Liaison Committee

That's a new one.

No, they may not make decisions without consulting the rest of the board, unless they're talking about minor and trivial things such as spending $10 for some flowers at the community entrance. However, the rest of the board would have to agree ahead of time that this would be OK. I suspect that's not what they have in mind.

Time to push back.

More info needed:

* Are you in condos or an HOA?

* How many homes are in your association? I assume your community is pretty large with a 7-member board.

* Are you on the board or a homeowner? You'll have more leverage if you're on the board, but a determined group of homeowners can remove board members who aren't doing their jobs properly.

* The management company works for the association and takes direction from the board, not the other way around. If the manager is calling the shots, that's another issue that needs to be dealt with. Is your manager by any chance a holdover from the days when your community was still under developer control? If a manager is used to answering to a developer only and not the board, that manager may be used to telling the board what to do. However, a manager can also be a convenient scapegoat for a board that is misbehaving.

At the very least, communication doesn't appear to be your board's strong suit. (And I believe that a web site is required for condo communities over a certain size in Florida - one of our Florida posters will add more if I'm wrong about that.)

On the other hand, boards generally are not required to get approval from homeowners for decisions they make, except in certain specific instances required by state law (which can be different for condos vs. HOAs). Their decisions should be taking place in open, properly noticed meetings, and they should be documented in the meetings' minutes so that homeowners know what's going on.

Are you saying the management company suggested a "Liaison Committee"? If so, and like CathyA3 and KerryL1 indicated, legally only the board has the authority to make such decisions or possibly delegate such decision-making. I suspect no such delegation of powers was made. I suspect the committee members do not understand that they have committed acts of ultra vires. Said acts are a violation of the law. The typical HOA member and HOA director are typically 99% ignorant of their legal obligations. They think a HOA is just a club, and that being on a board or committee means they have the authority to do whatever they want, including making up rules as they go along. Not so.

As CathyA3 indicated, communications may be the main problem here.

The operative words here are "committee charter". This suggests that the entire board is "on board" (heh, heh) with it, rather than a couple individual directors setting up some informal structure on their own. However, I can't tell from the OP's posts which of these two scenarios it is.

Sorry, entire boards don't have to be "on board", just a simple majority. Sorry, that sometimes is the reality in HOA's.

As others have mentioned, they ain't enough information to go on, as the OP probably is not on the Board, hasn't been tpo a meeting and probably doesn't look at minutes, IF they are provided.

You shouldn't be shocked as to what rogue board members can accomplish if left unchecked.

So.... Rita. Did the Board vote to permit the Prez & Veep to have so much power? A Board could delegate a lot of things to an executive committee or to one or more officers. Keep in mind though, that as a director YOU are still
reponsible.

Corrupt is probably the wrong word.

Perhaps they are simply not following the rules? Perhaps there is no one willing to challenge them?

I am assuming both you and your son in law own separate properties?

If you have CCRs and Bylaws do you know exactly what they say about elections, how often for board meetings, officer duties, how to call special meetings, etc?

RitaS4, many people are uncomfortable with board members who are related to each other. But even if you were husband-and-wife, there's nothing in the Florida Statutes that prohibit that in an HOA. The Condo statute prohibits members of the same household from serving together on the board, but the HOA statute has no such limitation. With that said, you are 2 people who own 2 separate homes and, even in a condo, it's perfectly fine for the both of you to be on the board.

It sounds like you've got a real situation on your hands. First things first, DO NOT RESIGN. If you're interested in making positive change and are committeed to it, resigning is the worst thing you could possibly do.

I'd start at the top: verify your corporate status is active at the FL Secretary of State's website at http://search.sunbiz.org/Inquiry/CorporationSearch/ByName. Make sure the HOA has been filing Annual Reports.

Then make sure you have copies of your current governing documents: Articles of Incorporation, Declaration of Covenants (aka CC&Rs), and Bylaws.

Ask for a copy of the current management company contract. Every homeowner has the right to see that, not just board members. Then ask for copies of the monthly financial statements for the last 12 months.

I'd start with those.

Rita,

Don’t resign.

You need to accept responsibility to fix whatever is going on ... if you don’t, who will?

OK, that's good.


You've got more than 3 times the number of homes that we do, so the dynamics are probably quite different. It certainly sounds like you've got a rogue president. 'Corrupt' may be exactly the right word.

Look at what your Bylaws say with regard to Directors, Officers, Board Meetings and Membership Meetings.

FS 720.303 requires that the minutes of Board Meetings must record the vote or abstention of each Director present on every item brought up for a vote. If your partcipation at a board meeting was falsified in the Minutes then that could be the end of a loose thread where you might start to pull. I assume that was at a board meeting because the Board wouldn't be voting on anything at a Members Meeting (except for voting as a member on issues that come before the general membership as a whole).