CAI-NJ Sep.2016

LOOKING FORWARD LARRY THOMAS, PCAM | CAI-NJ CHAPTER EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

P rior to joining CAI-NJ as the Executive Director in September of 2014, I had no idea of the amount of pending legislation that involves both HOAs and condominiums. One of my first meetings as the Executive Director was the NJ-LAC meeting. Needless to say, I was amazed at the quantity of proposed bills and the depth at which the effect of the bills would be if they became law. I dedicated time every week to try to “catch up” with the major bills while still getting my feet underneath me with all of the other facets of what CAI-NJ is, as well as putting together a team of staff members and keeping the daily operations up and running. At the second meeting, I was a little more in tune to the conversations, but between the last meeting and this meeting, several new bills were introduced and needed to be evalu- ated. Their potential affect needed to be carefully measured should they become law. Chris Li, as Committee Chair, kept the conversations on point, focused and valued all of the committee members' opinions and input as well as comments from our lobbyists — Tim Martin and Paul Matecera from MBI Gluckshaw. Still, after the second meeting, I would sit at home at night and go over the previous meeting's minutes and my notes from the most current meeting and educate myself on the several items of suggested legislation. Chris Li was very helpful and through several phone calls and hundreds of emails, got me to the point that I understood the process and direction that the committee determined was the best for our communities. These meetings led me to believe that if I were to be of value to the NJ-LAC, I needed to get some assistance from within my office. Right about this time, I was interviewing for a new Director of Membership and Marketing. After several interviews, Laura O’Connor came in for an inter- view. Laura had a strong background in membership mar- keting and also several years of involvement with the New Jersey Restaurant Association’s legislative action program. I

immediately realized that my search for my new Director of Membership and Marketing was complete and hired Laura soon afterward. Laura has been an invaluable addition to the staff and tutors me every day on the inside workings of how the legislative process works. Laura attends every LAC and PAC meeting and is always up to speed on the committee’s initiatives and progress. The NJ-LAC is comprised of 20 members from all of our membership categories — Community Association Volunteer Leaders, Managers and Business Partners. This combination gives the committee the ability to hear the opinions from every angle. What may seem like bad leg- islation to the business partners, might make sense to the CAVL’s, or visa-versa. This is where the details of the meet-

"That’s the easy part. Once we come up with an opinion, we need to use all of our resources to see that our voice is heard by the right people."

ing conversations are fleshed out and a position is taken. In a lot of cases, the bill makes sense in a lot of ways, but needs some tweaking to make it a beneficial measure for our communities. That’s the easy part. Once we come up with an opinion, we need to use all of our resources to see that our voice is heard by the right people. This may be the sponsors of the bill or the chair of the involved committees. This is where MBI-Gluckshaw goes to work. They know all of the decision makers in Trenton and spend countless hours behind the scenes getting our voice heard. Once a course of action is determined, Tim Martin sets up meetings with various senators or assemblymen and we start our cam- CONT I NU E S ON PAGE 71

5

S E P T E M B E R , 2 0 1 6