Board of Directors member Phyllis Goldstein has been a resident of North Shore Towers for more than 30 years, and has been active in the community for just as long.
On October 15, 1975, Goldstein and her husband, Mitch, moved into the Towers. Prior to that, the couple had spent the first 10 years of their marriage living in the Bronx.
Saying it was time to move on, Goldstein said that on a Saturday they saw an ad for the Towers in the New York Times and went to see it the very next day. When they did, the two “just fell in love with it.”
“It was a fresh beginning and there was a lot to attract us,” she said.
Goldstein was a special education elementary school teacher and Mitch an attorney. They retired from their careers in the mid and late ‘90s.
At the time they moved in, the salon was the only vendor open.
“Little by little the other shops opened,” Goldstein said. “It just made living here even more attractive.”
Before North Shore Towers underwent its conversion to become a cooperative, while it was still a rent stabilized building, Goldstein first became active in the community. The Towers had been built under a tax abatement program that, unknown to many, would cease after 10 years, at which point rents would go up to the fair market value.
Goldstein was one of the affected individuals from various buildings that became part of a coalition that got active in order to maintain the rent stabilization.
“I’ve always been very active in the community,” she said.
When North Shore Towers went through the transition of becoming a co-op, Goldstein chaired the conversion committee. Afterwards, she went on to serve as a member of different committees.
In 2001, Goldstein followed the suggestion of a friend and ran for the Board of Directors. During that two-year term, she chaired the Marketing and Public Relations Committee and the House and Grounds Committee, which, at the time, was known as the Enhancement Committee.
With the help of many others, Goldstein said, that during that time, they were able to change what looked as a schoolyard into what is now called the courtyard.
“We just completely renovated it to what I consider to be a beautiful garden,” Goldstein said. “I think people have enjoyed it all these years and it does keep getting better.”
When that term had finished, Goldstein decided not to run again until 2007. Last year she once again headed the Marketing and Public Relations Committee. With the help of a dedicated group of residents, the committee created a new web site for North Shore Towers.
“I think that the new web site catches the eye of the people we want to attract, which is the baby boomers,” she said. “I think it shows the complex to its best advantage.”
The web site is also a valuable resource for residents, since there is a resident log-in that enables access of the tennis schedule, golf tee times, movie schedule and monthly calendar. In addition, Towers meetings are taped and put on the site for residents to view.
Goldstein has chaired the Screening Committee for the last two years. In the past, she also spearheaded efforts to pass the requirement that all new residents and sublets be mandatory Country Club members and one to extend the proprietary lease.
Goldstein estimates that the mandatory membership has brought in more than $1 million in revenues, while also helping to keep membership dues increases to a minimum.
The most challenging part of being on the Board, Goldstein said, “is to maintain what I believe is in the best interests of the community even though it’s not a popular idea.”
On a personal level, she said the most rewarding part of her Board service is the work that she has done with others on major projects. For the Board as a whole, she said that it has been gratifying to see that, under the three presidents she has worked with, the fiscal integrity of the Towers has been maintained and increased.
Goldstein is also a member of the Towers Camera Club, where she has learned a great deal. She takes her camera when she travels to take many pictures, and has even gone on trips in the area to hone her skills.
