Legislature Upholds Gibbons' HOA Veto - Las Vegas News Story - KVVU Las Vegas: "The bill would have limited the associations' ability to fine homeowners, or ban certain energy-efficiency additions such as solar panels. It also created new rules for elections and safeguards against financial abuse by managers."
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Governor Gibbons said the bill would increase assessments and lead to changes in common areas without homeowner participation. I think others see the matter differently.
9 comments:
Of course the bill also prohibited associations from imposing and enforcing traffic rules on private roads, limited their ability to adequately reserve for future capital expenses, permitted individual homeowners to make "improvements" to common elements, like roofs, without seeking approval, and directing editorial decisions in association publications.
Unfortunately, this is what happens when you take more than a dozen community association bills and throw them together on the last day of a legislative session into an omnibus bill, then don't discuss or deliberate them, and pass the whole ugly mess in the last hour.
Sure there were some good ideas in the bill, in fact some of the items were things that CAI and other groups had actively supported and advocated. Sadly, they were overshadowed by some of the more damaging provisions.
Thanks for the info, Tom. I lost my earlier attempt to respond to this, but I was trying to say that all these state legislatures seem to do things differently. In CA they do the CLRC huge complicated bill that beats a particular subject absolutely to death with detail (elections, ARC, etc.). In Florida they have these task forces generating HOA or condo leg separately. In AZ they run about 25 tiny bills every year. Now in NV you say they jammed a host of bills together at the last minute, good ones and bad, and the governor vetoed the whole thing.
Last year the Virginia legislature passed a massive rewrite of the VA Property Owners Association Act, leaving individual owners a lot worse off than they were before. It requires managers to be licensed and it actually names CAI as one of the organizations that would provide the training and continuing education. Managers would be required to hold CCAMS, DCAMS and PCAMS, CAI designations that coincidentally would require CAI membership.
The very same people who, year after year have testified that associations are working brilliantly and do not need any form of adult supervision, now wanted a "Common Interest Community Board" This board is empowered to adopt rules and oversee HOAs. The final number for this panel of overseers was 11 people, 8 of whom are industry. The original requirement was that one of the 3 citizen members has to serve on an HOA board or HAVE served on a board. There was NO requirement for anyone to actually LIVE in one of these contraptions. The excuse? "Well, we need flexibility and it is hard to find people who actually LIVE in these things." In a state that boasts over 9000 associations, with huge ones, like Reston with 10's of thousands of "units", Fairfax County and all the other Virginia jurisdictions with HOA mandates (the estimate is that over 90% of all housing in Fairfax is in an HOA - that ratio could be higher in some of the outlying areas like Loudoun, Prince William, Stafford, etc.) that excuse does not pass the smell test.
HB 516 grew to a whopping 98 pages long, was tweaked and "enhanced" between every reading it had. It was also written by the lobbyists for the Virginia Association of Realtors, CAI and the Virginia Association of Community Managers, you know, the CCAMS, DCAMs and PCAMs.
Sadly CAI did not object to THAT HUGE bill. They WROTE it.
Evan: No problem. Here is the most interesting tidbit. The bill originally passed via voice vote in the assembly with only two nays. The governor then vetoed what seemed in the moment to be a wildly popular notion and caught a fair portion of heat for doing so. And yet when they returned to session the Nevada assembly voted 0-42 to override the veto.
Guess the entire legislature had a profound change of heart in the intervening months regarding governance in HOA's. Or perhaps recognized that throwing everything up against the wall at the last moment to see what sticks was not the best path to effective legislation for the citizens of Nevada.
As I said before. We supported a number of the provisions of this bill, but because of the process and the inclusion of some very detrimental things we just couldn't support it and actively worked to obtain the veto and sustain it.
And I just have to make a couple of points re: Shu's comment above. She has a strong personality and passion for these issues, but has a tendancy to state things as unassailable facts even when they are 100% wrong.
First. Individuals do not have to be members of CAI to hold our designations. This is true of almost all c(6) organizations that provide training and designations per federal rules. Sure they can be members, but we don't require it and can not and would not deny someone the opportunity to participate in education programs and achieve a designation regardless of their membership status.
Second. CAI has consistently supported the development of relevant community manager licensing in our public policies and legislative advocacy around the country. In fact we are actively supporting bills this spring in a number of states including IL, NC, and SC.
Third. Virginia's CICB board is the commonwealth's governmental entity empowered to set standards and determine licensing requirements for community managers and management companies. That is their primary purpose, not to provide oversight to or of community associations themselves. In fact, Shu was one of only 2 or 3 people to speak against licensing, bonding requirements, and higher standards for managers and management companies, and the resulting enhanced consumer protection for associations and their homeowners in Virgina.
Cheers,
Tom
There's no problem with CAI training managers for licensing purposes. That's what they do for their own certification program anyway. There should be several organizations offering training and people can choose from among them. If owners could get better organized they could get certified to teach managers from their perspective. But there's no way to cut CAI out of the manager training loop. We would end up with managers having little or no training at all.
I could copy and paste the bill in its entirety right here but I won"t do that. This link will take you to it Read it for yourselves.
http://www.richmondsunlight.com/bill/2008/hb516/fulltext/
� 54.1-2348. Common Interest Community Board; membership; meetings; quorum.
This chapter establishes the board which is made up of:
3 managers
1 HOA attorney
1 HOA CPA
1 Time-share industry member
and three shall be Virginia citizens, one of whom serves or who has served on the governing board of an association and two of whom reside or have resided in a common interest community.
I think they added 2 developers to this board made up primarily of industry members.
The following chapters make for interesting reading as well.
� 54.1-2349. Powers and duties of the Board.
� 54.1-2353. Protection of the interests of associations; appointment of receiver for common interest community manager.
And towards the end the bill states its purpose.
"The purpose of this chapter is to protect the interests of associations adversely affected by common interest community managers who have breached their fiduciary duty."
This bill, we were told, was in response to the Koger embezzlement of $3 Million of the HOMEOWNERS"s money. All of a sudden, after years of swearing that adult supervision was not necessary as "nothing bad ever happened in virginia associations" we discovered that, in fact, we did need the oversight. Lucky us, the Governor picked 9 or 11 names randomly out of a hat and just managed to appoint a gaggle of "community association experts" to "protect the interests of associations adversely affected by common interest community managers who have breached their fiduciary duty."
Sorry, but you can't have it both ways Shu. If, as you demeaningly put it, the industry requires "adult supervision" then why in the world did you of all people oppose this bill that provides some level of supervision. Particularly since you have been fighting for just that for years.
The reality is that the licensing and bonding provisions of the bill will provide enhanced protection for association assets, and while you can never prevent every case of abuse, you can, and this law will, reduce the financial and operational risk to the association and its owners. Is it a perfect solution? No of course not. And I am sure we will see continued regulatory and legislative updates over time - that's just the way the system works.
And let's be clear on licensing. CAI has a long-standing public position in support of manager training and licensing. And where it appears it can be successful we pursue it.
Let me also deal with one other canard. The reality is that CAI has never claimed that there are not problems in associations or with boards. For you to state otherwise is knowingly false, as you and I have had this conversation personally. There is no such thing as perfection in a population of 300,000 communities, 1.5 million volunteers, and 60 million residents and anyone with any common sense understands that.
The difference is one of degree. We believe the vast majority of associations function well and the vast majority of the 60 million people living in associations are satisfied, and we actually have some independently collect4ed and statistically valid data to back up that claim. I am not sure what you believe, but from where I sit it certainly looks like you think that all associations and all boards are guilty until proven innocent and no one has ever been proven innocent to your satisfaction.
Tom, my turn to clarify a couple of things. First of all, no I do not believe that every association is bad, but they are all just one election away from turning that way. Of course that doesn't mean they all will but they have ALL been given enormous powers over the years with no real oversight. And by that I mean, objective, independent, unbiased oversight.
I believe that a government's function is to protect the citizens and as we all pay taxes, part of which is for police protection, the real government should be providing that protection. Why is stealing a $100 from a 7-11 or a local bank a crime but embezzling millions of dollars from HOAs a civil matter? And if you are a manager serving on this panel and a homeowner who has earned a reputation of being difficult files a complaint against a very close personal friend of yours, how objective can you be? I think there is a natural tendency to blame the homeowner for not taking NO for an answer and insisting on seeing ALL the financial statements of the association going back a number of years to discover the discrepancies. I can tell you that I would not want to be in that position.
Isn't it ironic that a manager walking around the neighborhood, clipboard in hand, looking for covenant violations, like a chubby dog, a garage door open too long, a child's tricycle left in the front of the house, an unapproved garden hose is perfectly normal? After all homeowners really don't know how to take care of their property and need to be fined for breaking stupid rules but unbiased object oversight of people who have unfettered access to millions of dollars of homeowner money is demeaning? You are right, Tom, it really is a matter of degrees.
In an earlier post you said:
'And I just have to make a couple of points re: Shu's comment above. She has a strong personality and passion for these issues, but has a tendancy to state things as unassailable facts even when they are 100% wrong.
First. Individuals do not have to be members of CAI to hold our designations. This is true of almost all c(6) organizations that provide training and designations per federal rules. Sure they can be members, but we don't require it and can not and would not deny someone the opportunity to participate in education programs and achieve a designation regardless of their membership status."
I suggest you read CAI's own Code of Ethics, page 11 sections 4 and 5. (emphasis mine)
4. Violations of CAI membership requirements
PCAM, AMS, AAMC and RS members are required to hold membership in CAI. If membership in CAI lapses, the Designation(s) will be automatically revoked if, after three attempts (including one notification sent by certified mail) the Designee does not rejoin paying all applicable dues.
As a CAI member, all Designees are obligated to keep CAI member address records current. Al notices will be sent to the current address listed in the CAI database.
5. Non-Payment of PCAM, AMS, AAMC or RS fees
In the event that a Designee has not made timely payments of PCAM, AMS, AAMC, OR RS fees after two billings:
a. The CAI Chief Executive Officer or his or her Designee shall send a certified letter advising the Designee that continued non-payments of fees will result in the suspension of the designation.
b. If payment is not received by CAI within thirty (30) days after the warning letter was issued; the Designation shall be suspended automatically. Notice of such suspension shall be provided to the Designee, the Chairperson of the Credentials Policy Committee.
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I did not make this up, the CAI membership requirement is in your own Code of Ethics. Not only is membership required but non payment of membership is grounds for being stripped of the designation.
CAI "ethics"?
What was CAI's response to the Koger embezzlement?
HOAs have no business enforcing traffic regulations. That's a governmental function and HOAs aren't governments, right? So having an HOA enforce traffic regulations is like having a private person bullying the neighborhood.
As far as Skiba's representations that the "vast majority of HOAs function well" - the only thing they function well at is bilking homeowners for the benefit of the HOA vendors.
Similarly, Skiba's representations that it is only a question of "degree" is a bit misleading. CAI constantly proclaims that it is only a few disgruntled residents causing problems instead of admitting the problems are actually the norm. Moreover, many of the problems are a direct reflection of standard operating procedures of CAI vendors. One only needs to look at CAI's Public Policies and then watch their practices to understand what a facade the organization is.
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