I posted this page on 8-25-25 and this is an update 9-7-25 to post that none of the contacts I have made in the city of Los Angeles have been of any help after this was posted. Meghan Aldrich, Neel Mistry’s supervisor, offered to accept my email about this project and send it to people she knew were involved but I never got any communication from her that she had done that. I have left dozens of voice mails for many people at the city and at FordEC without any replies. In an effort to avoid violating the cease and desist order from AOReed’s attorney Werner, I talked to him and asked that he contact Romaine to give me an update on the status of the rooftop installation. He asked me to give him 2 days to do that. After a week I texted him and said that if he did not respond he would force me to contact Romaine myself. He did not send an update after a week so I texted Romaine. I have placed many calls to the FordEC buyer, Farnaz, with no replies. I called her suggested alternate, Arash at 310 864 9112, and he was rude, saying he saw my cease and desist and would not talk to me. I called the second alternate, Sam, who was equally rude. Neither would listen to me talk about the events leading to the C and D.
Below is my first post on 8-25-25
Kurt Shafer here, to present the history of my communication with the people in the city of Los Angeles and at the contractor FordEC and at AOReed, the company that has the contract from Ford to build the roof on the Recreation Center gymnasium.
The purpose of this message is to show that the design done by James Shwe in 2015 used the best rooftop ventilation system in the world and Raymond Romaine at AOReed is apparently determined to use an inferior rooftop. I am looking for current status of the rooftop to know if Romaine has obtained approval for a change or not.
I made many calls to Neel Mistry and when he left on leave in July 2025 he wrote me an email saying
—————————————————————————————————————————————“I’ve arranged for my team to oversee all active projects to ensure continuity and timely progress. For urgent matters related to ongoing projects please refer to the following contacts based on your needs:
Studio City Recreation Center CM Ulysses Aparicio and Sr CM Mariet Ohanian.
For all other matters you can reach my supervisor Meghan Aldrich at Meghan.Aldrich@lacity.org”
In the last month (August 2025) I placed calls to Aparicio and sent emails and never got any response. I emailed Ohanian without a response.
I called Ms Aldrich just a few days ago and she agreed to send any email I sent her on to her contacts. This web page is intended to be the heart of my email message to her today.
BACKGROUND IN 2015
In 2015 I met with James Shwe from the design firm MarokoShwe to talk to him about his rooftop designs. He told me he was asked by the people at the city of Los Angeles to design their new gymnasium. I introduced James to a rooftop ventilator he had never seen before, the Australian CSR Edmonds (now Bradford) EcoPower hybrid rooftop.
Here it is – you can see the motor that turns the turbine when powered. The turbine is such an excellent rain hat and air path that the air flow is better than any other rooftop then made in the United States and it is enhanced by any breeze. Hence the word hybrid for the combination of free gravity air flow and powered air flow.
When James saw this innovative new rooftop he was so impressed that he immediately chose it for the Studio City design. He was specifying 8 rooftops, 4 large ones and 4 medium size. Here are the specs – The EF-1,2,3 and 4 are 20 inch diameter throats and EF-5,6,7 and 8 are 16 inches.
Please note that I have changed my web site from invisco.com to inviscoinc.com
Later I learned that this design had one flaw – it was good for pulling air in open air but it fails to pull air in any space with a static pressure greater than 0.1 inches of water. As a contrast, here is a comparison of the performance of the Edmonds hybrid and standard rooftops in America – Note the CFM at 0.1 SP . And note the HP needed by Greenheck and LorenCook compared to the Invisco Tornado.
The reason the Tornado is so much better is the Australian rain hat made from a turbine. You can see the other US made rooftops use solid hats that require the air to go down before it can go out.
LorenCook designed their fan with a curved top edge on the throat to enable the air to flow easier. I think that is the reason why they can pull more air at lower power than Greenheck.
But neither of those fans can outperform the Aussie turbine.
THE POINT IS THERE IS NO BETTER ROOFTOP
In fact, no equivalent rooftop. So my goal here is to inform you in the city of Los Angeles and those at FordEC and those at AOReed that your procurement people need to be watchful for any attempt by AOReed to try to use an inferior rooftop. You do not need to accept that.
Here is the text exchange I had with Raymond Romaine at AOReed right after he started working on the contract. You can right click each image to see larger views in a new tab.
DID LOS ANGELES AND THE MEOR ACCEPT A VE?
It is interesting to note that Romaine says “The customer accepted the alternate VE to replace the hybrid ventilators with gravity ventilators. It was approved by the customer and MEOR. (Mechanical Engineer Of Record).
To my knowledge the MEOR is James Shwe, the designer, and he says he was not involved in any approval. And the customer is Los Angeles and no one I have located there has any record of approving a VE.
So the challenge before us is to find out more about what Romaine is talking about.
Shortly after this text exchange Romaine had the company lawyer write a cease and desist letter to me threatening me with a lawsuit if I did not stop contacting Romaine. I have not darkened his door since.
I am writing a letter to the lawyer to request proof of the purported MEOR approval.
I HAVE TWO IMPORTANT REASONS FOR THIS PAGE AND MESSAGE
- First is a personal reason – I spent 10 years anticipating this construction and the purchase order it would result in for me.
- Second is that I am concerned that Romaine’s irrational dislike of me will result in his trying to get approval to install an inferior rooftop ventilator. I have talked to the engineer, James Shwe about his original design and he agrees that there is no other source for the performance I offer you. He has since sold his design firm to another owner who has no knowledge of any of this. So any action you might want to take regarding a substitution that requires approval by the MEOR needs to go to James who is still taking calls on all his past work. Just recently, in my attempt to find out the present status of the work by AOReed, I called and talked to Arash Daghighian at FordEC (at phone 310 864 9112 ) and he was very angry at me and would not talk to me. He mentioned the cease and desist letter from AOReed and he gave me the impression that he felt I was a bad person calling him for no good reason. He did not let me discuss with him the facts I have outlined herein. I am concerned that Romaine has told everyone he is in contact with that I am not to be dealt with. I am hoping that the facts above will convince others that I was simply trying to ask Romaine when he would be placing the order I was anticipating. Why he felt the need to sic his lawyer on me is hard to understand.
In closing I hope the facts above will convince all people involved in this project that it is not in the best interest of the people at the city of Los Angeles to consider any request by AOReed for a change in the rooftop design.
I encourage you to call James Shwe to corroborate all of what I have presented here.
