Counselor 52's Updates
As a "Truth Seeker," and due to the ever changing rules, regulations, codes, statutes, ordinances and most important "Laws" both federal and state, it has become nearly a full time endeavor to research this type of subject matter. Because of this I have created this "UPDATES" page in order to as it states, update various information as they become available.
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 12, 1999; Page B09
Homeowner associations in Virginia will be required to open their financial records and provide other information to their members under a new law portrayed by promoters as a residents' "bill of rights."
The state law, which takes effect July 1, guarantees that members of homeowner associations can review a board's plans for spending their dues money before those expenditures are made. It also requires the associations to give advance notice of meetings and to let members record them on audiotape.
"It's an outstanding piece of legislation, and I think it will go a long way towards ensuring that homeowners in associations have access to the material that the board is considering," said Stephen Frazier, a homeowner on the board of the Cascades Community Association, the largest in Loudoun County, with 10,000 members.
The legislation was signed last week by Gov. James S. Gilmore III (R). It was sponsored by Sen. William C. Mims (R-Loudoun) after complaints from association members that they didn't know how their dues money was being spent. Residents also have complained about association boards not letting them know about meetings and withholding financial records.
"These are the same rights that a resident of a city or town already has, and the bill reflects the fact that large homeowner associations function almost as town governments," said Mims, who lives in the Countryside community in Loudoun.
Under the new law, associations are required to send notice of regular board meetings and, when reasonable, of special meetings to homeowners who send a written request. The request is good for a year.
The law also requires that agendas be made available in advance, so homeowners can find out, for example, when the board is considering signing a new mulching contract or buying a lawn mower.
A law guaranteeing similar rights for members of homeowners associations in Maryland went into effect in October. Critics of the new Virginia law argue that it goes too far and could become a financial burden. The funds to mail or deliver notices of meetings may be hard to come by, and a smaller association may not have an office in which to let residents view records, critics said.
"The underlying concept of this bill is that we have to treat boards of directors as if they are a governmental entity like the Fairfax Board of Supervisors," said Robert M. Diamond, a lawyer with the Northern Virginia firm of Hazel & Thomas and former president of the Community Associations Institute, a nonprofit association for 205,000 community associations nationally. "I disagree with the concept absolutely."
The bill went through several changes before it was signed. Early drafts would have prohibited board members from conducting any official business by e-mail or over the telephone. The provision was removed after some legislators said that it was impractical because board members are unpaid volunteers who sometimes need to do business on the fly.
Mims did not want boards to conduct any balloting in secret, including the election of board officers. He said he agreed to allow secret voting for electing board officers after discussing the issue with Pia Trigiani, a lawyer who advised the Community Associations Institute. Trigiani said she wanted to "avoid bruised feelings" among board members. Homeowner associations vary widely in size, from giants such as Reston, with 58,000 residents and 80 full-time employees, to groups such as Spring Lake Farms in Stafford County, with 130 homes and no central office. When board members there want to meet, Jonathan Glick said, "we just call one another."
Lawyers active in homeowner associations said that the disparity in size makes it difficult to come up with one-size-fits-all legislation. "What's happening is a reaction in some respects to badly run communities," Trigiani said.
Some homeowners said that the open government law is academic for good associations, which always have operated in the sunshine. "I think it's the way homeowner associations should operate," said David Haas, president of the Reston Association.
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