Annual Meeting Minutes Approval

I recently was elected to my communities HOA board of directors as Secretary. When I asked about the minutes from our Annual Meeting and would we be receiving a copy prior to our first board meeting, I was told that the Annual Meeting minutes aren't approved until the following year at the annual meeting. Some how, I find this odd. As how are the residents in our community supposed to know who won the elections. What the vote count was, and we also passed some changes to our by-laws that no one will know what the actual tally of the votes for the proposed changes will be.

My questions are simply these: When are the minutes from the annual meeting approved, and when are the votes for the board, and the by-laws approved and passed onto the residents?

Thank you

Regards,

Elizabeth Piper

Hi Elizabeth:

This question came up on a manager's internet board that I'm on. Basically, practice is all over the place on whether it's done at the next annual meeting, or at the next board meeting. Robert's Rules (which many HOA's use and some states mandate) call for approval at the next regular meeting. Since most HOA's only have a meeting of members once per year, that points toward approval at the next board meeting.

At a minimum, it would be wise to have the draft minutes distributed to the Board for feedback and correction, even if they don't "approve" them at that meeting and it waits until the next annual meeting.

Regarding letting owners know who won the election, a few thoughts:
1) this could be sent out in a newsletter, on the notice for the Board meeting, or by email (you do send notice of board meetings to all owners, don't you?).
2) anybody interested in who won would probably show up at the next Board Meeting.

Any changes to legal documents (bylaw amendments, CC&R ammendments) and any resolutions passed, should be sent out to the membership within a month, unless another timeline is mandated either by your documents or by state law.

Best of luck on the Board. Be sure to get some education (if you haven't already) through your local CAI chapter or by other means. CAI has some very good resources (books, classes, etc.) and it's well worth a line item in the budget for the HOA to send you to class or purchase books that could be passed from board member to board member.

J. Patrick Moore, CMCA

Elizabeth:

We approve at the next board meeting, don't know if that is the proper way, but that is what we do.

Hi J.M.:

Thank you for your immediate response to my questions. Actually, I purchased two very good books on HOA's recently. First, I have a question for you, I'm not being nosey but what do the CMCA initial after your name stand for.

And yes, according to our community documents are HOA board is supposed to be following Roberts Rules. But I was told by our newly elected Pres. that she discussed this with our management company who told her that the minutes from the annual meeting are looked upon as different from those of reg. meetings therefore, they are not approved until the following years annual meeting.

As this didn't sound appropriate to me, I felt I should ask on here to see how it is usually handled.

As for the way our HOA handles contacting the residents, the meetings are put on a calendar in our monthly newsletter. Signs are put up on the Blvd. 72 hours prior to the meetings and posted on the outside of the clubhouse and on the community HOA bullentin board.

We also have a community email newsletter than comes out weekly that supplies the residents on the mailing list with info. on meetings and other community info.

Hopefully,if I contact the management company again, they will supply me with the minutes from the annual meeting,along with the final tallies for the election, and proposed by-law changes votes. I did request this information the day after the annual meeting and was informed that info. was not a priority to them and they would be available later. Then I was informed by the Pres. of assoc. about having them at the next annual meeting. This seems rather fishy to me.

Again, thank you very much for your response. I certainly appreciate it.

Regards,

Elizabeth Piper

The best procedure is for the board to promptly approve the annual meeting minutes for publication so that the actions can be provided to the members. At the next meeting of the members, the members approve the minutes.

JudithW,
How about a comment on this:

Our Board is all Non-residents in our Condo Regime. Annual meetings are held and Board meeting about four times a year with no owners allowed to join conforence call meetings. Board says there are numerous reasons owners are excluded and mentioned expense as one but did not specify other reasons.

At our annual meeting we always have a motion from the floor that the members ratify the meeting as accepting all the Boards actions taken or will be taken as a result of meeting. The same person always makes this motion and the same person seconds it and the members all vote yes because they don't know what it means. I don't know and suspect this is something that got started and just continues.