Open Meeting -- Work to generate documents for BOT vote

I'm sure the other, more experiences members will chime in here. I recently watched some BOD member training videos and it was stated that if you aren't discussing association business then it isn't a meeting. Doesn't sound like creating a procures document is discussion association business.

Regards
John Cummings

BH,

The open meeting law applies to meetings of the board or committee.

Our committee was able to rewrite guidelines and comply with the open meeting requirement.
Simply plan meeting dates ahead of time and publish them.
My VA hoa would publish dates up to 3 months ahead of time.

Sending drafts ahead of the meeting is allowed.
Discussing the drafts outside of a meeting is not allowed.

I'm a huge supporter of open meetings of the Board. Even Committees if they have decision making-authority. But, a Committee that's doing collaborative writing to create a new 15 - page document to recommend to the Board? And at an open Board meeting, the Board will discuss and debate about it?

I agree with Max it would be a nightmare. But that type of collaboration can't realistically be scheduled as Tim suggests. So what ARE the options?

Maybe less than a quorum of the Committee could work on the doc and have regularly scheduled meetings with the full committee every so often that Owners could attend? Changes are very good that not the entire committee participates anyway, unless it's unusual.

I suspect getting a bill passed in the U. S. House of Representatives is easier.

I think the biggest mistake here is writing a long document "by committee." Especially a document that is only a "guide" and so may lack enforceability.

If you tell the forum here what the purpose of this guide will be, then I think you might get more constructive feedback.

If per chance this document will set the architectural rules (not guides, darn it), then folks here will have a lot to say and it will be helpful.

That the Virginia statute requires committee meetings to be open meetings, properly noticed and so on, is unfortunate. (And I like checking such assertions and so did confirm it.) You all are volunteers. You have different time schedules and availability. And so on.

Personally I do not like "guides" as they can easily fly in the face of ones docs. Non-lawyers playing lawyer can be dangerous and expensive

Could a "guide" be the same as a community handbook?

I was on the committee that rewrote the architectural guidelines (which is what I referred to).
I was on the board when we created and rewrote many policy procedures.
I was on the board when we created and also rewrote common area rules/regs.
I was on the board when we amended the bylaws.
I was on the board when we created our first reserve study.
I was on the board when we amended many reserve studies.
All were done in Virginia.
All were done in compliance with the opening meeting statute.

I start with your current documents. If they and Virginia's state law reuire open association meetings, that's what you have, but that doesn't mean a free for all. It's OK to have homeowners listen to the proceedings, but they shouldn't be allowed to ask questions or make comments during the business portion of the meeting.

Usually I recommend resident forums during board meetings, but you don't have to have them for committee meetings. If people do have questions or suggestions, they can be submitted to committee members before or after the meeting, and the board can decide what to do with them. At the very least, take a look because someone could have a brilliant idea or think of something that's really important that the committee members didn't think of.

The way your committee works is exactly the way most HOA committees operate. Nothing is official until the board reviews and signs off on the final draft, then it's presented to the homeowners for review. That will likely generate more questions and suggestions, followed by another rewrite and then it's put to a homeowner vote if you're revising CCRs or bylaws. When 5ge final final draft is sent, you could have another document discussing some of the major concerns and why it did or didn't make the final draft. That's usually how the federal government does it when it creates or revises th federal regulations.

It may be the board needs to educate the homeowners and committee members how this is supposed to work so people will understand the committee's role vs. the board and how this will ultimately affect the homeowners. As for the meetings themselves, you can do it live or virtually as long as it's accessible to interested homeowners. Someone can moderate the zoom meetings and put people on mute if they get rowdy or won't shut up. You might even have people sign up to attend those meetings and put everyone on mute do you can keep track of ti sandpit throw the meeting agenda.

Bh%, can you let us know what type of 15-page document you're working on? Is it, for instance some kind of governing document? Or something else, perhaps about a particular topic?

TimB4

To give you an idea of what we are dealing with, some (one, mostly) people think we should call an open meeting to write an agenda for a meeting.

BTW, none of the new committees will also have Board members. Also, there will be virtually no unilateral decision making. All work products will go up to the Board for final approval. We will definitely have open meetings for members when we get something of substance to discuss. We all want that and encourage it. We will also do community-wide surveys. We are just trying to get to the point where we have something during the open meetings to work on that has substance and results in a near final product at the end of two hours as opposed to spending all the time debating commas and grammar.