What to do if not enough people respons to a vote?

Started by GreggK2 • 3 replies • 1432 views

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GreggK2 (Kansas)
Posts: 86

Posted:

Hi again, folks. I go into this question asking that those who respond keep in mind that I have only been the president of our board for 3 months now. We have made many significant improvements and we want to make more. But here is my problem.

Our Area Homes Association Declaration was written 13 years ago. It is out-dated and needs to be amended. To amend the AHAD requires a 2/3's majority vote of the home owners. Unfortunately, we have some very uninvolved home owners. The board wants to make a modification so here is my concern. We have 114 homes in the HOA. If we mail out a voting ballot to all 114, we would need 79 of them to approve the amendment. But what happens if, of the 114 homes, only 70 respond? Are our hopes of making positive changes is dead in the water because 44 homes chose not to even respond to the vote? OR...do we go by the 70 who did respond and then determine if we have a 2/3's majority of those votes. For example, it 70 respond and 46 are YES votes (which would be 2/3's) can we go off of that? I'm concerned that we want to make some real changes but a number of "absent" home owners might kill it off due to their own inaction.

Your thoughts?

Gregg

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

What is the exact language of your AHAD (CC&Rs) amendment section?

2/3 of the membership to approve is not the same as 2/3 of the votes cast.

To answer your question, we need to know what the exact language is (minus any reference to the Association) concerning amending your AHAD. That language would be within your document.

Typically, you 2/3 of the membership to approve an amendment (not just participate). If this is the case for your Association, you need 76 yea votes to approve. If all 114 participated and you only received 75 yea votes, the amendment fails.

JonD1
Posts: 2,350

Posted:

If your documents do in fact require a 2/3 vote of all the owners and you don't have a chance accomplishing that any effort and cost would be a waste of time.

I would prefer to address matters to which I could makeositive change. Not taking on battles that can't be won.

RichardP13 (California)
Posts: 3,868

Posted:

Gregg

I would be curious as to what modification the Board wants to make and is it one that requires the amended of the CCRs. If, in fact, a amendment to the CCRs is required and it is something you really want then campaigning will be required. The old adage, nothing in life comes easy will also hold true here.

You will need to get consensus beforehand. If you talked to 50 homeowners and only receive 50% approval, not sure if I would waste my time. If you think that sending a ballot out with cut it, you would be wasting your time and the association's money. Most CCRs will require 2/3 affirmative votes of ALL the membership, not 2/3 of those that voted, as Tim pointed out.

As President, you should know off the talk of your head what the requirements should be. This can't be wishful thinking.

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