Are HOA Homeowners Who Are Not on the Board Entitled to Board Information About Rules

[Alaruk]

Actually, I have quite a few thought I will share on the subject.

OK, so the cut off time to be out of the pool is 10 PM, but the board has unofficially exercised their discretionarry decision making authority not to take enforcement action against folks in most cases unless they are there past 11 PM. Why do you suppose that is? I’m going to suggest it is because of folks who see things in black and white, want to dissect each rule and bend and twist them to their advantage. Let’s take a look at the difficulties of enforcing a simple 10 PM pool curfew rule.

10 PM as defined by whose clock? The phone company’s time? The big clock in the town square? The National Institute of Standards and Time that broadcasts the time by radio from Fort Collins, Colorado? The wristwatch that you are wearing. Which will be the standard for the 10 PM pool curfew? I have multiple clocks in my home, few of which agree with each other as to what the current time is. One is eight minutes fast, the other is five hours slow and I stopped paying attention to it years ago. What if the time you as a pool goer go by is in conflict with the time the HOA uses? Who prevails?

Next, because there is likely to be a conflict between time keeping devices, how many minutes should someone be over before enforcement action is initiated? One minute? Two? Three? What if the overage is the result of a good faith mistake due to a conflict with their time keeping device? How do you differentiate between a good faith mistake versus someone who is intentionally violating the rule to take advantage of Board’s discretionary enforcement policy?

So, by not enforcing until the violator has been there for more than an hour past the cutoff, there is no doubt that a violation has occurred. It is clear that action against the HOA member is not petty or capricious, but has been taken for a clear cut violation of the rules.

Such a discretionary enforcement policy is generally not written or publicized because it is just that - discretionary. Were it a codified rule, then 11 PM would be the cut off for pool use instead of 10 PM, and we would be back to the same questions – 11 PM as defined by whose clock? How many minutes must one be there past 11 PM before enforcement action is taken, etc. ?

If 10 PM is the cutoff and they don't hammer you if you are a bit late getting out of the pool, consider that you've got a pretty good board. If you don't like it, vote in a new board that does things how you want them. We just did that where I'm at and everyone is now happy.

A simple resolution would to make the official hours until 10PM and post the fine or punishment schedule. E.g. After 11PM is an automatic assessment, but between 10PM and 11PM is akin to an infraction, such that if you accumulate more than a given posted amount in a given posted time period, it will count as an automatic assessment. If people continue to nitpick after that, then one could be assessed points based on how many minutes after 10PM they were using the pool. These solutions are far more fair and equitable than to allow the board to be privileged to information about enforcement of rules which the body of homeowners is denied access to.

"Acceptable" to whom? The word "acceptable" implies a subjective evaluation that may be different from individual to individual. If you're asking whether some law in California requires that the board of an HOA tell all of the members that it won't strictly enforce a particular rule, the answer is that no such law exists.




Again, no law covers this sort of thing.




No.




I don't see the point of creating a hypothetical by-law. If you're a member or board member of an HOA and you want to see the by-laws amended in some way, I suggest you confer with a local attorney.




I have lots of them, including that HOAs suck.



I can't speak for "PayrolGuy," whom I believe is not an attorney, and I'm not sure if he's in CA, but I can assure you that what "PayrolGuy" wrote is legally correct.




It is certainly true (and well-known to any adult who isn't completely naive) that people in positions of power/authority sometimes abuse the power they have.




Sure it does. If you want written confirmation, ask for it. If you don't get it, then you can, at the very least, send an email that says, "Hey Bob, I'm writing to confirm our discussion today in which you said, 'blah, blah.' Please let me know if you don't believe this accurately reflects what we discussed. Thanks."

So let's say they tell you verbally that the hours are actually until 11PM, and you ask until what date is that in effect, and they say it is up to the board's discretion. Then what good would it do to send them this confirmation notice? They could change the rules 5 seconds after you get off the phone with them. If they wouldn't give you a date that it is in effect to, how would you handle that?

[L-1]

A simple resolution would to make the official hours until 10PM and post the fine or punishment schedule. E.g. After 11PM is an automatic assessment, but between 10PM and 11PM is akin to an infraction, such that if you accumulate more than a given posted amount in a given posted time period, it will count as an automatic assessment. If people continue to nitpick after that, then one could be assessed points based on how many minutes after 10PM they were using the pool. These solutions are far more fair and equitable than to allow the board to be privileged to information about enforcement of rules which the body of homeowners is denied access to.

You are absolutely right, that would be a simple solution. And if you ask another homeowner, I bet they would give a completely different "simple solution" that is totally in conflict with yours. And if you ask yet another homeowner, you would get a third solution that might be in conflict with the first two. Wash, rinse, repeat.

That's why homeowners elect HOA Board members, to whom they delegate the authority to make these decisions on behalf of the collective.

Again, if you feel so strongly that this is wrong, throw the rascals out. Elect a slate of Board Members who are more attuned to your thinking. Recently our community center needed rebuilding after 50 years and our Board wanted to assess each homeowner $22,000 for the cost of building their Taj Mahal design. We (the homeowners) voted them out and put in our own board that came up with a more reasonable and less costly design and assessment.

But if you are just a voice of one, you will only be shouting into the wind.

I served on our Board 25 years ago and couldn't wait to get off. I was constantly fielding phone calls from 82 households, all insisting I vote to do things their way and telling me I was a bad person if I didn't do what they wanted. None of them ever stopped to consider that the things each of them wanted were often in conflict with what what others wanted, and no matter what I did or how I voted, it was going to piss off half the community who wanted something else. Our current Board President has been feeling the heat and has repeatedly stated at Board meetings that if anyone wants his job as President he will gladly step down. So far, there have been no takers.

[budwad]

A simple resolution would to make the official hours until 10PM and post the fine or punishment schedule. E.g. After 11PM is an automatic assessment, but between 10PM and 11PM is akin to an infraction, such that if you accumulate more than a given posted amount in a given posted time period, it will count as an automatic assessment. If people continue to nitpick after that, then one could be assessed points based on how many minutes after 10PM they were using the pool. These solutions are far more fair and equitable than to allow the board to be privileged to information about enforcement of rules which the body of homeowners is denied access to.

I really don't get your problem. You should run for the Board if you want to have a say in what the HOA does. But it seems to me that you don't like rules unless they are your rules.

The pool closes at 10:00PM. That is simple enough. Get out of the pool by 10:00PM. If you are a few minutes late, nobody cares. But if you abuse the leniency and think you can swim until you are ready to leave after 10:00 or up to 11:00, you should be assessed a fine. You know what the rule is and you do know how to tell time right?

[Alaruk]

I really don't get your problem. You should run for the Board if you want to have a say in what the HOA does.

In our community, one can't simply volunteer to be on the board. During a conversation I had with the association manager a few years ago, he suggested I join the board. So I offered to do so, be he said I couldn't.

But it seems to me that you don't like rules unless they are your rules.

That is a red herring at its finest. This isn't about whether or not I like the 10:00 PM closure time of the swimming pool (at least in the example provided). It is about board members being informed what the rules REALLY are, while the body of homeowners isn't. IMO, that is not fair.

The pool closes at 10:00PM. That is simple enough. Get out of the pool by 10:00PM. If you are a few minutes late, nobody cares.

And if I am a board member, I secretly know anyone can use it up until 11:00 without repercussions.

But if you abuse the leniency and think you can swim until you are ready to leave after 10:00 or up to 11:00, you should be assessed a fine. You know what the rule is and you do know how to tell time right?

In the original example, I only know what the posted rule is. I don't know the real rule.

[Taxing Matters]

In our community, one can't simply volunteer to be on the board. During a conversation I had with the association manager a few years ago, he suggested I join the board. So I offered to do so, be he said I couldn't.

In pretty much every HOA the way you get on the board is by winning an election for a board seat when elections are held for that. So yes, you don't typically get on the board by simply saying to someone "I want on the board". Simply volunteering isn't enough. You need to convince other HOA members to vote for you to get the largely thankless job of being on the board.

It is about board members being informed what the rules REALLY are, while the body of homeowners isn't. IMO, that is not fair.

While I understand your position, what the board is doing is not unusual or even necessarily unfair. Pretty much every organization that has some kind of enforcement power makes decisions about how strictly to enforce the rules. We see that all the time. A police department may have a position that speeding tickets will only be given out if the driver is exceeding the speed limit by at least 5 mph. Of course the police do not tell the public what the exact enforcement rule is for the reason that if they'll simply encourage everyone to start going 5 mph faster because drivers will then know they'll never get ticketed for that bit of speeding. That defeats the purpose of the policy.

In any event, since you don't like the policy the HOA is using, your recourse is to convince a majority of the board to change how the board conducts business. Getting yourself and others who feel the same way elected is one way to do that. Another is simply lobbying the current board members to change how they do business.