Recalled condo board asking owners to withdraw recall ballot

We are a condo with 120units and 5 board members, 2 of which have been there for 20 years. 3 months ago we found out about a $30,000 per unit assessment that was approved by the board yet no homeowners were notified or invited to a meeting to discuss. The board was discussing signing a contract. We subsequently obtained over 70 signatures on a petition to stop the contract. The board ignored it and said they hadn’t signed the contract and had no plans to, however it was their decision alone to do so. Within the following three-week period we obtained Recall ballots for all 5 board members by 51% of homeowners (we now have more) and also attached profiles for all 5 replacement board members. The board and cam were served last Thursday but continued to hold a scheduled board meeting discussing the $30,000 assessment last Saturday. On Sunday we found out that the board was calling homeowners to encourage them to withdraw their recall ballots by signing a form they would send to them. Some home owners have reported this to us saying they had no desire to resend their vote. Can the board do this? Is this legal? We followed all the rules but considering there are a majority of homeowners that live out of town many signed by docusign. Th ballots gave the option to ask out one or all of the five board members to be recalled and one or all five of the new board members to replace them. During the meeting Saturday two days after the board was served the recall ballots one homeowner asked about the recall and the attorney for the board who was present jumped in to state “the recall is not valid!” and immediately shut us down. We had our own attorney review the ballots and we were not told of anything that could be challenged. What could they possibly dispute?

Oh, and next time, please write in smaller paragraphs - the huge blocks of verbiage can be hard to read.

More on the use of electronic signatures in Florida condo recalls --

-- An owner’s “signature was an electronic signature. It was simply the owners’ full name in a cursive font. This is not a signature and the ballot is also invalidated.” See
https://www.jimersonfirm.com/blog/2018/10/how-to-analyze-a-condominium-board-member-recall-in-florida/ and Division arbitrator decision, rejecting a ballot with an electronic signature, at http://www.myfloridalicense.com/dbpr/lsc/arbitration/allorders/2014003018.pdf . I have concerns about the arbitrator's ruling here. Florida's Electronic Signatures Act seems to conflict with the arbitrator's ruling. As interested, see http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0600-0699/0668/0668.html . But the OP needs results. I think it would be best to redo the vote but without using docusign. Mail a form like the board did, but complying with the Division's requirements for recalls. The OP's attorney should have known this, IMO.

-- Form to use for condo recalls: http://www.myfloridalicense.com/dbpr/lsc/documents/recallprocedures.pdf

-- Florida Administrative Code on Recalls: http://flrules.elaws.us/fac/61b-23.0028

-- Floridian GenoS will hopefully chime in with his wealth of experience on Florida condo recalls.

Please reprint the exact wording of the ballot.

I thought that's how you roll in the Carolina's.