Why should potential contracts be discussed in closed meetings?

With around 54,000 HOA's in California, there may be that same number of ways they actually conduct business. You could have a board where everyone is retired or a 55+ community where most are not doing anything during the day. Others might be a younger community where a Board works during the day and may have limited availability for meetings.

Here is how I would approach bids and contracts, when I was a Board president and now. We held ES prior to meetings, so once decisions were made it could be announced a few minutes later in open session.

If we were looking to start a project or renew a contract or insurance policy, it first placed on the agenda to make a motion to move forward, if passed, then the process to obtain bids or copies of new insurance policy for the Board to discuss. I have a policy to bid on insurance once every three years to keep them honest.

Once the bids were received, they were/are forwarded to the Board to review and ask questions prior to a meeting. We had people that had expertise in certain areas. If we were good to go, it was put onto the ES agenda and in some cases invitations were sent out to interview the bidders. Once discussed in ES, the Board would then decide which vendors they were going to choose.

The open meeting agenda, posted 4 days prior would have the topic to be voted on it. This way people interested in the outcome can choose whether or not to attend. The previous Board always had Open Forum at the end, so they would never have a chance to give their opinion prior to Board vote. I always thought that was BS. I have served on government Board where the audience could have a voice prior to any item voted on. In addition, we discussed how we came to the conclusion we did and what the price was.

Once the vote was done, if it effected homeowners directly, email blast would go out. We had 2/3 of the emails in the community. The rest went with monthly statements.

I firmly believe there is no real right or wrong way to handle contract, EXCEPT that it is wrong if you do everything in ES and NEVER put it into the minutes of Open Session, which is the official records of the Association and the only access to what members have to meeting. Of course they can review executed contracts.

I have been doing this for almost 10 years now and have never been accused of hiding anything.That is something I take pride in.

I appreciate your replies, Richard & Bill. I need to rethink how I asked my question. I agree with you both that with competing bidders, we should do the interviews, discuss their pluses & minuses, references, etc., in ES.

We do, of course, provide a general summary at the next open meeting as required in CA.

But why should we use ES when there's only one bidder? Or when there are change orders needing board approval? Or keep secret the entire work processes that'll affect every owner though we've accepted a vendor, but want to negotiate further?

(We have open forum at the beginning & end of every open meeting.)

(I don't get how Richard's 1st paragraph relates to my question)

Kerry, I see your point(s) and cannot think of any good reason why the situations you describe have to be discussed in ES.

Frankly, with respect to the work processes, the ideas or preferences of those affected may be valuable. We used town hall sessions about six years ago with a client to both educate and solicit input regarding what was a very messy project which involved rebuilding brick common area walls. Doing so necessitated opening back yards for several days. Think about how that affected the kids, pets, patios, privacy,and here in Texas, pools. With the help of those affected we devised work processes which met the needs of the contractor and owners and which were not the same for everyone.

Thanks to bill and Kelly.

I've been nagging my fellow board members to hold a town hall soon to allay owners' many & justifiable fears. But, instead the latest message from the prez in our newsletter is we "the board needs more info" before we can reveal, and "Incorrect" information is being shared among Owners.

She and in fact a majority of directors do have info we could share but apparently they're too concerned the real story will make owners even more upset. Oh,did I mention we have an election in late October? And the prez is running for the board again?

I think I wrote this unclearly: We hav d 3 bids, selected two to interview and the unanimously selected one of them in executive session. BUT we do not have a signed contract as the board wants to negotiate a couple of things, mainly price. So I know there's no requirement in CA to share any of the details of the forthcoming contract at this time.

BUT, no matter what price we end up with, the details of the work, HOW it'll be done HOW long it''ll take; HOW our elevators & common areas and unit interiors will be affected will NOT change. IF, by chance the Board decides not to involve every unit, the work processes will remain the same.