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DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/07/2010 8:30 AM
I recently moved from one SC covenant controlled community into another such community. The developer here is, in my estimation, at least two years away from turning the POA over to the Homeowners. Article 3.10 of our By-Laws reads: “No member of the Association shall have any right as an Association Member to attend any meeting of the Board, except such meeting of the Board as the Board of Directors shall, in the exercise of its sole discretion, open to the membership or any other person.” This, of course, gives the HO populated board, when established in the future, the option, at its discretion, to have closed board meetings. We fought in my previous community to get board meetings to be open but that was much easier as those By-Laws stated they would be open. My plan is to initiate a letter to the present BoD (the developer) to amend that article to cause the By-Laws to be open to the membership. If this does not bear fruit, my next step would probably be to make a motion at the next HOA meeting (DEC 2010) for such an amendment to be made. Is this the appropriate course of action? Is there other action(s) that I am overlooking that might be more appropriate and bear better fruit? Also, there are some states that make it mandatory that POA/HOA board meetings are held as open to its members. I see from posts here on this site they include AZ and CA (and DE?); what other states require this? I’d like to refer to them (or some of them) in my letter.

RuthH1
(Maryland)

Posts:5

03/07/2010 10:53 AM
Refer to Maryland House Bill 552 Closed meeting for specific issues only i.e indivisual assessment discussions, legel matters with legal council.

DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/07/2010 12:08 PM
Thanks Ruth; are you saying that MD board meetings are required to be open? I realize that you are referring to Executive Sessions but I’m referring to the regular session of board meetings; states vary on this.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/08/2010 12:29 AM
Donald, Find out when your association will be turned over to the members. Right now, you don't stand a chance of changing your (actually, the developers documents), he has absolute control, and controls the board and not much you can do. Don't send any letters until you understand where you stand. Find out the turn over date, approach his Board if you can, if there are owners on this board approach them and and satisfy yourselve what really is going on. Chances are you won't like the answer. Then get back here and let us know what you found out. The developer is in control, can the owners move him, remains to be seen, but it won't be by forcing him or requesting him to change the documents, he wrote the damn things, he did not get approval from anyone but his lawyer, and he registered them at the court house. You will want to on line search all the documents he filed at county court house considering you association or any other interesting information on record...all public information and usually free for download. Know your adversary, if he is indeed one. He may turn out to be be a great guy and realizes the profit in keeping good relations, or he could be more interested in the bottom line and knows he has already dealt with you.

MaryA1

Posts:0

03/08/2010 4:19 AM
Donald, I agree with Robert, you may have much better luck in getting this amendment passed if you wait until the HOA is transitioned to the members. But, know that it's not uncommon for the bylaws of many HOAs to read the same as yours. Most of the AZ bylaws I've seen do and that's why we rely on the AZ HOA open meeting law.

DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/08/2010 8:13 AM
Thanks Robert & Mary, it appears that this may be a thornier issue than I expected. Perhaps I was being naive thinking that the developer would be receptive to what seems like a pretty reasonable request. You posed some questions, Robert, for which I need to determine the answers. I moved into this community just before the last HOA meeting in DEC 2009 and there was only one person representing the board and I believe he was a representative of the builder/developer. This developer has several other communities in the Myrtle Beach area and, as Mary alluded to, I’ve learned that the By-Laws in our docs appear as boiler plate and are the same, except for names, as used in at least one of the other communities. Mary, I’m very reluctant to wait until after the transition to take any action. It’s possible that a new board may quickly see an advantage in closed board meetings and create such a rule; once made it could be very difficult to reverse as now you have to convince the board that they were wrong. If possible, I’d like to take steps that may help avoid even getting into such a situation – I’d really like to get in front of this issue prior to the transition. SC is, I believe, in the process of instituting HOA legislation and I understand that they are leaning towards board openness. It’s possible that such legislation could resolve my issue but I don’t care to just wait and hope. I’m going to try to dig up some answers to Robert’s questions, see where I stand and decide how best to proceed.

MaryA1

Posts:0

03/08/2010 9:34 AM
Donald, One thing you may want to check out is if an amendment to your bylaws requires a vote of the members or just the BOD. Many assn bylaws can be amended by a vote of the BOD only. I can understand you wanting to have this issue resolved now as I gather you would like to attend the board meetings. However, it may be that there aren't any board meetings to attend. Oftentimes the board doesn't meet while the assn is under developer control since the developer is the Pres and his cronies sit on the board meaning he does as he wishes with no input needed from anyone. Of course this is not the case if it is a large assn that takes many years (some times decades) to build out. Of course, as Robert says, it certainly shouldn't hurt to have a little talk with the developer to see where he stands on the issue. If he is adamant about not wanting to change the bylaws, then I'm afraid you're stuck until transition.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/08/2010 1:09 PM
Donald,Mary is right of course, except I think she would agree there are steps and plans and procedures that you can look at, outside your documents. You still have rights, granted they are certainly not something that will make you friends with your developer of the developers board or the developers M/c. Keep trying to resolve this, keep good records and if all else fails, post back again. But first, make your presence felt to the developer and the Board and MC and if you got a couple other owners interested, take them along to any meetings you attend or set up. Again try, to resolve your differences, but keep records of events. You get into this,, you may find there is no cause for concern, but make sure.

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/08/2010 7:23 PM
DonaldM3 I'm in an HOA in Florida. By state statuate chapter 720 says all board meetings are required to be open to the membership except for meetings between the board and its attorney with respect to proposed or pending ligitation where the discussion would be an attorney client privilege. However our CCR's says the board has sole authority on all maters to be voted on. You have the right to speak,make comments, ask questions, make suggestions, etc, but you don't have any vote, only the BOD has this authority to make decisions in spending our money. This sounds like a small dictatorship doesn't it. The only vote we have is to vote in our BOD or recall them. Now as for turnover Florida state law says it has to be turned over within 3 months after 90% of the lots have been sold out. You can keep up with this percentage by searching the tax appraiser's records for recording and sale of all lots in your subdivision. There were no meetings by the developer and the membership of our HOA befor turnover. Here's where voting rights may come into effect with your association. The developer is a class B for his voting rights and has 3 votes for each lot owned. Where as the owners has 1 vote for each lot owned. As the lots are sold off the developer loses voting power. At some point this will equal normally it is when 75% of all homes are sold. At this time all voting for each class has equal voting power. This of course is much earlier than the 90% sell out rule. It makes you wonder why we never had any meetings with the developer befor turnover doesn't it. I believe he did not want to hear any complaints from the membership. I must say its been a circus since turnover in all our meetings almost turning into a riot at times. Donald welcome to living in an HOA. JerrellC- Florida Homeowner

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/08/2010 7:29 PM
DonaldM3 Oh yes Donald our CCR's requires 50%+1 approval vote of all our members to make any changes to our CCR's. JerrellC Florida homeowner

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/09/2010 1:29 AM
Jerrell, I'm learning some stuff here but I have a lot of trouble figuring out what you say belongs under state law or what is under the CCR's. At times it sounds like all the HOA CCr's are the same in FL. Then when you interject your personal context, I have some trouble sorting that out. Is it a state law that ALL developers MUST turn over their associatioin when 90 % is sold? I know that kind of information is spelled out in the HOA documents other places. A developer with 100 lots could reserve 10 of them and never turn over control of the association, is that right? Is there a class B membership in all associations, and does every developer hold 3 votes on every lot he owns. Regards the decisions of the Board to spend money. Does your HOA have a budget and does the membership approve this budget at the annual meeting? Aren't your BOD meetings open meeting and the members given the right to speak at each Board meeting? Doesn't each prospective owner have the right to find out all these restrictions before they purchase. I grant that most associations have little to do with the sale, but our HOA will provide any prospective owner with information on all the governing documents. In FL, does the seller or sellers agent have an obligation to include the HOA documents at time of sale? How long has your association been in existance and how long have you lived there Jerrell? You will help me if you could word this stuff in such a way to separate what is what. I appreciate it.

DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/09/2010 4:39 AM
Thanks, Jerrell, for sharing. One of the bits of information I was seeking in my original post was which states have legislated (mandate) open board meetings. Now I have CA, AZ, FL (for sure) and DE is questionable. I’m sure there are others but at this point I am lacking supporting information. I don’t agree that what you describe “sounds like a small dictatorship”. To me it sounds like a mini democracy. You elect your legislators and they legislate. My issue is that they legislate in openness and my greatest concern is the time subsequent to the developer turn-over when there is a Homeowner populated Board of Directors acting on behalf of the HO’s. Although appealing at times, I would not expect the ability to vote at a board meeting and that’s why I elect qualified and dedicated (ideally) board members. If any of my board members are failing their HOA, I want to be aware of this so I can recall them or vote them out in 2/3 years and open board meetings help in this regard. Open board meetings are conducive toward a congenial relationship between the BOD and the Homeowners whereas closed meetings, on the other hand, perpetuate suspicion and distrust. Robert, as usual, brings up some interesting points. He asks when prospective owners have the right to find out the content of the CC&R’s. In PA, where I was a Realtor some years ago, I recall that prospective buyers were required to be given a copy of the CC&R’s at the time of signing the Agreement of Sale. They then had 10 days to review them and if there was something in the covenants the prospective buyer did not like he/she could then withdraw from the AOS.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/09/2010 5:30 AM
Donald, Your post is thoughtful and refreshing. However, some might miss where you are coming from so I am going to venture a little extension or examination of your thoughts, at least they strike me this way. This is the age of instant satisfaction and it carries over to any evaluation of HOA or condo living. We often do not look at pressing items long term. It is clear you, Donald, are looking at this long term. Once you get twenty years of living in an association under your belt, you can look back at your own record (at least, I can) and realize there was a lot of times it would have been more productive to walk than run through the forest. Your post allows for this and that's a great thing to get across on a forum such as this. One of the surprising things I learned is that not everyone should be on the Board. I believe strongly everyone should have the opportunity to run for the board and I think it is the lot of the ownership to suffer the tenure of a bad board member, as long as you have enough good ones. I am convinced now more than ever that owner participation in committees, assignment by the board or any volunteer work makes the wheels go round also. I know now, you aren't going to get everyone to join the crusade but you need to get enough to make things work. It may end up you find five or ten run the association, but don't run them off because you want more to participate, these few can be the salt of the earth and I have known enough of the good ones to know that morals are still strong in the people and they will try and do the right thing, if properly motivated. The motivation is what I fall back on. Anything any of us do connected to this association living must be done for the association............always....no personal agendas.......this keeps everyone straight and on the same page. Does this add or detract from your post? I apologize if I overstepped on your post.

DavidW5
(Virginia)

Posts:297

03/09/2010 6:15 AM
Donald, The Virginia Property Owners Association Act specifies: "A. All meetings of the board of directors, including any subcommittee or other committee thereof, shall be open to all members of record. The board shall not use work sessions or other informal gatherings of the board of directors to circumvent the open meeting requirements of this section." The statute also defines a limited list of valid reasons for the board to convene in executive session such as to consult with legal counsel...

DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/09/2010 8:27 AM
Thanks for the “extension” Robert – well said. Thank you also, David – That is the type of information I am seeking; particularly that you provided the words from the Virginia act. I may very well use it for an example.

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/09/2010 2:10 PM
RobertR1 Well robert to your first question. Yes Florida law is clear on this. Florida chapter 720.307 on home owner associations under Transition of association control in a community.Par (1)(a)Three months after 90% of all parcels in all phases of the community that ultimately be operated by the homeowner's association have been conveyed to the members. Its hard for me to believe that a developer would retain hold on 10% just to retain control. In our subdivision the developer immediately sold off all his lots to at least three other builders in the initial stage of development. I believe its boiler plate language in Florida where the developer is a class B owner and the owners are class A owners with 3 votes given to the developer and 1 vote given to the owners. After installation of the utilities in the subdivision the developer had little to do with anything that went on. He paid the management company to manage according to our CC&R's after that. So you might say we really didn't have a declarant just by name only in the corporation documents was the developer involved. Thats also why we never had any meetings befor turnover. I asked the management company was there any minutes of any previous board meetings. She said there wasn't any minutes of any board meetings befor turnover. In our membership and voting rights class B membership shall cease and become class A members when the number of votes assigned to class A members equals the number of votes assigned to class B members. As lots are sold off this happened in July of 2007. We have 473 lots in our subdivision. When 355 lots are sold off leaving 118 lots this is the point where the declarant would become class A member. The above interjection may explain why we never had any meetings befor turnover. This was the first time anyone ever saw the developer. I might add he never said a word just acknowledged that he was the developer. The budget we had at turnover in January 2009 was made up by the PM. It was accepted by the current board without questions. ( the PM gave their company a 11.3% raise). Three board members were voted in at turnover. President, Vice President, and Secretary/Tresurer. We had a total of three board or HOA meetings last year. All members have the right to speak, ask questions, or give suggestions, etc., but do not have any voting power in how the board spends our money. The only vote the owners have is to vote in new board members or recall them. The builders do inform you when you purchase your home about the HOA restrictions. The association was incorporated in Feb 2003 with the first home deeded in late 2003. Construction was very steady until late 2008 and came to a crawl after that. We now have three vacant lots to full buildout. I've lived here since March 2005. I hope all the above explains how our HOA has come to exist. JerrellC-- Florida

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/09/2010 2:39 PM
Jerrell, If we accept the fact that was is done is done, that brings us up to 2009 in January when you had turn-over. Who was the turn over to? Did you have elections at that time, who put the ballot together. Do you now have a three member board? Why did or who did elect the President, secretary and Treasurer? Normally the Officers of the Board are elected by the Board, and it seems at that point you didn't have a Board. The turn over was Jan 09, the developer set the Budget, and some Board approved or accepted it. Was the membership asked to vote on the budget, does your ccr's require a vote of the membership to approve the budget? I am trying to get at how you all got control. Do you still have the same PM. Who set the 2010 budget and how was that done. You say the meetings are open and owner input invited......any results of that. Who approved the 2010 budget? At turn-over was there a financial accounting and what did that look like. Did you have a reserve account, any debts on the books, anyone in arrears, any liens or court filings. Who checked out all this stuff? Who signed the turn-over papers, did you all have an attorney present? Are you in a stable position now with a stable management and board, do you have committees set up. Have you given complete control over to the PM?

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/09/2010 4:01 PM
Posted By RobertR1 on 03/09/2010 2:39 PM Jerrell, If we accept the fact that was is done is done, that brings us up to 2009 in January when you had turn-over. Who was the turn over to? Did you have elections at that time, who put the ballot together. Do you now have a three member board? Why did or who did elect the President, secretary and Treasurer? Normally the Officers of the Board are elected by the Board, and it seems at that point you didn't have a Board. The turn over was Jan 09, the developer set the Budget, and some Board approved or accepted it. Was the membership asked to vote on the budget, does your ccr's require a vote of the membership to approve the budget? I am trying to get at how you all got control. Do you still have the same PM. Who set the 2010 budget and how was that done. You say the meetings are open and owner input invited......any results of that. Who approved the 2010 budget? At turn-over was there a financial accounting and what did that look like. Did you have a reserve account, any debts on the books, anyone in arrears, any liens or court filings. Who checked out all this stuff? Who signed the turn-over papers, did you all have an attorney present? Are you in a stable position now with a stable management and board, do you have committees set up. Have you given complete control over to the PM? RobertR1 you do have a lot of questions don't you. Turnover was January 28, 2009 even though the 90% rule by state guidelines was not followed. It hapened to be Sept 30,2009 by looking at when deeds were recorded. I did my own checking on this. Ballots were supposably sent out to all members to vote before hand. There were twelve people who wanted to run but six were disqualified by the property manager because they were not current in their dues. It was kind of a circus at the turnover where ballots were being handed out to anyone there. We had a total of 42 people there. There was never a roll call or verication of who actually was voting. Every owner has one vote for their lot owned (max one vote if multiple lots are owned)Votes were counted by a comittee of the developer and his secretary and a couple of volenteers from the members. Each perspective board member had a chance to introduce themselves to the membership. Each was given about 3to5 minutes to speak. After that the PM said who the winners were. That was the end of the meeting. The membership was not asked to vote or approve the budget at turnover as I said it was already made up befor years end 2008, and the board just accepted it as given by the PM. We still have the same PM. The 2010 budget was also made up by the PM and accepted by our board. The few meetings that we had in 2009 were not very well received by the membership. There were a lot of complaints and dissatisfaction expressed by many people about many things manily petty complaints, but some were reasonable. There was no accounting by any CPA of the financial records. Just a year end report given of the financial condition of our association. There was no attorney present at turnover. There is now one committee(two people)for the ARC committee set up. No the board we now have is not very stable. One member said he does not plan to run again. At January 29 we had elections for a new board. We did not have a quorum and the PM said the existing board will remain in office. It almost turned into a riot with many outburst from several people. A week later we had a BOD meeting. At this meeting the board said we would have another election. I have heard it wil be on April 6. I don't expect we will have any change in the board makeup if it is done like last year. We have received a nomination form from the PM to be returned in by the first of March. I am planning to run. I hope to bring a little more common since to the board and watch over our expenses closely with control over writing checks to our maintainence people. Wish me luck. JerrellC-Florida

MaryA1

Posts:0

03/09/2010 4:17 PM
Jerrell, All the CCRs that I've eiher seen or have been advised of all state there are 3 votes for Class B members (the declarant), however, I recall some posting on this forum stating their CCRs only allow one vote. I don't know if that was misinformation or not, because that really doesn't sound right to me. However I just wanted to alert you to the fact that you shouldn't make assumptions, there will always be someone to prove you wrong. LOL

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/09/2010 5:53 PM
Well Jerrell, I do thank you for all the information and since what we do around here is give opinions, I will give you mine. If you are close to accurate in what you are saying, it appears just about everything in the association is dysfunctional. Your history reads dysfunctional and it seems to be rolling along that way. If that assumption is close to the truth then there are lots more questions to ask, but I'll ask only one. Why did your association let this all happen? Doesn't it appear to you all that at this point and maybe before the management company runs the train. Not supposed to be this way, and it is the owners responsibility to set the train back on the track. You can't get folks to come help you because your problems belong to all of you. It's a mess. What would I do? Well if you are going for change you have to know what to change, you find that out by learning the truth about what is going on there. Go back to the court records and follow your history through the creation of your complex. This will raise many questions. Request to find these answers by looking at the association records. Follow your documents on how to do this. It should be a simple process, you request specific information, they allow you to review the documents. I suspect it will turn out to be far from simple, then you begin to get an idea of who you are going up against. You desperately need support, you must get organized and do a better job and know more than who ever is your adversary. It will be long, hard and maybe expensive, but you all made the bed, you have to sleep in it. Finally, don't take anything as I say as written in stone. If it helps, good, if it don't, throw it out. Your desire to get on the Board is commendable and you can bring change from within, if, you can be in the majority and have the talent and drive. It won't be done by a rider in a white horse, it will be done by hard work, smarts and dedication and people. Let this post stand a while and see what other folks think, the more that post the better the advise normally.

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/09/2010 6:43 PM
Robert, Yes several of us think the association is in a mess. I've believed this from day one. I've done my own investigation of the financial records in the PM's office. I'm don't have enough knowledge yet as what to look for in the records only what the statuates say what the PM must turn over. I spent about three hours looking over their records and could not immediately find any conflicts but not being a cpa I would not know what to look for. I did say to the PM that we really need a certified report from a CPA. The PM said there would be no problem and it would be healthy for them and for the association. I know the association is not in the best financial condition at present. I've been told that we have 16 homes in forclosure, with 10 liens have been filed. and about 16% behine in their dues. I know there were over 40 warning letters of forclosure befor the end of the year. There are reserves for a wall that was built at the entrance of our subdivision. It has been hit twice by automobiles and repaired. I don't know if the association was repaid for the repairs or not. We do not have any amenities at the present other than two parks with kids playground equipment. I've tried to get organized with other members but I can only get one couple thats interested. We've also talked about self managing our association. I'm looking into getting our own website and other things that we must do if we self manage our association. We're waiting now to see what is going to happen on April 6 for the next election. JerrellC- Florida homeowner.

JackB8
(Virginia)

Posts:105

03/09/2010 6:54 PM
Virginia Property Owners Association Act requires open meetings of board and all subcommittees and these meetings must be publicized in advance. It is hard for me to imagine how an HOA board could get away with having meetings closed to those they represent.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/09/2010 7:24 PM
JackBB, I agree, but consider, there are many associations that have closed meeting, right or wrong. Also, if we can require open meetings as some states do, why don't they require this openess of the developoer, many times he don't even have meetings to be opoen or closed, or is not by law made to inform the members where their money is being spent. From what we read here. Ri9ght now in SC, open meeting are not required by the state, legislation is supposed to change this, but I do believe we are seeing here in SC a push to make individual associations hold Open Meetings. CAI, for one, endorses open meetings. We had to fight like crazt to get open meetings and a web site and an active e-mail list, but we got them and they work. Just the ability to instantly contact the vast majority, ours about 98% I think, by e-mail is worth all the trouble. You would be surprised to find what interest is aroused by e-mail blasts. There was not a sudden rush to get involved but there is now an awareness of some of the associations events and happenings, social and business.

JerrellC
(Florida)

Posts:83

03/09/2010 7:35 PM
MaryA1 You could be right but I've talked to three different association members, and they say theirs are the same as ours with 3 votes to the Declarant class B members and 1 vote to each property owner or class A members. JerrellC

MaryA1

Posts:0

03/10/2010 7:07 AM
Jerrell, What is contained in 3 assn docs is hardly an indication of the norm! I'm just saying that we all need to be careful when posting our "opinion" so that it does not come out to sound like the abosolute truth. You posted your opinion but made it sound like that's the way it is for all assn's. All I'm saying is that it may NOT be that way for all assn's. Do you have any idea how many assn's there are in the country? AZ alone has over 100,000.

GlenL
(Ohio)

Posts:3526

03/10/2010 7:52 AM
Donald after transition depending on your documents you and your fellow H/O’s have the option to call a special meeting to change the By-Law to open the meetings. While generally changes are initiated by the BOD the H/O’s can change them as long as they don’t violate the law.

Too bad the only people who know how to run the country are busy driving cabs and cutting hair. - George Burns

DonaldM3
(South Carolina)

Posts:132

03/11/2010 6:05 PM
Thanks, Glenn, for your response. The option you propose is certainly a good plan B or perhaps D as I do not want to wait until turnover to take action; particularly, as you’ll see below, that it’s so distant in the future. Why do you suggest I do this after turnover and at a special meeting? What's wrong with making a motion at the next yearly HOA meeting to initiate action in this regard? Robert, I did a little digging and wanted to respond to your earlier question as to when out association will be turned over to the members. In my initial post I had guessed that will be “at least two years” away – I was off by greater than a factor of 2 as the projected turnover of the POA to the HO’s will take place in DEC 2014 or at 95% sold units/lots, whichever comes first. So obviously there is plenty of time for some action/steps to be taken. I do not, however want to wait that long to take initiate action so I’ve formulated a respectful letter that after a little more tweaking I’m going to send to the BOD in care of the MC; I’ll probably send it Certified, signature required. Do you remain against such a letter? As of yet there are no HO’s on the board.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/11/2010 7:04 PM
Donald, Thanks for the ionfo, good for you to know. Yes I am against you sending this letter to developer. Why? You single yourself out as a dissident.......like it or not, that is probably how the developer will take it. But you get ten folks to sign your letter as representing 3o homeowners living in the association and you can make music. Then you will become not Jack.......but one of the homeowners that formed a private group outside the organization and are gearing up to take over this place come turn-ower. They will say and think, this group is serious, they are thinking long term, they are organized, they have strong leadership, they have a war chest, thay have set up a web site to inform their fellow owners of how this association works, they are ready to elect their officers the day of turnover and they will be at the table. In the meantime they will have requested and recorded numerous advances to the developoer to be more involved in the finances of the organization, they want to know about the reserve fund, they want to know about these mechanics liens against the developer that they picked up off the county court records, etc, etc. Which letter would you rather sign?

MaryA1

Posts:0

03/12/2010 6:34 AM
Donald, I've always been of the opinion that it's much better to project with sugar than vinegar. IMO you should phone the developer or perhaps meet with him. Ask if he is conducting board meetings as you would be interested to attend. Let him know you are interested in knowing what is going on in the assn and you would like to be involved if at all possible. IF board meetings are being held, you may want to feel him out regarding changing the rules to require that members be informed -- but go easy on this. For starters just speak for yourself. You could even ask him when he thinks turnover might take place -- at what % of build-out are they. IMO, a phone call or a face-to-face is much more preferrable than a letter -- much easier to project exactly where you are coming from. Above all else, you do NOT want to come across as being confrontational.

RobertR1
(South Carolina)

Posts:5164

03/12/2010 6:49 AM
Mary, Donald's original post quoted this: rticle 3.10 of our By-Laws reads: “No member of the Association shall have any right as an Association Member to attend any meeting of the Board, except such meeting of the Board as the Board of Directors shall, in the exercise of its sole discretion, open to the membership or any other person.” Now it seems to me the developer has pretty much established the pecking order . A face to face meeting might work, but at what cost to Donald at this point. Do you think a face to face meeting will open any doors that the developer has not seen fit to open up to now. He would much rather let things play out as the have been and as he knows he can make happen withing the documents he wrote. But, I respect your opinion and believe Donald should give it serious consideration. He could lose a little face but there is not much the developer can do to him, and it just may cause the developer to see the light.

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Forums > Homeowner Association > HOA Discussions > Open Board Meetings #2