Is this a conflict of interest??

My question is that our soon to be old BOD asked an appointed board member to service and maintain our streets lamps. The board member is a licensed electrician and does good work. The board has said that the electrician board member was asked by the other members of the board and a vote was taken to grant him the contract. There is nothing in our by-laws or CCR's that speak to this issue. So does anyone see it as a problem or a conflict of interest if the board member continues to do the work as long as he does not vote on anything related to his contract?

I did a little research on conflicts-of-interest a while back.

First, it is not illegal to have a conflict-of-interest. A conflict-of-interest is like a yellow caution light, not a red stop light.

Second, from what I could find, there are only two legal requirements and they are only required in some cases. (You might want to check the laws in your state, though, specific to HOAs.) The two legal requirements (which are not always required) are: (1) the person discloses/announces that they have a conflict-of-interest and (2) that the person abstains from voting in matters in which he has a conflict-of-interest.

So, I would say that (a) yes, the person has a conflict-of-interest but (b) no, it is likely that there is no problem with his contract.

People tend to exaggerate what must be done about conflicts-of-interest. You don't need to do sealed bids or a bunch of other crazy, bureaucratic procedures or out-right bans. If you want to do that, hey, feel free but don't think that it is a legal requirement.

Thanks Daniel, that makes a lot of sense and helps.