How to remove our HOA president.

How do I remove our current HOA president when the VP and treasurer refuse to see his wrong doings. I'm the secretary and we are constantly butting heads because I don't agree with all the changes he has made and trying to make. He's a bully and if you don't agree with him, his temper flares and he makes threats of voting me off the board. Last night we had our annual board meeting and we had a homeowner voice a legit covenant violation. Apparently, the president and VP had a prior meeting with said homeowner but nothing was settled and they both refused to speak to her again. They knew she would be at the meeting and they called in their neighbors for back up. As this homeowner began to speak, she was immediately attacked by other homeowners including the presidents wife. No one, including me, but especially the president said anything. He allowed the bashing of this homeowner who by the way is 87 yrs old. I sat their in complete shock not realizing what was happening until it was over. The president cursed at her. Told her he was done listening. The other members called her a trouble maker. Yes, she is known as the "nark" of the neighborhood, but she reports legit violations. Its not as if she goes looking for them, but she does report them if she sees them. As homeowners, we all should be doing this. Anyways, isn't this grounds to ask for the presidents resignation? His abuse of power has cost us so many committee members due to his temper and being a bully. What steps do I need to do to remove him. He won't step down if asked. I can't vote him off, because the other two board members will vote against it. When his election year comes up, they will all call their friends to show up, and vote, to make sure he gets reelected. Is there any other ways to remove him legally? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Regarding the violations of the covenants (and bylaws?): The courts recognize these documents as contracts and will enforce them as contracts. You can threaten suit, but doing so while serving as a director is highly problematic. Also by far it would be best to hire an attorney to pursue this. This will not be cheap.

> Is there any other ways to remove him legally?

I don’t know about Oklahoma, but in Texas TPC Chapter 209 “provides for automatic removal when a board is presented with written, documented evidence from a database or other record maintained by a governmental law enforcement authority that a board member was convicted of a felony or crime involving moral turpitude not more than 20 years before the date the board is presented with the evidence.”{1}

I don’t think there’s any ‘magic’ answer for you, sorry. In my time serving on an HOA Board, I’m often reminded of this quote from H. L. Mencken: “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.” From your description of the situation, it sounds like you’re in the minority, and the majority are indeed getting the government they “want and deserve”. Unless you go out and meet people and either a) change people’s minds or b) discover and motivate a heretofore silent majority, I don’t think there’s much else you can do.

I’m not unsympathetic to your situation. But the change you seek will take a lot of time and work.

Bill

{1} Thanks, and a tip o’ the hat to AugustinD.

In most hoa’s you need 67% of the owners to vote a director out by petition. Once you get that much, you can call a meeting to remove. But it’s very hard to do this.

However sometimes just starting this petition scares the bad director and they may just resign. I have seen this personally.

The problem is even if you remove one bad director there is one right behind them and things could be worse.

Listen to others above, lead by example, don’t fight, don’t threaten and when you gather enough support you can get your buddies elected to the board. It will take hard work but you can swing those voters that keep electing this president to the HOA. Possibly years.

Good luck.

In Louisiana it depends on the Declarations and the Bylaws. The members may call Special General Meeting and hold an election for new Board Members or the Board may have an election and elect a new President.

I think you could get a percentage of the homeowners signatures to call for a special meeting to to have him removed from the board.