WA does not require Open Meetings for Condos

I looked up our meeting laws for condos HOA in WA and it says:

"Under the Washington Condominium Act, and Horizontal Property Regimes Act, condominium boards are not required to hold open meetings. Non-condominium homeowners’ associations, however, are required to hold open meetings. Closed meetings in homeowners’ associations are allowed only to consider certain sensitive matters such as personal issues or pending litigation (See RCW 64.38.035 (2)). Of course, any board is subject to the provisions of its governing documents and must comply with any open-meetings provision contained there."

My question is that most of the owners think that they are allowed to be at any meeting other than an executive meeting. We are going to hold meetings once a month.

The new president has threatend that if anyone puts a meeting notice up for the owners he will tear it down. Me and the other BODs have decided to hand deliver the meeting notices to the owners as one of the things we told the owners was that we were going to communitcate with them more and wanted them to come to the meetings.

Any help would be appreciated.

r

Help with what? The meetings are not required to be open, the president who chairs the meeting doesn't want it to be open but you and the other BOD have decided to open it. Now don't get me wrong I'm all for open meetings and as much transparency of the process as possible, I just think you're going about it in an underhanded manor to put the president in the worst light possible.

Here's how I would have done it: At a closed meeting I would have put forth a motion to open the meetings to all homeowners and if it had passed swung the doors wide open. Or you could motion to change the By-Laws to allow open meetings and gathered the required signatures to amend it.

Ruth,

I certainly do understand your reasons for wanting the board meetings to be open to the members, but the Pres does have the law on his side. However, the Pres is only one member of the board. If you can get a majority of the board members to agree to open up the board meetings to the members then it won't matter what he feels. Otherwise you'll have to employ other methods to inform the members of what is going on. A newsletter is a good way to get info out, in fact this is a good idea even if the meetings are open to the members.

I definitely would not recommend passing out notices until this matter is cleared up with the board. The whole board should take a vote on whether or not their meetings should be opened up to the members. Just because the state law says it isn't required, does not mean it cannot be done.

LOL re: "Survivor"!

If there is one thing this reality show has done, it's informed us of some very relevant human interaction and group dynamics !

Don't mind at all. We have 104 Units... I believe 30 attended that last annual meeting. We are holding monthly meetings that maybe 5-6 attend periodically.

Ruth:

Thanks for your quick response.

So you get 30% of the owners once each year and 5-6 out of more than 100 each month.

In my opinion Ruth transparency is of little value when most people have no desire to be involved. (Sort of reminds me of the national issues we now face.)

Living in NY we are not required to hold open meetings. In our case the simple fact of the matter is the vast majority of owners want NO real part in the operation of the property. And those that do, offer little in the way of constructive input.

I would never ever, and I'm talking NO under any circumstances suggest we work to open our meetings. After 22 years of serving on this Board I would see nothing postive coming from it.

Most owners have many opinions which are based on little if any understanding of the facts. To open this process up each month to individaul owners would retard the progress of the Board and waste the limited time the Board has to run the property.

In my opinion the election of the Board is done to provide the authority to those on the Board to make decisions and act in the best interests of the property.

Most HOA and condos operate as corporations. Now if we had Microsoft, a corporation, operate under the open meeting rules then their Board would need to open their meetings to each and every stock shareholder. In my opinion nothing or very little would get done. Last I heard they don't operate that way.

If you make the effort to open your meetings perhaps you might be disappointed
at the turnout each month.

It is certainly within your rights to push for a change in the state laws, my thought being perhaps there is a better path you could take to improve the situation on your property within the current laws.

I don't know why your Board President prefers closed meetings maybe with good reason perhaps with not. I do know human nature and if you push to open meetings then there might be a push coming back and somehow or someway this person has been elected to the Board which might suggest they have some following. Will the support of a small group of unit owners willing to get involved be enough to change things contrary to existing state law?

I have a guess.

In any case good luck.

Ruth,
I would love to know where you are now...2 years later. Big changes for the better?
Dianne

That gives me hope! Good for you.
My community of 18 townhouses has endured 10 years of infighting, poor communication and non-existent community involvement. A dysfunctional board of (2) women refuse help and every BoD meeting is “closed” because the only thing on the agenda is the ‘confidential’ delinquencies that are now preventing our homes from selling.
So, I recently spearheaded a grassroots effort to communicate with each and every homeowner to get their input on the current situation. Ten owners now have met and agreed to replace the current Board of 2 with a Board of 5 at our annual meeting and then fire our expensive, overbearing PM of 6 years. Big ugly job, but someone has to save our investment! I hope my story has a happy ending like yours!
Thanks for sharing your story.
Dianne

Ruth,
Every community must have a "bully". They keep life interesting.
Our bully got voted on to the Board a couple of years ago because the sole board member at the time had a moment of weakness. Within two weeks the bully wanted to fire the PM (to self manage), lower the monthly assessments from $350 to $250 (by halting the reserve account funding) and freeze work on our declaration amendment project that we all voted for.
These baseless changes led to his immediate removal.
Now we are facing new challenges. With better communication and new leadership on the horizon, I see the light.
BTW, where are you in Washington? We are in Kirkland.
Dianne

I was a member of CAI while serving on the board for the first 5 years; a great resource.
Since stepping away, the BoD has met one disaster after another. It’s like watching a train wreck in slow motion. I need to back involved because now we are talking about serious property value loss if not brought into control.
Like your situation, the current BoD seems to be taking all the (wrong) direction from the PM. I suspect too that the PM is working with “their” vendors and everyone is getting rich.
Self-managing is only an option if enough volunteers are committed and you have a good BoD. But for our community, nobody has the time or the knowledge to do it right.
Time for shake up!