Condo Association Management Blog

simple, contact your state office of condominium law and they will respond to this quickly

Send a regustered return receipt letter to each board member. Detail specific acts they that violate yourn state law. Cloase that letter by advising the board members that knowingly violating the law remove3s the immunity granted to them in your nby laws. That usually gets there immediate attention. Also address a copy of this letter to your state attorney general and annotate the board copies accordingly

In CT we also had condo law amendments go into effect in 2010, and one of them was the same as yours - clearly stating that unit owners must be notified as to when Board meetings are taking place (within 5 days in CT) and clearly stating that "at each Executive Board meeting, the Executive Board shall provide a reasonable opportunity for Unit Owners to comment regarding any matter affecting the common interest community or the Association." 
 
Now, when a Board violates the law and holds a meeting without notification, actions taken at the meeting will stand unless such action is timely challenged. Such a challenge ultimately will succeed. However, you may have to go to court to succeed, which means you'll need legal help. 
 
If your goal right now is simply to get the Board's attention and make them comply with the state law, what you can do is write up an amendment to your existing Bylaws and propose it to the Board by certified mail and ask to attend the Board meeting where your amendment is discussed. The amendment would simply mirror the new state law. Email me (george.cameron@ymail.com), and I'll send you back the changes we made to our bylaws as a result of the state condo law amendments. 
 
Any way you slice it, you're in for a fight and you'll need to engage the Board.  
 
You can also just write to each member of the Board and enclose a copy of the new state law section and demand your rights that all owners be notified of meetings and be permitted to speak. Send each letter by regular and certified mail. Begin documenting everything. I guess your objective is to get to the meetings and start to straighten things out. You may want to field candidates at the next election or even remove directors before terms expire. 
 
I suggest having all your condo documents in a binder and to study the relevant sections. Also, you should be able to print out the current State of Iowa condo laws by accessing the Iowa's state legislature site. And you probably can print out separately the Public Act that was passed containing just the amendments. In CT the Public Act was passed in 2009 but didn't go into effect until July 1, 2010, in order to give everyone plenty of lead time to get acquainted with the amendments. 
 
In CT, the body of condo law is called the "Common Interest Ownership Act" or CIOA, which coincidentally is pronounced like Iowa. CIOA and its amendments generically come from a national condo institute of some sort, so many states have virtually the same laws - but tweaked for each state's preferences. This fact is a great help as we seek to understand our roles as Unit Owners or Board members in an HOA.

Help....our condo board here in Pennsylvania schedules announced quarterly meetings however, this month they had two secret meetings to discuss condo issues. One secret, unannounced meeting produced a bill for $2200 to repair lawns that the builder should have fixed. One of the lawns belonged to a board member. 
 
On another occasion, secret meeetings were held to transition the complex from the builder to the association. When we asked how the transition was progressing...we were told it's done. We had passed a motion at an annual meeting to hire a lawyer to monitor the transition. The executive board felt it wasn't necessary. I asked a board member what he signed.......he wasn't sure. We have 45 units in our complex.

Advise them that board decisions made illegally may mean they are not covered by their D&O insurance. Notify the state agency which governs corporations, depending on the state, they may or may not take action. Otherwise bring it up in the annual meeting.

Thanks for the info. I'm sure there are instances where the board could meet for general discussion of an issue......is this legal? 
 
I feel that if they meet secretly to spend money, this is illegal. 
 
Can someone give me examples of what is legal?

You need to get on the board. Then you can have more input in the managment of the association.

You can't always get on the Board...I've noticed this is something that happens commonly. I sent our Board Members notice via certified return receipt that they have violated bylaws which in some cases is a violation of law. I have yet to receive any information. The only other alternate thing that you can do is contact a lawyer.

Just to give you an idea of how normal board meetings are set up; we hold 12 monthly meetings and two annual meetings. All meeting dates are provided to the homeowners months in advance. Our regular board meetings are on the 2nd Monday of each month and the annual meetings are in June and October so each homeowner can plan to attend or not. Homeowners are allowed to attend the monthly meetings but, if they want to discuss an issue with the board, they must ask for a 10 minute appointment. After the meeting is over the board goes into "executive session" to discuss bad debt. All homeowners are asked to leave at that point. Minutes of the meetings are published and provided by hard copy in the mail kiosks plus a pdf copy e-mailed to all homeowners. I would not trust a board that wants to hold secret meetings. They might have a case of "I volunteer so I own the place" syndrome. If you want to make sure they are abiding by the state and by-laws you need to dig in and do some homework. Do put them on notice, as suggested, because if they skirt the law then the board's liability insurance will not pay out in case there is fraud. If they are not aware of the seriousness of this circumstance then they need to retire and let someone else volunteer. Renee

When to try to sue the association be prepared to be virtually counter sued. You need several people to get on board with you. Your case had better be air tight because if you lose they will sue you for attorney fees.

you can take the assoc.to small claims court seeking equitable relief

In CT, small claims matters are restricted to litigants seeking monetary damages only (up to $5,000). So, in CT, this matter would not be allowed in small claims court. I do not know about small claims court jurisdictional rules in Iowa.

Dennis Gaggini, I feel your confusion! First, as to the lawn issue, I would opine that although the lawn may be in front of the board members units, the lawn probably is a "common element" that belongs to everyone. In a condo complex, there generally are "units," "limited common elements" and "common elements" and maybe "accessory structures."  
 
Regarding your question about what's legal and what isn't, the answers you seek are in the Declaration, Bylaws and Rules AND importantly, state condo law. Your job is to orgainize these docs and start to become familiar with them. Your job is to learn as much as you can about reading stuff written in legaleeze, so to speak. 
 
Now, from what you said, your association has transitioned out of "the period of declarant control" of the HOA. The declaration requires the period of declarant control and also requires the period of declarant control to end when certain criteria is met - like when a certain percent of units have been sold to homeowners by the declarant, or when a certain period time time has elapsed. The criteria is specified in the declaration. One key that everyone must know in order to understand their declaration is that once the period of declarant control ends, ALL references in the condo documents as to what's required, permitted or prohibited "during the period of declarant control" NO LONGER APPLIES. When I first got into my declaration, I saw an overwhelming amount of language pertaining to "the period of declarant control" and a lot of stuff about the powers of the declarant, and on and on. Again, none of these procedures, requirements, powers, etc. goes forward after the period of declarant control ends. I found it effective to simply cross out the sections and sentences in the declaration that dealt with "the period of declarant control."  
 
I suggest putting all the docs in a large 3 ring binder, separating the Declaration from the Bylaws from the Rules. I also suggest going onto your state's website to access the condominium laws. They should all be together in one "chapter" or however your state does it. Print out these laws and put them in the damn binder too, because state law ALWAYS trumps condo documents when there is a direct conflict between the provisions. For example, in my HOA, the declarant had inserted a provision in the original declaration that forever exempted the declarant from all the use, occupancy and alienation (sales/leasing)requirements in the declaration that were applicable to all other unit owners. UNLAWFUL! State law in CT clearly states that "the declaration may not limit the power of an association to deal with the declarant if the limit is more restrictive than the limit of the power of the association to deal with other persons." Sec 47-244(b)(1) Connecticut General Statutes. 
 
The declarant simply bamboozled everyone's thinking and unlawfully rented out detached garage units to non residents for years.  
 
HOA members and especially board members have a critical need to understand the basic legal framework and procedures of HOA docs and the state condo laws.

The dirty little secret about condo law is there aint no stinking law. Even thought there may be state statutes, your only legal remedy in most states is to sue, and the judges do not care to enforce these things. You are screwed.

You have to sue. Consult a lawyer. 
 
According to some state laws you can get a judges order and compensation for attorney fees from the condo. Whether they will comply is usually a black box.