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BOARD MEETINGS BEHIND CLOSED DOORS
By
Jan Bergemann
Published March 16, 2018
If the Moraitis’
ANTI-OWNER BILL HB 841 isn’t vetoed by Governor Rick Scott
there will be no more “Business in the Sunshine” in
Florida’s community associations. The wording of the bill (valid
for FS 718, FS 719 and FS 720) allows board members to do
business behind closed doors – by e-mail.
This is the wording
added to the BOARD MEETING provisions: “Members
of the board of administration may use e-mail as a means of
communication but may not cast a vote on an association matter
via e-mail.”
This wording allows board members to do their business by e-mail
– and since
an arbitration ruling stated that e-mails sent and received by
private computer are NOT public record owners will
never know what has been discussed among the board members.
Even if the wording
says that they “may" not cast a vote by e-mail, they can even
discuss to agree to vote “YEA” on a specific motion. The owners
present at the board meeting wouldn’t even know what the motion
is all about. Imagine a motion like: “Do we want to agree to
hire the contractor who submitted “Bid B”?” “Second?” “All in
favor: … !” AND THAT’S IT!
That would be legally ok according to the wording of the bill.
We made Moraitis
aware of this serious issue and offered a simple solution to fix
this problem, but – in his normal arrogant way – Moraitis
ignored these serious concerns. Moraitis is happy as long as he
can cater to special interest, ignoring the concerns of his
constituents.
This provision alone
– many more other serious issues are contained in the bill – is
reason enough for all homeowners and condo owners in Florida to
ask Governor Scott to veto the bill.
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Jan Bergemann is president of Cyber Citizens For Justice,
Florida
's largest state-wide property owners' advocacy group.
CCFJ works on legislation to help owners living in
community
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associations. He moved to
Florida
in 1995 - hoping to retire. He moved into a HOA, where the
developer cheated the homeowners and used the association dues
for his own purposes. End of retirement!
CCFJ was born in the year 2000, when some owners met in
Tallahassee
- finding out that power is only in numbers. Bergemann was a
member of Governor Jeb Bush's HOA Task force in 2003/2004.
The organization has two websites to inform interested
Florida
homeowners and condo owners:
News Website: http://www.ccfj.net/.
Educational Website: http://www.ccfjfoundation.net/.
We think that only owners can really represent owners, since all
service providers surely have a different interest! We are
trying to create owner-friendly laws, but the best laws are
useless without enforcement. And enforcement is totally lacking
in
Florida
!
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