Condo Association Management Blog

The board must follow your state's condominium laws, the association legal documents (they are really a contract between an owner and the association), and their fiduciary responsibility to put the best interests of the association and treat every owner fairly and equally. Furthermore, if the board engages in 'Self Dealing' the courts have come down very hard on board members responsible (see Fiduciary menu choice at Web link below). 
 
See www.wvnorthface.info Website and go to 'Fiduciary' page from the menu to see some examples of a board's Fiduciary responsibility. Also, the 'Bylaws' menu choice has some info on 'Minimum Expectations for Any Condo Board'.

I am looking forward to the comments etc. to be posted! One of our Board Members has a personal issue with our daughter and we need a 100% vote to divide our unit in 2 units. We have everyone elses vote as it will help them as well since we will be dividing a commercial unit into 1/2 commercial, 1/2 residential which will help all parties that are looking to refinance their residential units. Our A/C Unit for our commercial Salon is on the roof, this board member has a unit on the top floor under all of the A/C units. She contends that Our Unit keeps her awake at night if left on and until she has total silence in her unit she will not vote in our favor. We had A/C company ck unit (unit is in very good working order)we out padding under the unit as well as went into the Board Members unit with her husband and checked the decibal level which was no higher than that of a normal conversation. These units are in a downtown area on the Main Street in town! There are restaurants/businesses etc all around us. Can she continue to hold us up due to a personal vendetta that we know she has.This is all due to a personality conflict essentially. Has anyone ever had this type of problem? I would love to hear about other unit owners about the Ethical Behavior of Board Members. We actually went to a Board Meeting last week and she never said hello or looked in our direction, all questions and comments were directed away from us etc.Never have seen such behavior in 35 years of owning commercial/residential/business properties.

Excellent info above. Have forwarded to several of our owners.

If you do not follow Roberts Rules of Order I'd strongly suggest you do so. Following this widely used format from our House of Reoptresentatives to major business concerns,bridge clubs, garden clums,HOAs and Condos will solve your ethics problems. But it will require the board members and the assembly (meaning those who attend board meetings) will have to gain an understanding of these rules. There are many sources of such info and training. For an iontroduction go to your public library and get Roberts Rules of Order New Edition. After scanning thast book go on the internet and searh for Roberts Rules. You should find a site-"Roberts Rules Made Easy." They are excellenty and offer remote training that is well worth the cost.

I agree that following Roberts Rules of Order will help but it certainly will not solve all problems.  
 
My condo association legal documents also specifically require following Roberts Rules of Order. The board follows them in part but use their position to suppress when it suits their needs. Couple of examples: 
 
1. They did not allow owners to discuss windows at the annual owners meeting, or even use the word 'window(s), despite windows being on the annual owners meeting agenda. 
 
2. The property manager refused to answer a question that would have clarified that the previous meeting minutes needed to be corrected at the time of the meeting set aside for this purpose. The property manager not only refused to answer the question, he refused that the other two property manager staff answer the question. This was done to protect the board, all three property manager staff was at the meeting head table with the board. The board allowed them refuse to answer the question that would have clarified the matter. 
 
The point is the board has control and that control can be abused in many ways by an unethical board, including, but be no means limited to, not following Roberts Rules of Order. 
 

I live in a condo that is about 85 percent or more seniors. They recently changed the locks and gave each unit two keys. I, as do others like to have a key for our children in case of emergencies and also have access to our unit in case we are in the hospital or away from home. 
 
 
 
I ask the board how I get two extra keys for my daughters. I explained that my last emergency trip to the hospital I couldn't even walk to the door to open it. They said if I want to get keys for my daughters it would be 20. Dollars each that would be 40.00 total. 
 
 
 
Can they do that? I own my own unit and feel they are trying to rip us off. The keys say do not duplicate. Do you know of any place that someone will make a key from a do not duplicate key and only charge a reasonable amount??? Or some senior advocate place what I can contact about this matter. By the way they have been screwing around with the doors for about 3 weeks and can't seem to get them working correctly and sometimes you can open the front door from the inside --- they have a sign on the door that says if the door won't open go to the side door --- besides being a pain it is also a fire risk. 
 
Sincerely,  
 

two owners live a cond, work in the condo and are paid by the condo association, the owner's niece is the board's vice president, is this not a conflict of interest??