Construction without Permits

If CC&R's and architectural committee rules mandate that in addition to architectural committee approvals, homeowners are responsible to obtain required building permits, but after the construction is completed, it is determined that work was not properly permitted, badly impacts surrounding homes, what can the association do? Ask the homeowner to produce permits? If homeowner refuses, can association report him to City? How can situations like this be avoided, if cannot ask for permits upfront as volunteer architectural committee does not know what permits are required?

You don't state if your governing docs "require" that the member obtains proper permits, or if the member is merely "responsible" to do so. If they are only "responsible" for getting permits, then I would read your governing documents as taking the position that permits are a matter between the owner and the city. If, however, your governing documents explicitly require that an owner get permits, then I would think the board has every right to demand verification that all proper permits were obtained (i.e., in order to verify compliance with CC&R's).

As for reporting to the city, *anyone* can anonymously report violations. This happened to my father when he did some exterior work without building permits; the city refuse to divulge who reported him and the inspectors were all over him immediately.

Betty:

two issues here, if your CC&R's require them to obtain building permits I would try to tweak the language in it that requires them to show proof of permit prior to construction if that language doesn't already exist.

secondly, let the city or local municipality handle the permit issue, one less headache for you all and it really isn't your jurisdiction anyway. Report that you are concerned about not having a permit for a project, should be an easy lookup for those folks.