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ENFORCERS FOR THE PRESIDENT?
By
Jan Bergemann
Published November 20, 2015
I am getting more and more complaints from members of community
associations regarding boards hiring off-duty police officers as
their personal enforcers against owners who don’t agree with the
actions of the board.
Many police officers that are hired “to keep the peace” at these
meetings have not the faintest idea about the rights of the
members allowing them to speak at these meetings. Many of these
police officers think that they are getting paid as the personal
bodyguards of the president and jump into action – threatening
or even escorting members out of the meeting room who did
nothing else but speak for the three minutes on agenda items as
allowed by the statutes.
Many of these police officers act like bull-dogs going after
owners if the president says so – right or wrong.
First of all: These police officers have to understand that they
are not paid by the board, but by the association members, no
matter on which side of the board table they are sitting.
Second: A police officer who wants to make some money on the
side by “keeping the peace” at meetings should undergo a
trainings session to learn how such meetings should be conducted
and what rights board members and owners really have in order to
avoid taking wrong actions or going after the wrong person.
If it is really necessary to spend good association money on
hiring police officers to oversee the meetings – and the
behavior of the owners present – it should be done right.
Owners shouldn’t pay for the personal bodyguards of board
members, hired to intimidate owners whose opinions differ from
that of the board. Never forget: Bullies are never interested in
“KEEPING THE PEACE.”
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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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