By-Laws

Our association just voted on new By-laws. There is some question in regards to if they passed or not because the current ones are ambiguous regarding " voting membership". Now in researching the By-laws that we're currently working under (amended in 2008) it's been found that no one realized that the ammended By-Laws of 2008 may not have passed either. What now? The By-Laws previous to that are from 1990. Do we revert to those to interprete this vote?
Thanks for the help

If challenged in a court of law and the Board could not prove the bylaws were properly adopted, then the court could rule them invalid and force you back to work under the last set that was valid.

If not challenged, then you could likely use them.

If you know that they were not properly adopted, then yes you should revert to which ever set is valid and follow those requirements unless your corporate laws (applicable if the Association is incorporated) specify a different amount to use. Note: many laws may defer to the governing documents and only apply if the governing document is silent.

Tim

Char

Voting Members are generally owners in Good Standing with only one vote per unit/home. When the unit/home is owned by more then one person, they must designate one person as the voting member. In Good Standing usually means no overdue dues and/or assessments. You can get an arguement if unpaid fines are considered overdue dues and/or assessments.

Also a Voting Member usually does not have to be a resident.

Hope this helps.

Lets say you have 100 members, 98 of them allowed to vote, 50 actually attended and voted (expecting 1 vote per lot)

2/3 of the membership = 67 votes needed (2/3 of 100 rounded up)
2/3 of the voting membership = 66 votes needed (2/3 of 98 rounded up)
2/3 of the membership that are present = 34 votes needed (2/3 of 50 rounded up)

Therefore, based on above numbers:

2008 amendments would be legal if there were 34 yea votes

You need to determine the # of lots represented (in person or by proxy) at the 2008 meeting from the sign-in sheet and the number of votes cast (in case a lot attending didn't cast a vote) and then count the ballots (if they were retained).

Some states have a statute of limitations where the clock starts ticking when the offense (violation, mistake, whatever) occurs (in this case, passing amended bylaws) after which no challenge to the HOA can be made. I don't know if Massachusetts is one of those states or not. I think in Connecticut it is one year, but I would have to look it up. You would have to check to see if Massachusetts has such a statute of limitations on HOA actions.