I don't know how to respond really to your question. You may be sorry you asked. . .
I would posit that half the homeowners association board members have no idea (1) what a point of order is, or (2) how to deal with it in the normal conduct of a meeting. Most board members have no experience in governance, or group decision making, or the fundamentals of meetings, or in applying Roberts Rules of Order, etc.
Nor should they.
Nor need they.
I admit to being a heretic. I see much of the world, and its "common" knowledge, in a very different way than most people. While most people are asking, "How?" I am asking, "Why?"
Most boards and board members have no idea what they are supposed to be doing, or how they should be doing it, so they perpetuate doing things the same way things have been done for years, and not worked very well.
We need a new model of governance of homeowners associations--a new way of looking at the role and function of the board.
From studying organizational governance for a number of years, and looking a wide variety of homeowners associations particularly in Hoosierland, I can legitimately make several observations.
- Every neighborhood, every community, every association has a different "corporate culture." What works in an association of 26 townhomes with shared common walls, does not work for a 120 unit high-rise condo with rental units and part-year residents, and does not work for a 2,000 member association of single family homes on 1/4 acre lots. What works for a community with a high level of amenities, does not work for a community with few amenities.
- The laws in every state, both statutes and case law, are different. What works (best) in one state, can be entirely inappropriate in other states. (That point seems to be missed by many posters in this discussion forum.)
- In Indiana, only about half of the restrictive covenants in a neighborhood are legally enforceable. Most are boilerplate, and if properly challenged in court would not stand up. It is appalling to me that lawyers endorse such drivel. It has got to be the greatest collection of the worst work of the legal profession. We should be appalled. But we are not, sadly.
- Most "busy boards" are "busy" doing the wrong things.
- Most associations work best informally, through common sense, not legalisms. Yet, common sense is an incredibly rare commodity among board members and some homeowners.
- Lack of open full, expansive, adequate communication is the single greatest characteristic of homeowners association boards of directors. It can be either a symptom of a more fundamental problem, or a problem in and of itself. Boards that do not communicate well are able to protect themselves, and operate without accountability to the homeowners they supposedly serve.
- Boards are highly prone to the vagaries of "committee think." Through much social research we have learned that a group of individuals will think and act in a way that none of the members would think or act as an individual. We see this in street gangs, in packs of domesticated dogs, and in state legislatures as well as the United States Congress.
- Typically, 1/3rd or less of homeowners care to vote in a board election. Thus, board membership is ripe for abuse and the exercise of egoism and petty power.
- Lack of transparency, heavy-handedness, and arrogance of petty power tend to characterize a large number of homeowners association boards of directors.
- There are inadequate controls over the abuse of power by boards. Boards have little accountability and significant power.
- In most homeowners associations there is too little protection for minority opinions or rights.
- The business model and the organizational model we use for homeowners associations are woefully outmoded, based on the 16th century common law notion of how a fraternal society should be governed.
- The modern approach taken to more closely emulate local government, trying to mold homeowners associations into private pseudo-governments has met with little success. And it is simply wrong. Boards are not common councils, nor are they city councils, or county commissions. Boards are not mini-legislatures.
- We fail to understand that a home is not like a publicly traded stock than can be easily bought or sold. The lack of fungibility and marketability has an enormous impact on how we need to think about homeowners association governance.
- Most homeowners do not read covenants, nor understand the concept of a homeowners association.
- Lack of desire to be involved in the governance of homeowners associations by the majority of members is a fact of life. The Pareto principle applies to homeowners associations as it does to nearly every facet of economic and social life.
- We fail to understand that the association exists soley to serve and to provide value to homeowners, individually and collectively. We fail to understand that the primary duty of the board of directors is to homeowners, not to the corporate body.
- Lawyers and property managers have a vested interest in a power balance that favors strong association boards at the expense of homeowners, collectively and individually. CAI is the last place we should look for advice on good governance, organizational or management models.
- The vast majority of problems in homeowners associations occur as a result of the application of an ineffective organizational and governance model.
- Way too much of the discussion on HOATalk takes a descriptive, normative approach to management and to governance, rather than a proscriptive, positive approach. People are trying to solve problems based on how associations are currently governed, rather than how they should be governed.
- Accordingly, there is quite of bit of factual inaccuracy that is put forth on HOATalk and accepted as gospel.
OK, now that about 2/3rds of the readers have stopped reading, I move into solutions.
We need an entirely new way of thinking about the governance of common interest ownership developments. We need a new organizational model and a new business model.
I advocate the adoption of the
policy governance model, with a healthy does of servant-leadership philosophy for members of the board of directors.
Boards of directors have just
three and only three governance functions. Everything else they do beyond these three function is something other than governance. It can, and should be delegated. And because boards seek to do more than they should be doing, it becomes the source of a great many problems found in homeowners associations.
- Make policy
- Assure compliance with policy
- Assure the financial health of the organization
- Boards should not be in the habit of meeting to make every management decision. Once proper policy has been established, boards should delegate management to elected officers.
- A well-functioning board need only meet quarterly.
- A board should serve as the appeal body, rather than an enforcement body.
- Boards should be versed in the concept of servant leadership. Before making a policy decision, each board member should ask, "What is in the best interest of the homeowners," rather than the more frequent question, "What is in the best interest of the association." Sometimes the answer to each of those questions leads to the same place. More frequently than not, the answers are quite different, and the association is taken to a place it should not go.
'Nuff said for now.