Lack of fiduciary responsibility of President of HOA

We are a HOA located in St Cloud Florida. Due to the resignation of three members of our board as of 8/31/23(president,secretary and communications director) these three positions had to be filled by appointment of the sitting board. An emergency meeting was called on 8/28/23 to fill the positions.
There were two members who presented written requests for President, two members for vice president and one for community Outreach (VP position and community outreach were vacant already)and one for secretary. with 5 board members present, two voted for one President, two for the other and one for a write in. This resulted in a tie for President. The other positions were filled without any issues. Our problem is this….one of the two presidential candidates dropped out ending the tie. The other candidate immediately took office. Facts are he took office on two votes which was not a quorum of the board voting on 8/28/23. This was not an election of the members but an appointment. Is his appointment legal by Florida law. If not, would you state the section of the statute that covers this. There is nothing in our bylaws that deals with this issue. Thank you for any input you can give me.

-- https://www.hoatalk.com/Forum/tabid/55/forumid/1/postid/354806/view/topic/Default.aspx

-- I suspect the OP may still be confused about the meanings of "officers," "directors" and "board members." NormaB3, respectfully the path to clarity is by asking questions.

-- NormaB3, I advise that you post the bylaws here, so people can help straighten out your understanding of officers, directors and quorum.

-- The purpose of quorum is to ensure that a certain, specified minimum number of directors are present for conducting business. Do consider looking up the meaning of "quorum."

-- With five of seven directors present, I assume quorum was met, so the board may lawfully conduct a meeting. During this meeting, the board is allowed to have votes on board business, such as selecting officers.

-- With quorum met, a vote on officers could lawfully be conducted.

-- Florida statutes FS 617 and FS 720 do not specify whether appointment to an office (Pres, VP, Sec, Treasurer etc.) requires a majority vote or a plurality vote. In my opinion whether a majority of the remaining directors present must vote for an officer, or whether a plurality is sufficient, is a board decision. It

-- One huge caveat: FS 617.0808 says either an officer or director that was appointed can be removed by a majority vote of the board. Hence if only a plurality voted for the candidate who wanted to be president, and the majority did not want this person as president, then the majority could lawfully refuse to seat the candidate as president. An impasse is possible. The board needs to break this impasse and work towards consensus or a compromise.

-- -- Otherwise I wish all readers the best with the math here.

I think I recall Norma's in a mobile home park. do the cited statutes apply?

The board appointed the individual as President, the board can remove the individual as President.

If the board appointed the individual as a Director, the board can remove the individual as a Director.

Keep in mind that Directors and Officers are two different positions.
Directors, by majority vote, makes the decisions for the Association.
Officers implement those decisions and carry out the day to day tasks of the association.

Directors often appoint officer positions from amongst themselves.
When this happens, that individual has two jobs.

Officers serve at the pleasure of the Board.