What is the difference between a condo declaration and by-laws? As I read my declaration it seems to contain most of the elements that most articles refer to as by-laws.

As a newly chosen (not elected) President of a small HOA (32 units), I am hoping to take our 35 year old community and HOA out of the stone age. Remarkably we have no by-laws as I can discover. We do have CC&R's that obliquely refer to by-laws but never actually state them. We have been self-managed and the Board is composed of interested owners but membership wanes between two people that made all of the decisions for several years to now a group of eight, mainly because the current board made a very unpopular decision on a big landscaping project that only affected one-half of the community. It's a classic situation, no participation only complaints.

I wish to craft by-laws and install a voting process whereby the Board is elected by the community. Amazingly, this too has never been done. I cannot find much about the governance of a HOA, nor by-laws in my State's (New Mexico) government pages. We are willing to do the work, but we need a starting place. Can any of my fellow members of this site provide any help? I have started wending my way through the by-laws section of the blog but there are 72 threads. The election section is also extensive. Perhaps someone might attention the appropriate entries to me. Thanks.

How much can the condo association charge escrow for requested documents like CC&R, Bylaw, Reserve study, Article of Corporation, Rules and Regulation, fill out escrow forms?

The following clause has been added to Florida Statute 720 HOA. Can you help with interpretation? Can any member make a motion to cancel a contract at any time in the life of the contract or only at the next regular meeting. The clause has two sentences. The word 'ratified' in the second sentence seems to imply that any motion must be put close to the inception of the contract but the wording does not state this, as does the first sentence.

'Any contract entered into by the board may be canceled by a majority of the voting interests present at the next regular or special meeting of the association, whichever occurs first. Any member may make a motion to cancel such contract, but if no motion is made or if such motion fails to obtain the required vote, the contract shall be deemed ratified for the term expressed therein'

I am part of a condo association that has no rules or bylaws regarding smoking that takes place in an owner's unit. One of the units contains a family of smokers and the smoke is making its way into the other units that make up the common building. Since this is not addressed in the condo bylaws is there recourse by going to the county or state? What, if anything, is the responsibility of our Board of Directors with this issue?

We live in 15 unit condominium in Washington State. Our association is considering changing our bylaws so the outside windows in each unit are considered part of the individual unit owner’s responsibility instead of being considered a “common area”. This is so the cost of the replacement or repair of each unit’s windows would be the unit’s owner’s responsibility and not part of the assoc. reserve assessment. We do not expect any replacement of window to be necessary for another 20+ years. I would like to receive input from other associations on your experience on this subject so we can consider all the advantages and disadvantages if we make this change. I know our Bylaws would have to state that architectural standards for replacement windows would have to be followed. Specifically, my questions are: how would the association force a homeowner to replace their windows when the association determines it is necessary? If a homeowner replaces a window – who pays to repair/replace the siding that needs to come off during the window replacement? We are interested in making sure we are not opening a “can of worms” by changing this.

Our board president seems to be the only one who can break the bylaws. The board sometimes says something about his actions, but the president always has an excuse or sweeps it under the rug. What can be done. It seems to me it is the board's responsibility to make sure the bylaws are obeyed.

Our Board is reviewing a budget for 2012 with our Annual meeting set for Jan 2012. FS 718.112 Bylaws Section 8,(e). Budget meeting states that "Any meeting at which a proposed annual budget of an association will be considered by the board or owners..." has to be conducted with 14 days notice and a copy of the proposed budget needs to be supplied. Our President refused to provide a copy of the proposed budget to any owner before or even after the meeting. He claims the Board has the right to "not" provide the proposed budget for owners to review before the Board is ready for it to be released. Is this a correct interpretation of the Statute?