Using HOA funds for illlegal stop signs

best thing to do is to ask for a copy of the HOA insurance and then call the insurance company to see how this would play out if the HOA were to make a claim. if the insurance company covers it but raised your rates then thats not a great outcome.

Here is a sample part of many By laws: Liability of the Board. The members of the Board of Directors shall not be liable to the Owners for any mistake of judgment, negligence, or otherwise except for their own individual willful misconduct or bad faith.

is their stop sign decision willful misconduct or are they really so stupid to think they can control pulbic traffic signs?

It certainly wasn't proper what the board did,, but is this something that would warrant criminal prosecution? Technically it could, but do you think your local prosecuting attorney would pursue this? Probably not.

If tbe township removed the signs, I suspect it also sent a nastygram to the board and required the association to repay the removal costs. I'd attend the next meeting with some neighbors and demand answers, along with a request that these board members reimbursement the association for an unnecessary expense.

Association assessments should go towards whatever services the documents require it to provide. You should already know what those are, so use your common sense. I think you'll answer your own question regarding reimbursement

You said the board doesn't or refuses to hold owner meetings - do you mean board meetings, annual owner meetings or both? There is a difference, so read your documents to see what they say regarding the topic. That leads to my next question- if this board has been doing this for a while, why on earth have you and your neighbors not voted them out, either at the next board election or a recall?

It would appear your community needs a change in regimes and if this buchh refuses to straighten up and fly right, you and your neighbors either vote them out in the next election or hold a special homeowners meeting to recall them. Youll probably require a recall if they dont all step down, so keep reading your documents to see what's required, rally together your neighbors and get to work.

Yes it will take some time and may get messy, and you may even need to pass the hat for your own attorney to represent your group, so think long and hard if you want to do this. If you succeed, 6oull need a group ready to take over a d one of the new board members may need to be YOU. Good luck in whatever you decide to do

I was thinking more along the lines of a civil suit to force the board to personally reimburse the HOA for misuse of HOA funds for a criminal act.

According to our documents the HOA has no responsibility for the street or street signs.

Our documents specifically state that our Owners Meeting is to be held in November. One time they moved it to June of the next year and this year they moved it to December. Most members would like a change, however this board, especially the president and vice president make it difficult. Our Bylaws state that nominees for positions up for reelection be sent out prior to the meeting. This never happens. Instead they send out blank proxies and continually request that they be sent to the board if not attending. So, no one knows who is running prior to the meeting. Typically, they end up with enough proxies to pick whoever they want. Since they know if anyone not on the board is running they will recruit enough friends to run to spit up the votes of the members attending and then use the proxies for themselves. If one of their friends would happen to win, they usually just stay for a couple of months and then quit. Now the board can just appoint the losing board member back on.

At this point, most of the members have been so disgusted that apathy and hopelessness has set in.

I appreciate all of your feedback.

Attend the next Board meeting and asked your questions. Also ask where the stop signs that the HOA paid for now located?

There is a difference between criminal behavior and boneheaded ideas. Criminal behavior would be using HOA funds for personal expenses. Spending HOA funds on something that may be ill-considered is bonehaded because these were public streets. On the other hand, has there been a history of accidents at that intersection? Do kids play in the streets? Are views obstructed? I'm more inclined to view this as possibly the right idea followed by poor execution. These folks don't need lawsuits, they need education - as does the entire community, IMHO.

People are too quick to jump to lawsuits, which are generally expensive and have no guaranteed outcomes. They can also be counterproductive, as others have noted. Watch what happens to home values and assessments following a lawsuit. And watch how many people are willing to volunteer their free time to serve on the board after such a dust up.

I am not sure it was "illegal" but just "ignorance". Which is what they could and mostly would claim. It's not really worth spending more money that was already wasted on the bonehead idea. I am sure the township if they were upset enough would have fined the HOA for their "damages". Plus if there was any laws broken, they would have enforced the fines etc... Just consider you and your neighbors lucky the Township did not do anything more than remove the signs.

Our HOA used to be "private". When it was, we could put up our own street name signs. We didn't really have any stop/yield type signs. It was a small area in one giant loop with a few middle roads. When we had to become Public due to a water utility project, that is when they installed the proper Stop/Yield signs. Plus we had to remove our custom wooden street signs. We also had to have some residents cut down trees or lower a fence as to not block the view of the signs for Stop.

It could be your HOA was under the impression it was "private" owned roads? The proper process if it wasn't was to go to the township to get them to evaluate the situation. They would decide if the intersections needed the signs. That would have then been on the township. The HOA could have still had these installed IF they had gone the correct route.

The township probably suspects who installed the signs but I don’t think that any members have informed them that our HOA did it.

It’s interesting that there is another HOA with lawyers on the board who are abusive. Our president is very abusive at our owners meetings often continually talking over or screaming at anyone who speaks up about any decisions. At one meeting she actually said that she didn’t care if members thought that she was a dictator because she would do whatever she thought was in the best interest of the HOA regardless of what was in our documents. Not many residents have anything good to say about her and no longer attend meetings because of her abuse. She tries to intimidate me, but I don’t back down which really irritates her..

The Pa Planned Community Act says that an Owners Meeting SHALL be held annually and a proposed budget for the next year SHALL be sent to the owners not less than 30 days prior to the meeting. Our Declarations state that the meeting SHALL be in November. That means they can’t skip the meeting one year and change it 7 months later in the next year. They also can’t send the proposed budget in December 15 days before they start collecting the assessment increase 15 days after the budget was sent out. Our Declarations and the State Community Act allow the owners to reject a budget at the meeting. How can you do that if there isn’t a meeting? This isn’t Just about the signs, that is just the latest in a pattern of willful disregard for our Declarations.

Ok so if PA says that, then yes they should have the annual meeting. If it says the budget should be presented there, then they should. But that message, if true, is lost in the absurdity of trying to punitively sue them to pay for road signs they erroneously put up. That's simply harassment. If you harass them, any legitimate message you have is lost.

This stuff also drives cost. Our D&O insurance doubled this year, not because we have had claims, but because there's a general increase in claims in our area. It wastes time for the board members and the manager because they are answering nagging email or chat posts that are not productive and sometimes plainly silly. Sometimes it requires the lawyer, at the lawyer's hourly rates, paid for by the association.

Not in our declarations. It’s 51% of those in attendance at the meeting or by proxy.