Association Shares?

Pitfalls:

Higher assessments for some, lower assessments for others.
Perception of fairness
Percentage required to change covenants

In the past a husband/wife who lived on a double lot plot were both on the board, both officers, and did some rather illegal things. Theoretically the rest of the board (2 other officers and a director) did not authorize their actions but it’s a bit of a legal mess right now further complicated by the fact that one of the other old officers has gone on to become the city council person for the ward our neighborhood is in. In short it appears that they will face criminal charges but we as an association will have to live with the consequences of their actions and there is not a great avenue for us to be made whole. I think this request came out of preventing that scenario again although our current president has pointed out there are other/better ways to prevent abuse of power. Currently none of the officers/board are related although the current president is the child of a former president and the former president father still owns his home and he is a committee chair. The other two committee chairs are the at large director and the current president. I am being a bit vague due to it being a pending legal matter and because I probably truly don’t know some of the details. (We did not live here when all of this happened. I have some not public details because of chairing a committee and being on the board now in the aftermath.)

Assessments are assessed on the lot but I don’t think the financial aspect of the assessment is actually a big piece of this.

Each owner, Paul? Or each lot or unit?

sorry, having hard time following your narrative, Emily. Can you say in one or two sentences how what you wrote relates to each lot having one vote on association members' matters?

It looks to me like some owners do have more than one lot, Paul. Maybe Emily can clarify this.

Thus if the system in my old building were used (1 share per unit), then in the case described by Emily, each share would have 1 vote. So if owners have more than 1 lot, they'd have more than 1 share. But large lots and small lots would each have 1 share. I don't like that system; it harms large owners and small owners in different ways.

I find this confusing. How did one person get two votes unless they own two lots?

What most of us are saying is one vote per lot. If someone owns more than one lot, they get more votes as in one for each lot they own. Such as one family owning 5 lots. They get 5 votes. It it that simple.

If a lot is owned by more than one person (husband and wife, corporation, etc.), they must designate the person that votes.

Some Bylaws allow a husband and wife (even if a single lot) to be on the BOD. Other Bylaws ban such.

Directors have one vote per each director no matter how many lots they own. So even if co-ownrs serve on the board, they have one vote apiece as a director whether they own 5 lots or 1.

A solution to your problem is to revise the bylaws to permit only one co-owner at a time serve on the board.

That was the original suggestion although it was not against co-owners as much as household members or first degree relatives. So that would also preclude closely related neighbors from serving at the same time.

What percentage of all votes is necessary to amend the governing documents? For a proposed amendment that will re-distribute power to such a great extent, the HOA might face a court claim, with a judge ruling that the vote to amend (on this issue) must be unanimous. Because of the threat of the "tyranny of the majority," my understanding is that, even if the percentage required to pass an amendment is met, a court can throw the amendment out.