Posted:
Roger,
Sorry to disappoint you, but no burnout here. Just curious though how often you tell board members that you disagree with that they should resign. Amazing! Whatâs next⊠name-calling? Youâre almost there with the inference in your reference to a âcompetent chairâ. Pretty âGolden Ruleâ of you there, Rog. Thatâs quite an attitude that you have.
You might want to reread⊠I said âALLâ board meetings. An executive session is a board meeting (though for a stated purpose in Colorado), and executive meetings are not open to the public, so Iâm afraid you are wrong on the law in your own state. Even so, the laws you refer to are almost irrelevant, as Colorado statute is completely silent on the requirements for ânoticeâ, therefore leaving it up to the bylaws. Consequently, unless bylaws specify notice requirements, it may as well be a closed meeting if thatâs the way the board wants it. Further, notice may be given in inconsequential manners on some obscure BBS, thereby making the matter moot or at least inconsequential.
BTW⊠BarbW is not here to learn. Sheâs here to find a way to force her agenda to the neighborhood and bypass the board if they donât do it her way. Did she circulate a petition? No! She hasnât even discussed this with a board member! She plans to present it (code-phrase for âspring it on themâ) at the meeting.
Hereâs a flash Roger⊠though your HOA is evidently fortunate enough to have its own meeting place or can afford to rent one, not all of us are that fortunate. We are a brand new HOA in an old community that hasnât had an HOA in 15 years. We do not have mandatory dues and the minimum rental we can get on a facility for one evening a month exceeds our ability to pay for it. There are a lot of HOAs in that position. I think I smell some elitism cooking in your kitchen.
Our board meetings are held at board memberâs houses and often at a coffeehouse. The last time we had an open HOA meeting, we had 160 people out of 200 homes. So as for your statement, âIt is not only possible but advisable to hold open board meetingâŠâ, Nonsense! Even if I wanted all the residents in my home (and I donât), my family room is only so big. You only speak for your obviously well-established HOA and from your own very limited frame of reference. Perhaps your comments of what is âadvisableâ and âpossibleâ should only be made after removing your head from the sand, and realize that not every board is as fortunate as yours. Of course if you accomplish nothing at your meetings of any significance, I guess that would explain your reference to nobody showing up. Lots of people come to our open meetings when we have them.
RogerB: âthe board members should listen and be responsive to all members' requests. It doesn't mean the board has to agree. But let the board decide, not you personally.â
SteveH: Uh, no! As well off as your board is Roger, you obviously have never been in a large HOA where you had to learn to do things correctly. In my old neighborhood of 4000, we used to get 150 ideas per week, most of them junk. Ideas need to come in, but they need to be filtered. Board members that let every piece of junk that someone thought of come before the board or allow any presentation to change the very structural foundation of the association (changing the bylaws) just because one person thought of it, would be completely lost in a large association and is wasting board time. It is incumbent upon the president to hear all voices, but also not waste board membersâ time with irrelevant falderal from a single individual. Give me ten people that think a change is necessary, and then we shall look at it. But one person, nahah!
RogerB: As far as open board meeting being detrimental, do you consider extending the length of a meeting to allow owner comments as detrimental?
SteveH: Sometimes! Other times, not. Owner comments do not need to be made on every piece of board business. As we are still in relative start up mode AND we are actually accomplishing something Roger, not just taking care of routine business, it takes us 2 hours just to run through the agenda with board comments, reports, and questions. Donât give me any of this âcompetenceâ junk. We are dealing with landlord homes out of compliance, homeowners out of compliance, setting up committees and briefing new chairs, dealing with accounting setups and legal questions, trash collection, traffic, crime, planning events, city and county issues, issues with families who have had tragedies and bringing the neighborhood out to help. We are dealing with promoting our neighborhood to Realtors, getting neighborhood sponsors, planning surveys, working up local business deals for our residents, promoting our resident business owners, honoring our resident public servants and soldiers, and we are working this together to form communities of service and the above with about 6 other HOAs. Then thereâs the other 50 things I havenât mentioned. We are also dealing with fundraising because we donât have dues. You donât have to worry about such things, do you Roger? It must be nice to be so much better than everyone else, though it would drive me nuts to have your kind of business meetings where nobody came and we only dealt with someoneâs ugly mailbox or something so irrelevant.
But do know what Rog? We have no complaints here. We have public meetings twice per year and the residents couldnât be more thrilled, even the ones whose suggestions we donât consider. They know we are working hard and things improve daily.
Iâve gotta laugh Roger â evidently you just show up to the meeting and think that the blue fairy set it all up, did all the public preparations, and will shut it all down when you bolt out the door leaving it for someone else to clean up. Nice! Heads up Roger â Extending a board meeting is only part of the issue. Board meetings require additional preparation time when they are open, if they are going to be done right. We can only take the time necessary to accomplish the necessary things, pay the bills, and discuss new and old business. Dealing with every nitpicking Tom, Dick, Jane, or Barb who had a thought last week or wants to force a vote on something that annoys her only complicates the business at hand. An open board meeting might be your 1-2 hours because nobody shows or you donât do it. But for many of us, itâs a full evening of setup, tear down plus the meeting, plus substantial prep time. Of course we accomplish things and our residents donât consider it a waste of THEIR time to show up, so that might be the difference.
As for public discourse Roger, we invite that all the time. My WEEKLY email newsletter discusses every facet of the public side of our business and we ALWAYS invite public discourse on the Forums on the community website. That way, itâs public record, people have time to think, and it doesnât require setting up chairs, or take up an entire night per month. It does however, allow for public debate but not arguments.
Do you do this Roger? Do YOU publish a weekly newsletter? Did YOU personally set up your HOA site complete with public forums as I did? Does it get hundreds of comments and posts per week and allow people to connect with each other by chat, connect with local business, post their jobs, garage sales, things they have for sale? Does your website ask for feedback for the board, ask for ideas? I bet we get a lot more discussion per household than you do with all of your wonderful open meetings that nobody comes to. Do you put your email out there and personally answer at least 50 emails per week from residents who have questions, thoughts, and praise?
If not, I think that perhaps you should hire someone to do this for you or resign, as you are evidently not doing things the way I would⊠Just kidding Roger! I donât run around telling people I donât know that they are burned out and need to resign. Thatâs your job.