Getting Board Meetings In Order Eight Tips Before The Balcony Inspection Deadline

Unruly board meetings may be the most discouraging part of HOA living. Mature homeowners avoid such meetings, managers fear such meetings, and directors cannot even discuss the agenda without interruptions. When normal manners and courtesies are abandoned, meetings end in frustration. Directors are discouraged that they cannot deliberate (consequently tempted to do so instead in closed session), and observers are discouraged not only from attending meetings, let alone volunteering. Here are eight tips to improve board meetings.

Meeting room setup. Avoid setting up the board table so that all directors sit facing the audience and not each other. That sends two bad messages at once - that the board is talking to the audience but not each other. Adjust tables so directors can better face each other, in a “C” shape with the open end facing the audience.

Disorderly open forum. Directors should not talk during open forum. If a director interrupts someone’s open forum remarks, it can seem fair to that person that they can interrupt board deliberations. Directors and managers should listen attentively to open forum remarks and save any responses to questions or comments until open forum ends. If the board desires further member input on an issue during the meeting, the board can re-open open forum on that issue.

Stay on target. Non-urgent matters can only be discussed after posting them on the agenda four days before the meeting. Directors need to be disciplined and focus on the agenda instead of topics that come to mind. When the discussion strays off topic, the chair or any director should politely object and request a return to the motion at hand. Avoid discussing a new motion until the pending motion is resolved.

Avoid lengthy meetings. Overly long meetings lead to tired and cranky attendees. Energy and focus both decrease as the length increases, raising the chances of unfocused discussions and poor decisions. Avoid overly ambitious agendas and insist that directors read all meeting materials in advance. Limit repetitive and excessive argumentation by moving to close debate and vote when everyone’s position has become clear.

Don’t ignore disruption. Some owners or directors cannot control themselves and continually talk over others, interrupt, or otherwise interject themselves in a disruptive way into meetings. Support your chair’s reasonable judgment in reining in misbehavior. There are many possible measures including warning the violator, asking for a vote to censure, or even ejecting the disruptive participant.

Allow disagreement. Build an environment in which disagreement is not viewed as disloyalty. There is nothing wrong with a “nay” vote if one believes that vote is in the association’s best interests. There is also nothing wrong with a 3 to 2 vote, which is just as binding as a unanimous 5 to 0 vote. Pressure to achieve unanimity increases the likelihood of tension as dissenters feel that pressure and the majority feels frustrated because they cannot get consensus. So, debates run too long, or tempers get short… or both.

Meeting rules and Code of Conduct. All but the smallest associations should have meeting and board conduct rules, describing meeting procedures but also establishing standards of conduct which are expected from directors and audience.

CAI. The Community Associations Institute has helpful education and publications regarding positive association governance. Find your local chapter at www.CAIonline.org.

On June 16, 2015, a fifth-floor balcony at a Berkely apartment building collapsed, killing seven people, allegedly due to weakening by severe dry rot. Three years later, the state of California adopted Senate Bill 721, requiring owners of multi-unit residential buildings to obtain architect or structural engineerinspections of above-ground “exterior elevated elements” by 2025 and every six years thereafter. The passage of SB 326 in 2019 imposed essentially the same requirements on HOAs with a deadline of 2025 except with a repetition requirement of every nine years instead of six. The new law is found in the Davis-Stirling Act at Civil Code Section 5551.

Unfortunately, many contracts presented to HOAs reflect misunderstandings of the statute’s requirements and propose more work (and expense) than required by the law. Here are 8 tips to help understand your HOA’s inspection contract to ensure your HOA is not paying for unnecessary costs.

1 The statute applies only to areas under HOA responsibility for maintenance or repair (5551((b)(1). If it’s not the HOA’s responsibility, it does not fall under the inspection requirement. Many planned developments do not fall under the requirement, since they typically do not maintain or repair residence balconies, elevated walkways, or stairs. Some townhouse style (side-to-side residences, no stacked homes) condominium associations are amending their CC&Rs to shift maintenance of second-floor balconies to the individual unit owners; thereby, taking the HOA out of the inspection requirement for those balconies.

2 The statute does not apply to all elevated elements but only to load-bearing components supported wholly or partly by wood or wood-based products (5551(a)(3)). Make sure that your HOA is not paying to inspect steel elements.

3 An “exterior elevated element” is a component extending beyond the exterior building walls that has a walking surface over six feet above ground level. A deck on top of the building, garage, or part of the main residence may be excluded, as only parts extending beyond the exterior building walls are include per 5551(a)(3). Many associations have balcony patios that are partially within the main structure of the building or walkways, which are part of the main building structure, or other areas that do not protrude from the main building.

4. The statute requires inspecting enough locations to provide a 95% level of confidence that the sample represents the entire building. Some contracts propose to inspect 95% of the locations in a building, which in medium or larger sized buildings may be overkill. The statute doesn’t say how to achieve the 95% level of confidence — it might be the judgment and experience of the inspecting architect or engineer, or perhaps a formal statistical sampling calculation from a website such as www.calculator.net. The more locations in the HOA, the less percentage of the locations need to be inspected to gain a statistically valid sampling.

5 The required inspection is visual, not destructive, per 5551(a)(5). Inspectors need not tear open balconies or stairways (destructive inspection). Using moisture meters, infrared sensors, or boroscopes will satisfy the law.

6. When choosing the architect or engineer, consider contracting for only the inspection. Be wary of companies proposing to inspect and then design and perform the work all in one contract.

7 Don’t wait until the last quarter of 2024 to pursue this inspection.