Email Address Collection and Privacy

DavidW37 (Florida)
Posts: 4

Posted:

Hi all. First time posting and tried to find an answer reading through the archives, but it didn't completely line up. Here is our situation. Today the MC has been the sole entity to solicit and collection email addresses from any of our homeowners. We are currently looking establishing a community website and reviewing online voting. We've been told since the MC collected the emails, those belong to them and they cannot share with the HOA. Today we have to email them and ask them to send out an email on our behalf. We are currently reviewing contracts and there very well could be a chance in MCs coming up after that review. We have been told if we switch MCs, the email addresses go with them and they will not stay with the HOA. So that is the background.

So today we are getting our community website established (I am doing most of the design work) as it is a feature that has been highly requests as we continue to grow to nearly 800 homes. The website will require people to provide an email address to sign up. Then if we enable online voting, that will also require an email address. A couple fellow board members and the existing MC have raised red flags that this will be a privacy concern for those that don't want to share their email address with others. The fear is as they register for our website, online voting, or any other web-based platform, their email address now becomes part of the official record. Any owner has the right here in Florida, to my understand, to request a copy of owners' contact information including email addresses if on file with the HOA. I can appreciate the scenarios where this could be concerning if someone wants to spam owners, smear candidates, campaign, or target a fellow homeowner (which should be handled by law enforcement at that point).

How have other communities, especially here in Florida, handled such scenarios? I've ensured our privacy notices and terms and conditions on our website will clearly spell out that if they participate and sign up for the website, their information will become part of the official record and could be released. Are there any other safe guards that have been looked at and practices?

Appreciate any feedback and guidance!

AugustinD
Posts: 3,698

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 9:12 AM
Hi all. First time posting and tried to find an answer reading through the archives, but it didn't completely line up. Here is our situation. Today the MC has been the sole entity to solicit and collection email addresses from any of our homeowners. We are currently looking establishing a community website and reviewing online voting. We've been told since the MC collected the emails, those belong to them and they cannot share with the HOA.

Respectfully, I want to know why your Board and MC seem to be clueless about what the Florida HOA statute says on this. From FS 720:

(4) OFFICIAL RECORDS.—The association shall maintain each of the following items, when applicable, which constitute the official records of the association:
...
(g) A current roster of all members and their mailing addresses and parcel identifications. The association shall also maintain the electronic mailing addresses and the numbers designated by members for receiving notice sent by electronic transmission of those members consenting to receive notice by electronic transmission. The electronic mailing addresses and numbers provided by unit owners to receive notice by electronic transmission shall be removed from association records when consent to receive notice by electronic transmission is revoked. However, the association is not liable for an erroneous disclosure of the electronic mail address or the number for receiving electronic transmission of notices.

...
Any rule adopted must, in addition to other matters, include a requirement that the association send an electronic notice to members whose e-mail addresses are included in the association’s official records in the same manner as is required for a notice of a meeting of the members. Such notice must include a hyperlink to the website or such mobile application on which the meeting notice is posted. The association may provide notice by electronic transmission in a manner authorized by law for meetings of the board of directors, committee meetings requiring notice under this section, and annual and special meetings of the members to any member who has provided a facsimile number or e-mail address to the association to be used for such purposes; however, a member must consent in writing to receiving notice by electronic transmission.

See http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0720/Sections/0720.303.html

Furthermore, the MC was acting as an agent for the board when it collected email addresses. The MC is using these emails at the direction of the board, pursuant to its contract. The HOA owns these email addresses.

DavidW37 (Florida)
Posts: 4

Posted:

Thanks August. I recently got appointed and have been getting "lectured" by tenured members and MC about how things work. It really seems that we are dealing with thinking that is stuck 30 years in the past and I'm trying to break through. I appreciate the response.

AugustinD
Posts: 3,698

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 10:03 AM
I recently got appointed and have been getting "lectured" by tenured members and MC about how things work.

In other words, how they do things, regardless of what the law and governing documents say. There is little worse than a board that makes things up as they go along. And it is a bit too common.

This forum's veteran directors emphasize complying with the governing documents (Bylaws, CCRs, et cetera), state law (especially the HOA and condo statutes and nonprofit corporation statute, along with some case law) and federal law (especially fair housing and creditor law).

Good luck.

DavidW37 (Florida)
Posts: 4

Posted:

I deal with corporate governance daily, to say this hasn't made my head spin would be and understatement. I appreciate the feedback!

AugustinD
Posts: 3,698

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 10:09 AM
I deal with corporate governance daily, to say this hasn't made my head spin would be and understatement. I appreciate the feedback!

Oh good. Because I forgot to add that a new director, joining a board where the majority consider themselves "old hands" (and yet do not reference the governing documents or state law in any meaningful way when differences of opinion arise), ought to be very political, savvy, deferential, obsequious and so on in trying to get the old hands to follow the law and governing documents.

Before trying to get xyz accomplished with your board, consider posting here first for suggestions on how to proceed?

Be ready to accept a "no" vote from a board majority and move on. Be ready to start a stealth effort to get a board majority who sees things as you do elected to the board at the next annual election.

I beg pardon if the above was obvious to you. It's my 1.5 cents of input.

JohnC46 (South Carolina)
Posts: 14,265

Posted:

David

I do not believe in making an association's web site interactive. I say it should be information only. If interactive, all it takes is one or two aholes to make it turn negative in a New York Minute.

HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 9:12 AM
Hi all. First time posting and tried to find an answer reading through the archives, but it didn't completely line up. Here is our situation. Today the MC has been the sole entity to solicit and collection email addresses from any of our homeowners. We are currently looking establishing a community website and reviewing online voting. We've been told since the MC collected the emails, those belong to them and they cannot share with the HOA. Today we have to email them and ask them to send out an email on our behalf. We are currently reviewing contracts and there very well could be a chance in MCs coming up after that review. We have been told if we switch MCs, the email addresses go with them and they will not stay with the HOA. So that is the background.

So today we are getting our community website established (I am doing most of the design work) as it is a feature that has been highly requests as we continue to grow to nearly 800 homes. The website will require people to provide an email address to sign up. Then if we enable online voting, that will also require an email address. A couple fellow board members and the existing MC have raised red flags that this will be a privacy concern for those that don't want to share their email address with others. The fear is as they register for our website, online voting, or any other web-based platform, their email address now becomes part of the official record. Any owner has the right here in Florida, to my understand, to request a copy of owners' contact information including email addresses if on file with the HOA. I can appreciate the scenarios where this could be concerning if someone wants to spam owners, smear candidates, campaign, or target a fellow homeowner (which should be handled by law enforcement at that point).

How have other communities, especially here in Florida, handled such scenarios? I've ensured our privacy notices and terms and conditions on our website will clearly spell out that if they participate and sign up for the website, their information will become part of the official record and could be released. Are there any other safe guards that have been looked at and practices?

Appreciate any feedback and guidance!

There is a lot of things in the above paragraphs that I could comment to, but I will say that I don't agree with doing online voting through a website that one has to sign up for. Signing up for a website is a task that not all will do, and thus, you will be limiting your election to those eager enough to go through the signup process.

In our HOA, I recently send out a SurveyMonkey style ballot to all homeowners, along with a piece of information known only to the PM company and then (well me too since I printed out the information). They then submitted their votes through the SurveyMonkey style system along with the piece of information known to them, so we could authenticate that the ballots came from the homeowner. We also provided paper ballots so homeowners could vote on paper and take a picture with their phone and return to the PM via e-mail or mail them in. While most people used the SurveyMonkey system, some chose to e-mail pics of the paper ballot which is fine too.

The result is we are getting just over 25% of our homeowners to return ballots. Had we had a website with a login that people had to use, I think the percentage would have been more like 10% or 12%.

I would highly recommend making electronic voting as simple as possible while still autheticating each ballot received.

DavidW37 (Florida)
Posts: 4

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By HenryS7 on 01/23/2022 5:04 PM

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 9:12 AM
Hi all. First time posting and tried to find an answer reading through the archives, but it didn't completely line up. Here is our situation. Today the MC has been the sole entity to solicit and collection email addresses from any of our homeowners. We are currently looking establishing a community website and reviewing online voting. We've been told since the MC collected the emails, those belong to them and they cannot share with the HOA. Today we have to email them and ask them to send out an email on our behalf. We are currently reviewing contracts and there very well could be a chance in MCs coming up after that review. We have been told if we switch MCs, the email addresses go with them and they will not stay with the HOA. So that is the background.

So today we are getting our community website established (I am doing most of the design work) as it is a feature that has been highly requests as we continue to grow to nearly 800 homes. The website will require people to provide an email address to sign up. Then if we enable online voting, that will also require an email address. A couple fellow board members and the existing MC have raised red flags that this will be a privacy concern for those that don't want to share their email address with others. The fear is as they register for our website, online voting, or any other web-based platform, their email address now becomes part of the official record. Any owner has the right here in Florida, to my understand, to request a copy of owners' contact information including email addresses if on file with the HOA. I can appreciate the scenarios where this could be concerning if someone wants to spam owners, smear candidates, campaign, or target a fellow homeowner (which should be handled by law enforcement at that point).

How have other communities, especially here in Florida, handled such scenarios? I've ensured our privacy notices and terms and conditions on our website will clearly spell out that if they participate and sign up for the website, their information will become part of the official record and could be released. Are there any other safe guards that have been looked at and practices?

Appreciate any feedback and guidance!

There is a lot of things in the above paragraphs that I could comment to, but I will say that I don't agree with doing online voting through a website that one has to sign up for. Signing up for a website is a task that not all will do, and thus, you will be limiting your election to those eager enough to go through the signup process.

In our HOA, I recently send out a SurveyMonkey style ballot to all homeowners, along with a piece of information known only to the PM company and then (well me too since I printed out the information). They then submitted their votes through the SurveyMonkey style system along with the piece of information known to them, so we could authenticate that the ballots came from the homeowner. We also provided paper ballots so homeowners could vote on paper and take a picture with their phone and return to the PM via e-mail or mail them in. While most people used the SurveyMonkey system, some chose to e-mail pics of the paper ballot which is fine too.

The result is we are getting just over 25% of our homeowners to return ballots. Had we had a website with a login that people had to use, I think the percentage would have been more like 10% or 12%.

I would highly recommend making electronic voting as simple as possible while still autheticating each ballot received.

Thanks Henry. Currently hitting quorum is already a concern. We struggled during the handover meeting last year, and will probably struggle at our upcoming Annual Meeting. At present we are 100% paper proxy and in person voting. The vendors that I've reviewed so far offer a clear, easy solution that helps to keep it simple. Outside of ease of use is that we have to have a system that is also permissible by the laws of Florida. We currently have over 600 owners with only half being full time residents and the other being property owners that live in roughly 11 different countries. Then we have another set of over 100 homes under construction where the builder controls those votes. With the makeup of our owners, online is being seen as our only option as the current voting method - regardless of how much we engage just simply doesn't cut it. I'm open to suggestions on how to better improve voter turnout, but I've been given enough feedback of "I'm not interested" when asking people to at least send in a proxy to help with quorum.

To add to this about a previous poster's concern about an interactive website. We already know what we are getting in to as the community already has (not setup by the HOA) a Facebook group with nearly 500 homeowners part of it. We've seen a couple of the bad apples come to the top and will have safeguards in place with our volunteer community moderators to assist with any issues.

HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 9:23 PM

Posted By HenryS7 on 01/23/2022 5:04 PM

Posted By DavidW37 on 01/23/2022 9:12 AM
Hi all. First time posting and tried to find an answer reading through the archives, but it didn't completely line up. Here is our situation. Today the MC has been the sole entity to solicit and collection email addresses from any of our homeowners. We are currently looking establishing a community website and reviewing online voting. We've been told since the MC collected the emails, those belong to them and they cannot share with the HOA. Today we have to email them and ask them to send out an email on our behalf. We are currently reviewing contracts and there very well could be a chance in MCs coming up after that review. We have been told if we switch MCs, the email addresses go with them and they will not stay with the HOA. So that is the background.

So today we are getting our community website established (I am doing most of the design work) as it is a feature that has been highly requests as we continue to grow to nearly 800 homes. The website will require people to provide an email address to sign up. Then if we enable online voting, that will also require an email address. A couple fellow board members and the existing MC have raised red flags that this will be a privacy concern for those that don't want to share their email address with others. The fear is as they register for our website, online voting, or any other web-based platform, their email address now becomes part of the official record. Any owner has the right here in Florida, to my understand, to request a copy of owners' contact information including email addresses if on file with the HOA. I can appreciate the scenarios where this could be concerning if someone wants to spam owners, smear candidates, campaign, or target a fellow homeowner (which should be handled by law enforcement at that point).

How have other communities, especially here in Florida, handled such scenarios? I've ensured our privacy notices and terms and conditions on our website will clearly spell out that if they participate and sign up for the website, their information will become part of the official record and could be released. Are there any other safe guards that have been looked at and practices?

Appreciate any feedback and guidance!

There is a lot of things in the above paragraphs that I could comment to, but I will say that I don't agree with doing online voting through a website that one has to sign up for. Signing up for a website is a task that not all will do, and thus, you will be limiting your election to those eager enough to go through the signup process.

In our HOA, I recently send out a SurveyMonkey style ballot to all homeowners, along with a piece of information known only to the PM company and then (well me too since I printed out the information). They then submitted their votes through the SurveyMonkey style system along with the piece of information known to them, so we could authenticate that the ballots came from the homeowner. We also provided paper ballots so homeowners could vote on paper and take a picture with their phone and return to the PM via e-mail or mail them in. While most people used the SurveyMonkey system, some chose to e-mail pics of the paper ballot which is fine too.

The result is we are getting just over 25% of our homeowners to return ballots. Had we had a website with a login that people had to use, I think the percentage would have been more like 10% or 12%.

I would highly recommend making electronic voting as simple as possible while still autheticating each ballot received.

Thanks Henry. Currently hitting quorum is already a concern. We struggled during the handover meeting last year, and will probably struggle at our upcoming Annual Meeting. At present we are 100% paper proxy and in person voting. The vendors that I've reviewed so far offer a clear, easy solution that helps to keep it simple. Outside of ease of use is that we have to have a system that is also permissible by the laws of Florida. We currently have over 600 owners with only half being full time residents and the other being property owners that live in roughly 11 different countries. Then we have another set of over 100 homes under construction where the builder controls those votes. With the makeup of our owners, online is being seen as our only option as the current voting method - regardless of how much we engage just simply doesn't cut it. I'm open to suggestions on how to better improve voter turnout, but I've been given enough feedback of "I'm not interested" when asking people to at least send in a proxy to help with quorum.

To add to this about a previous poster's concern about an interactive website. We already know what we are getting in to as the community already has (not setup by the HOA) a Facebook group with nearly 500 homeowners part of it. We've seen a couple of the bad apples come to the top and will have safeguards in place with our volunteer community moderators to assist with any issues.

What are the requirements in Florida for electronic voting? All we have to do in Washington is validate that the electronic vote was cast by someone with valid authorization to cast the vote (i.e., not a neighbor). In my mind, having the voter type in a piece of information known only to them is sufficient validation that the voter was authorized.

Do they have more strict requirements in Florida?