Board of Directord

Linda,

To be honest, and I agree with your thinking, unless your governing documents specify that to serve on your board, members must be current in their assessments, then you could only request that they resign. There is nothing that could force them to resign or prevent them from running for office.

How it should be handled is simple, you follow your Associations collection policy. If you don't have one, one needs to be created and applied equally to all members.

It also appears that the larger issue is how did those individuals get so far behind and still think that HOA assessments were paid from the mortgage escrow account. Has the Treasurer been sending out late notices? If not, why not?

A typical collection policy could be:

30 days late - warning letter.
60 days late - 2nd notice letter
90 days late - 3rd notice, sent via certified mail
120 days late - Intent to lien or Notice of agenda item (to discuss the issue)
> 120 days late - Issue sent to attorney for collections, recording of lien and potential foreclosure.

I've been in HOA business for 36 years. I've been President of my HOA for 7 years now.
Several words of advice;
#1, and this is important: The HOA Board members must always stand united! You are there to do good for your community. You can only accomplish that if you're on the same page. Work out your details OUTSIDE the meeting. You can't do business outside a meeting, but you can meet and work out differences.

2nd, and this is key to success:
Always remember you are a neighbor first, Board member 2nd! Treat everyone with that formost in your mind and you will avoid problems in the future and mistakes and you will foster a positive view of the HOA.

Thank you Tim for your additional comments because a previous BOD where I live cost the homeowners thousands of dollars for making bad decisions. I have more respect for board members who will speak up and state their opinions. I abhor members who just sit back and let the more assertive, aggressive types run the show because they are afraid to speak up.

I agree about Board members needing to be united. But sometimes I think there can ba an exception. Like the time our President had me contact our PM to come one evening and pick up a beer can that was in our yard. I did contact the PM who did come, pick up the beer can and came to my unit to tell me it had been picked up. Picking up litter was definitely not in his contract.
The time this happened only two other people were on the Board with me.These were the President and her husband
There were other things she did I did not agree with. Some I knew before she resigned and one I found out after she resigned and I was voted (by the new Board) as President. Basically her and her husband were making all the decisions. I could really write a long story about what happened, but I know people get tired of reading on and on and on

Let me get this straight Mr. BOD President. You want me to call the PM to pickup a beer can? Do I have this correct?

If so, go have sex with yourself, bye.

Call a PM to come out and pickup a beer can? Please tell us that is a joke.

This is not a joke. She actually thought people would agree with her doing this.
Shortly after this our PM emailed notice of cancelation. People were upset. She called a meeting to explain her side of things (The beer can was just one issue) but said no notes would be taken as it was an informal meeting.
This was just one of the things she did that if I mentioned you would probably think each was a joke.

I have been battling my fellow Board members for months now since I started back in January. The other four have been on the Board for coming on ten years. I found out about some issues involving conflicts of interest, open meeting violations, and bid rigging.

When I advised the President of these issues, he pretty much laughed and treated me like a child. Months later he has finally realized that I was right all along and his excuse was:

"Over the last 8 years we have been guided by different management companies on the use of the governing documents that a gated community should adhere to. These documents are the architectural guidelines and CC&R’s. The different management companies have guided us on the types of meetings we’ve had, either open session or what we call executive session. None of these companies referenced the ARS documents from the state. It has been unfortunately that the way these meetings were held were brought up in such a force full way with one of the Directors but in talking with the management company and having them review some of our past meetings it has been confirmed we need to change the way we hold executive meetings on specific issues.”

So his reasoning for those violations is that none of the past management companies had advised him that the Board was subject to the state laws. Is it just me or does anyone else find that to be a lame excuse?

Victor said:

So his reasoning for those violations is that none of the past management companies had advised him that the Board was subject to the state laws. Is it just me or does anyone else find that to be a lame excuse?

Sorry to say but many BOD's/owners defer to the Property Management company as the experts, highest authority, etc. Their bad.

4) gather support and change the Board (by either a recall election or simply not reelecting)