No notice of board meeting to owners

Condo association in Ct.

The new CIOA statues state that associations must give 5 days notice of board meetings. The management company sent a letter to the owners stating a schedule of meetings for the year. The board had a special meeting and "didn't bother" to notify owners. Manager was on vacation. What would you do as an owner? Go to a board meeting and address that they violated the law? Go further? Do nothing?

A little background, in 2007 our board was removed by the owners for failure to communicate with the owners and poor fiscal management of association funds. For as much as some things change, others seem to stay the same.

D

Perhaps CLOSED meetings are permissible in Alabama but here is how it reads in Ct, please read item 5........

(b) The following requirements apply to meetings of the executive board and committees of the association authorized to act for the association:

(1) Meetings shall be open to the unit owners and to a representative designated by any unit owner except during executive sessions. The executive board and those committees may hold an executive session only during a regular or special meeting of the board or a committee. No final vote or action may be taken during an executive session. An executive session may be held only to: (A) Consult with the association's attorney concerning legal matters; (B) discuss existing or potential litigation or mediation, arbitration or administrative proceedings; (C) discuss labor or personnel matters; (D) discuss contracts, leases and other commercial transactions to purchase or provide goods or services currently being negotiated, including the review of bids or proposals, if premature general knowledge of those matters would place the association at a disadvantage; or (E) prevent public knowledge of the matter to be discussed if the executive board or committee determines that public knowledge would violate the privacy of any person.

(2) For purposes of this section, a gathering of board members at which the board members do not conduct association business is not a meeting of the executive board. The executive board and its members may not use incidental or social gatherings of board members or any other method to evade the open meeting requirements of this section.

(3) Notwithstanding any actions taken by unanimous consent pursuant to subdivision (8) of subsection (b) of this section, during and after the period of declarant control, the executive board shall meet at least two times a year at the common interest community or at a place convenient to the community. Those meetings, and after termination of the period of declarant control, all executive board meetings, shall be at the common interest community or at a place convenient to the community unless the bylaws are amended to vary the location of those meetings.

(4) At each executive board meeting, the executive board shall provide a reasonable opportunity for unit owners to comment regarding any matter affecting the common interest community and the association.

(5) Unless the meeting is included in a schedule given to the unit owners or the meeting is called to deal with an emergency, the secretary or other officer specified in the bylaws shall give notice of each executive board meeting to each board member and to the unit owners. The notice shall be given at least five days before the meeting and shall state the time, date, place and agenda of the meeting, except that notice of a meeting called to adopt, amend or repeal a rule shall be given in accordance with subsection (a) of section 47-261b.

(6) If any materials are distributed to the executive board before the meeting, the executive board at the same time shall make copies of those materials reasonably available to unit owners, except that the board need not make available copies of unapproved minutes or materials that are to be considered in executive session.

If they are discussing 3 bids on lawncare they aren't spending money. It's when they decide to spend the money that this should be discussed at an OPEN meeting. However, when it comes to discussing bids, I don't have an issue with behind doors BOD meeting.

Gathering bids is a difficult endeavor. Any member should be able to submit a bid of their choosing on a project. However, they shouldn't expect their bid to be accepted. It's ultimately up to the BOD to take a vote to accept a bid/contract.

Not every meeting held behind closed doors is some kind of "Secret Conspiracy". Sometimes it's just to get everybody on the SAME page BEFORE presenting the final decision OPENLY to everybody else. The BOD need answers too before they can provide them to you.

It also was NOT an emergency meeting. If they had done due diligence they had 5 months previous to the 3 year contract ending to secure bids.

"Are you expecting some kind of "Experts" running your HOA? They are VOLUNTEERS!!!

What would you know and would you be willing to do it? Then get ELECTED...

I can't expect my next door neighbor to have experience running a corporation and familiar with every law pertaining to a HOA. Ironically, even if they were, they most likely are smart enough NOT to involve themselves.

HOA's are unprofessional volunteer organized owners who muddle through the laws they made up to live by. It's the bed you lie in"

I want to scream every time I hear that statement that just because people are volunteers that you shouldn't expect much from them. If you volunteer, be willing to do the work.

If part of the job is to be familiar with state statutes and the Documents of the Association then you darn well better do it.

It's these morons that are causing more and more states to pass legislation to control what boards do.

I see too many owners get on the board for their own self serving interests. You also have the 80/20 rule wherein on any one board you have a small percentage of the board members doing all the work, with the other 80% just showing up.

Of course its for self serving purposes to be on the board or particiapte in the HOA. What else would it be? REALITY CHECK... The people who are getting "their way" in a HOA do so because they put the work in and are involved. If your NOT involved or are a "Monday Morning quarterback with all the answers but don't attend meetings for some excuse", then why expect a different outcome?

Just because your sick of hearing about your "moronic decisions" of your Board, doesn't make it less than a FACT. The fact is they don't know what they are doing, don't care what they are doing, have an agenda, or just plain following the rules overzealously. To expect anything else out of a HOA, is a pipe dream...

I find it's these type owners who do NOT like dealing with their boards and such that go to their legislator for ADDITIONAL laws. The laws of the HOA are already written. The frustrated owners just don't know how to intrepret them or bring changes within their own powers. A HOA works as a quasi-mini-government just like it does a corporation. You have the power to VOTE to make changes. Why look elsewhere for power when elsewhere will just waltz right in and take your power of vote away?

Surprised to hear this type of attitude from a HOA President? The plain truth of the matter is that I did go to college and probably the most qualified person to run a HOA out there IF indeed it was a career field. I've taken legal course, business/meeting courses, accounting, and experience of being a manager. It doesn't take away from the fact that living in a HOA either running it or being a member of it, your still dealing with people. Those people are your neighbors and owners of property. I can't expect anything more than "Stupid" from most people I know...LOL...

The homeowners that serve on Boards are just regular homeowners and, as a result, they have no special abilities or education or moral awareness or reliability beyond the average. If you hold ordinary people to a higher standard, they'll mostly fail because they are ordinary.

You should hold Board Members to an ordinary standard and you should hold Boards to the same standard that you would hold any other group of ordinary people.

In this case, sure, they should give notice. And people should step up and ask/request/tell them to give notice.

Sorry, I almost had to laugh too loudly...Our BOD members were elected because they showed up to the election meeting. We basically asked people to raise their hands who were interested in being board members. If we got enough hands up, that was our board! Plus it wasn't unusual for whoever had volunteered to forget they had and never attend a meeting. Out of the 7 - 9 required BOD members, I'd be lucky to have 3 of them show up to a meeting. There would be months I'd be lucky a homeowner showed up to a meeting. I started having the meetings in the pool in my bathing suit! That's because most of my BOD/members were already there.

My HOA was run properly and to the rules. I was a stickler to the rules and people trusted me to run the HOA. I had even improved the home values by several thousand dollars. However, I couldn't imagine holding any of my members to any higher standard than owner of property.

Lawrence,

Our rules state that the board can have a vote without a meeting but that the result must be unanimous and that the Secretary must promptly send the results to the ownership.

Special meetings in Ct. are treated as regular meetings in regard to notice.

Let's see...........if I want to coach my son's baseball team I had better know some rules; if I want to be a scout leader I had better know about camping, fishing, merit badges, scout oath, etc.; if I volunteer in the emergency room there are rules that I need to be familiar with in regard to dealing with staff and/or patients and their families. Why is that if I want to be a board member in charge of a yearly budget worth $300,000.00 and a property value of $20 million dollars I'm not expected to know/learn jack sh$T? Gee, maybe "that" is why so many associations are in financial ruin.

And just for clarification purposes in regard to myself; I moved into a condo in '94, joined the board at the first election available in '95. I immediately realized how little I knew and joined CAI, of which I am still a member. I've taken more education classes than I can count and at a cost of about $200/year (with I paid). I persuaded the board in '95 to start a reserve fund. They were 10 years old and didn't have one.

I sat on the board several times. I sat on the board in 2007 until I stepped down to join others to remove them. 2008 and 2009 I was President of the new board wherein we succeeded in getting monthly fees to a realistic level, a budget that actually worked, addressed maintenance items that were let go or had never been addressed, came up with new rules to improve harmony amongst the owners, treated all owners fairly with regard to rules, etc., etc., etc. In other words, I worked my ass off.

Now, I decide to take a year off and within 2 months I see a President leading the board down a path we've been before and not with good results. Hence I came here looking for opinions from people that I tend to admire for their experience in properly running their associations.

Now Melissa, I hope that I've explained in enough detail for you the fact that I don't expect anymore of anyone else than I do of myself.

You go Girl...........