Thank you Dennis. This is what I have told the board of directors and the property management company, but you know what they are like. Very uninformed.
Thx again
Bente

Bente

The specific statute relative to liens for Condominiums is ARS 33-1256. And you are correct while the association has a statutory lien for assessment and does not require a judgement or to record that lien with the county, it must seek first a judgement and then record that lien for any fines, penalties or anything else that is not assessment based.

Short term rentals are a very large hot button in all these communities especially since a law passed in 2017 preventing any municipality to regulate or prohibit those rentals.

Dennis

Thank you once again for your prompt response. I support your efforts.

Kristi;

Unfortunately no. That process is only allowed to address alleged violation of the governing documents or the relevant state statutes.

It is understood that the association is responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of the common property but most governing documents do not mandate that responsibility or provide any details on what specifically is required to satisfy that responsibility. Remember all of these governing documents were written by attorneys to protect the interest of the developer and the association board as his successor. Everything is in generalities relative to the board but get much more specific when dealing on restriction of what any homeowner can do.
whether you attend board meeting or not has nothing to do with your rights as a homeowner and what you pay for every month in assessments. But to some extent if you want something to change than you need to get involved and go to board meeting and insist that the association live up to its fiduciary duty to the community and address all the common property that you described. Never ever do this alone. You will be simply categorized as a disgruntled individual and ignored or retaliated against. get a group of at least 5 other homeowners with the same concern as you have and go to a board meeting and ask that they deal with the issue, but if they do not then get a larger group together at the next board meeting and demand that they do something, or you will organize a petition to remove all of them from office and replace them that will actually do their job.

In these communities what you do not know will hurt you and what you do not try and fix will never get fixed on it own. If people want change they must become the catalyst for that change.

Dennis

Thank you for you quick response. You have relieved my fears. The homeowners are allowed to audio/video record the meetings. Further, how long after the meeting is the BOD required to provide at least a draft of the meeting minutes?

Art;
All planned communities and condominium are subject to the respective open meeting laws of ARS Title 33 chapters 16 and 9 respectfully. If you are a HOA you are a planned community. The definition of planned community was changed I believe totally inappropriately to exempt Sun Cities Recreation Centers for liability for violating the law for 25 years. My greatest fear in the language chosen for that bill by SCRC attorneys would open the door for other communities to claim that they are not subject to the planned community statutes. If they are not claiming to be exempt from the planned community act then they are without question subject to the open meeting laws.

In that law we guarantee the right for homeowners to either audiotape or videotape the meetings of the board or members. The board can deny that right only if they records the meeting for the entire community to use. They must provide an unedited viable recording available to any homeowner upon request.

What it sounds like in your situation is that the board is recording the meeting only to assist in the creation of the minutes. This is both legal and appropriate. The minutes of the meeting are the official record for the association and not the recording tool that help develop those minutes.

In this case why the association is recording the meeting is the key issue. Now you have not mentioned anything about whether the board is allowing homeowners to record the meeting. If they are not than this is an entirely different scenario. If they are denying you the ability to record the meetings because they are recording it for everyone, then deleting the recording would be illegal and inappropriate.

Dennis

Hey Dennis,
Thanks again for responding.

The board did preclude me from recording and had their own camera. When asked how we could view the recording they made they told us we could go to the clubhouse and watch it on a computer. They will not provide a thumb drive or any other means for anyone else to watch it – members will have to go with a board member and watch it.

Dave

There will always be HOAs that are worse. All are dependent on the character of the people on the Board. Imho and experience it is a myth that people do NOT wan to serve on the board. All I see is people clamoring to get on the board and those are the tyrant types. It’s important to push back on these people as soon as possible. The saddest part about the Arizona Dept of Real Estate and Office of Administration Hearings is that they don’t seem to be able to do much to help w/CC&Rs as those are left to be interpreted by the tyrants however they want. That’s exactly where we need to get control. the abuse comes from loose language in CC&Rs.

Dave;
I’m not an attorney and connote provide legal advice. I put that language into law and we were very careful about how we structured that language. The statement uses “audio or video recording” throughout and as such if the association audio records the meeting they can preclude anyone else from audio recording the meeting. But that would not preclude anyone from video recording a meeting. Conversely if the association video records a meeting that would preclude members from both audio and video recording the meeting because the video recording also includes audio recording.
Your point about trust is very important. I have had one community preclude its members from video recording because it was providing that service, then failed to produce a recording because the equipment failed in one case and the recorder was never turned on in the other. This is no longer hypothetical it really happened. By assuming the responsibility of video recording and denying anyone else’s right to record the meeting, the association also assumed the responsibility of actually producing the legible recording, the association in my opinion violated the law and could be held accountable to that act.

The bottom line here is that we are a single party state and anyone can record anyone else without their permission. While everyone hates to be recorded, in many cases it is the only way to curtail the verbal abuse and issues that arise at these meeting by either the boards or the members.

The purpose of this law is simply transparency. Just know that what you say or do either as a board member or homeowner at a meeting can and will be used against you if you violate the law. It can also exonerate you if you are accused of saying or doing something that was not true.

Litigation was not my primary purpose in drafting this language, it was to provide a mechanism to share the meeting with those that were not in attendance. With this tool homeowners whose busy schedule, or small children, or physical health issues that prevents them from attending the meeting in person, can view the meeting for themselves at their convenience and see what is going on in their communities.

Thanks
Dennis

Hi Dennis,
Thanks for your quick reply. What if the HOA decides to audio record only. Does that preclude us from using a video camera?

Our HOA is very secretive and deceptive and they do not want any (correct) record of their actions. One board member resigned last year and in his resignation he stated the reason was that the meetings were being recorded and he was “afraid” that the recording(s) would be used in a lawsuit.

The homeowners want the recordings, especially video recordings.

We suspect that, if the BOD decides to do their own recordings, the recordings will somehow become “unusable” and/or we’ll have to fight to have them available.

Thanks,
Dave