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Posted By DavidG45 on 08/22/2022 2:50 PM
Our declarant recently terminated control of the board, and we have a new all-residents board in place. There is a significant change to the bylaws that really needs to be made (sheer laziness on the part of the developer when the original documents were created) but getting a majority of all homeowners to vote in favor of a significant bylaw change, however favorable it might be for the HOA, would seem to be a monumental task. Can anyone share with me strategies on how to make this happen?
If the entire board is in favor, is it considered okay for the board to publicly advocate for the change?
Below are some of the steps we took when we decided to completely overhaul our 40 year old documents. Keep in mind we did much more than what I've listed here. I believed then and now that when you want to overhaul your docs
you need to sell it to the community. Educate, educate, educate them on the value of the rewrite and explain the benefits of the proposed changes. If you can tie a proposed change back to how it will save owners money then you need to emphasize this. You are correct that this is a monumental task but it can be done. In our case it took us 1 year from start to finish.
1.) The Board identified existing issues that we knew about. An example was conflicting statements on what was a Limited Common area and who was responsible for maintenance. There were many other conflicts in the documents.
2.) The Board brainstormed on additions and subtractions that we wanted to make. For example, we wanted to add a Capital Improvement Fee when homes were sold. (1/2 percent of the purchase price) We also wanted to add the requirement that a home could not be rented out until the purchaser had lived in the home for 1 year. We eliminated the requirement to always have the garage door closed. These are just a couple of examples.
3.) We worked with a lawyer to discuss what we wanted to do and got his feedback. In some cases he said we couldn't do what we wanted.
4.) We sent out an electronic poll asking owners if they would support the change XYZ. In some cases if the results were not good we dropped the proposed change. (Pick your battles wisely.)
5.) Once we knew what we wanted the lawyer began the process of re-writing our docs. This involved many meetings with him.
6.) We periodically sent out educational emails to our owners explaining what we were doing and why. Some of the emails were limited to one proposed change and laid out the reasoning behind the change.
7.) We held 3 Townhall meetings in our clubhouse where we explained why the docs needed to be updated and what changes we came up with. After our presentation we allowed owners to ask questions and express their opinions and concerns.
8.) We placed flyers on our mailbox stands that urged owners to get out and vote.
9.) A complete copy of the new proposed docs where sent out to all owners 45 days before the vote. Included in this package was a generic email address that they could use to send feedback or ask questions.
10.) The day before the vote the entire Board sat at the clubhouse for 4 hours and all owners were urged to come visit us with any questions or concerns. (We barely got the votes we needed and I believe it would have failed if we did not do this step.)