HOA BOD refusing to communicate

No. The Statutes specify that the Association must make them available for inspection by the members when the member/s request it. There is no requirement that they be published.


Unless your governing documents or State Statutes require the use of Roberts Rules, Roberts Rules of Order do not need to be used.


Send the request to the registered agent.
In that request, notate that past requests have not been honored.

You can find out who the registered agent is by contacting or doing a search on the website of the FL Division of Corporations


The best choice is to gather support, vote the bums out and replace them with those who will comply with the statutes. However, with an apathetic, mostly non-resident or part year resident membership, that can be difficult to impossible.

You might try filing a complaint with the Division of Florida Condominiums, Timeshares, and Mobile Homes. This may or may not have an impact.

If you can't vote the bums out, and filing a complaint doesn't work, you have the following options:

1) Try working with them (volunteer to assist where you can) and see if you can make changes from within.

2) Live with it.

3) Sell and move.

4) File legal action to obtain access to the records. Of course this won't make you any friends and, other than getting information, won't likely change anything else about the situation because the same people will still be sitting on the Board until others are willing to become involved and serve in their place (just being realistic).

INSPECTION AND COPYING OF RECORDS.—The official records shall be maintained within the state and must be open to inspection and available for photocopying by members or their authorized agents at reasonable times and places within 10 business days after receipt of a written request for access. This subsection may be complied with by having a copy of the official records available for inspection or copying in the community. If the association has a photocopy machine available where the records are maintained, it must provide parcel owners with copies on request during the inspection if the entire request is limited to no more than 25 pages.
(a) The failure of an association to provide access to the records within 10 business days after receipt of a written request submitted by certified mail, return receipt requested, creates a rebuttable presumption that the association willfully failed to comply with this subsection.
(b) A member who is denied access to official records is entitled to the actual damages or minimum damages for the association’s willful failure to comply with this subsection. The minimum damages are to be $50 per calendar day up to 10 days, the calculation to begin on the 11th business day after receipt of the written request.
(c) The association may adopt reasonable written rules governing the frequency, time, location, notice, records to be inspected, and manner of inspections, but may not require a parcel owner to demonstrate any proper purpose for the inspection, state any reason for the inspection, or limit a parcel owner’s right to inspect records to less than one 8-hour business day per month.

We had the same problem, but we're in California. We took the HOA board to small claims court. The HOA was required to pay our court fees and a penalty as well as turn over the documents.

Be sure to request that your judge write out all the specific documents. Our third time in court (in less than a year) our judge failed to specify and so when we attempted to file a contempt of court motion, the first one, the judge asked the HOA again to provide the documents and the second time we filed the motion, the judge came back and said that wasn't part of the original action.

FLA statues require 7 years of records be kept. DR