Legal Prudence

We sometimes run into something that needs to be done but there is no law clearly backing it up. The word legal obligation needs to have some statute or law requiring a HOA or condo assn to do something.  That word is grounded in law. Here is a link from the UK but I think it works. 

https://online.lincoln.ac.uk/what-is-the-law-of-obligation/#:~:text=The%20law%20of%20obligation%20refers,be%20enforced%20by%20a%20court

There are other times that a best practice needs to be done but we are missing a word that will work. There is no legal statute enforcing this and in fact it's best practice.
I think we can change the wording to legal prudence/best practices.  We are in better shape. Here is another link. 

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/prudence#:~:text=Prudence%20is%20defined%20as%20a,duty%20of%20care%20to%20others

I thought we could use the word legal prudence in situations where there is no law requiring the condo assn to do something but for best practices it should.

Your thoughts on this.

..."courts should defer to the board’s authority and presumed expertise."

I googled legal prudence and this appeared: "Prudence is defined as a reasonable standard of judgment, management, and conduct under the circumstances, based on what was known or should have been known at the time a decision was made or the action was completed."

As we know life is unpredictable and it's impossible for documents to address every situation that has or may come up in HOA land. I think you have to look at a situation individually with an eye on transparency and making sure the association isn't taking unnecessary risk. Homeowners may not think so, but sometimes there are no answers in the documents or the state/federal statutes, and so you have to apply common sense. - and in the end, the answer may be no. That doesn't mean the "no" is always permanent- you may get ahead od your time and will have to wait to see how it evolves and then you'll have more knowledge and experience to begin to address it. Even then, there may be more evolution and you'll have to revisit the matter and make adjustments as needed.

In some cases, you may have no choice but to work out a solution yourself because there's nothing that states the association HAS to address the issue. For example, many people want the association to pay for everything, but the money isn't there or it doesn't concern the common areas. Or they have beef with a neighbor and want the association to dictate what the neighbor has to do, but it doesn't concern misuse or abuse of the common area.

i agree with Sheila it can become a case by case basis.

An example would be when an association member sends out the many emails or one member gives out the angry at everyone email. The docs and the state condo law may not have any laws requiring a response but it will be "legal prudence/best practice" to at least review the email. In my condo association and we try to review all the emails but not necessarily to respond to all emails. I did not find anything very clear we have to respond to emails. However we should review the email.

I have a neighbor who is in another condo assn and when they deal with another assn member who is "problematic" they do the delete with no review. I thought they should at least review since there might be something important that they should deal with and it they don't it might cause problems down the road.