area needed a technology portal... and, well, here we are and (SURPRISE!!!) so is A.I.
Also the "Hi-Rise" newspaper publisher Valerie Dunn passed away, and some of her domains went down. So there was a bit of an information gap that developed in the area circa 2022-2023 say.
-------------------
Technical support for this installation of phpBB was provided by Marc M... the back end is a lot more complex than my old bulletin board system (that's an external link) used to be, but I think it's a toss up as to whether the web provides better access and functionality overall. In particular privacy issues have increased in scope and there's the whole issue of cookies, so be sure to read the privacy policy. Heh - privacy! Something that a lot of building managers pay lip service to!
If you have any questions please send e-mail to "admin" at 25 problems dot com (no spaces)
Suggested reading