A Brief History of the Edgewater’s Document Rewrite

OR

How the Democratic Process and Vigilant Owners Ensured Owners to Retain Many of Their Rights

OR

How the Board was slowly forced against their willto include the protections a majority of Owners petitioned for about a year ago.



September 2012: Board proposes New Documents that would for the first time:

  1. Allow the Board to rewrite Bylaws without Owner Vote

  2. Allow the Board to rewrite Rules without Owner Vote

  3. Allow the Board to spend any amount of money without Owner Vote (previously vote required for >$10,000)

  4. Allow the Board at its discretion to fine Owners $50 a day for “violations”

  5. Allow the Board to at its discretion, demand 12 months condo fees (and foreclose) and to ban Owner from beach/parking lot if Owner late with one payment

  6. Makes Privacy Yards regular common elements, no longer for exclusive use of Owner

  7. Requires garage Owners to park a car in their garage each night

  8. Requires annual chimney cleaning whether fireplace used or not

  9. [Places Edgewater in Derby and multiple other problems with Documents: no late fees, etc.]


October 2012: In Owner Meeting with Board and Attorney nearly all of the above was objected to.


November 2012: In petition to Board and Attorney, over half Owners say they will not approve Documents with above provisions (and requires limiting fines to $25 per week with maximum of $400 per year).


February 2013: Board proposes Second Draft that makes less than half the fixes and gives Owners only about half the rights that a majority petitioned for. The proposed Documents would still for the first time:

  1. Allow the Board to rewrite Rules without Owner Vote

  2. Allow the Board to spend any amount of money without Owner Vote (previously vote required for >$10,000)

  3. Allow the Board at its discretion to fine Owners $25 a day for “violations”

  4. Makes Privacy Yards regular common elements, no longer for exclusive use of Owner

  5. Requires garage Owners to park a car in their garage each night

  6. Requires annual chimney cleaning whether fireplace used or not

  7. [Places Edgewater in Derby and multiple other problems with Documents: no late fees, etc.]

The mail-in ballot the Board used to vote on this for this was not legal under CT Statute (Section 47-70a), which requires an Owner meeting. This Second Draft was voted down 15-22.


April 2013: Board says clerical errors responsible for defeat of Documents and proposed a Third Draft that would:

  1. Allow the Board at its discretion to fine Owners $25 a day for “violations”

  2. Makes Privacy Yards regular common elements, no longer for exclusive use of Owner

  3. Requires garage owners to park a car in their garage each night

  4. Requires annual chimney cleaning weather fireplace used or not

  5. [Places Edgewater in Derby and multiple other problems with Documents]

This Third Draft is narrowly defeated in a Meeting in which the Board paid for two attorneys and a recording secreatry to run the meeting, to defend their work, and criticize and make false allegations against those opposing bad provisions of the Board’s Documents. This is despite the fact that the Board has relented and so far made about half the fixes that a majority of Owner’s petitioned for months ago


Eight Owners put together Alternative Documents that fix these problems and much more. Under the Alternative Documents, Owners would get an Association financial statement twice a year, Board members could no longer be absolved of late fees, contractors could not be paid tens of thousands of dollars in cash (with potential kick-backs), and Boards could not ignore the majority votes by Owners. These have all been problems at Edgewater (click here). The Board and its attorney rejected these provisions out-of-hand.


October 2013. Fourth Draft of Documents pass narrowly. Our "opposition" fell 1-2 votes short in voting them down.  I think some Owners just got weary of the repeated meetings and votes.





We can be proud of what we previously achieved by: 1) carefully reading the proposed Documents, 2) petitioning for changes, and 3) previously twice voting down the Board's proposed Documents. With each rejection of their Documents, the Board  agreed to make additional Owner-protecting changes (though sadly not all) that the majority of Owners had petitioned for a year ago.  Below are the main things we achieved.


Many thanks to everyone that contributed to holding out against the new intrusive powers that the Board proposed we give them. We accomplished alot ...


WHAT WE ACCOMPLISHED BY SPEAKING UP:

  1. 1.The Board initially proposed to have the new power to change the Bylaws at will ... After our petition, the change was made to continue to require a majority Owner vote to amend the Bylaws.

  2. 2.The Board initially proposed to have the new power to change the Rules at will ... After our petition and first "NO" vote, the change was made to continue to require a majority of Owners vote to amend the Bylaws.

  3. 3.The Board initially proposed having the new power to fine owner $50/day ... After the petition, they dropped this to $25/day, still way to high. We proposed $25/week with a $400 per year cap.

  4. 4.The Board initially proposed that that they have the new power to spend any Edgewater funds, (sometimes amounting to $250,000 in reserves) ... After our petition, the change was made to limit Board gain Owner approval by vote for  improvement exceeding $10,000.

  5. 5.The Board initially proposed that for instance a 2(for)-22(against) vote against their annual Budget would still pass the Budget  ... After our petition and two "NO" votes, the change was made to require a majority vote to pass a budget.

  6. 6.The Board's Documents removed privacy yard from the LCE category which makes it for the exclusive use of your Unit's residents .. After our two "NO" votes, privacy yards were returned back to your exclusive use.

  7. 7.The Board wanted to require garage owners to park one car in their garage all the time ... After the petition and twp "NO" votes they still (for some crazy reason) require garage owners to clear enough room in their garages to park there if they have to.

  8. 8.The Board wanted annual chimney and dryer vent cleaning with each owner submitting a receipt to the Board yearly ... After the petition and two "NO" votes, they reduced this to every 5-year inspection/cleaning.

  9. 9.There were some factual fixes to problems that I caught that assigned porches, sheds to the wrong Units, etc.


The Board did however refuse to budge on giving up intrusive new power to levy $25/day fines indefinitely. The majority of Unit Owners petitioned against this power. Wednesday, the Board made verbal promises that power would never be abused, but we shall see. Members of this Board have tried to do so even when our Documents did not authorize it. They also rejected out-of-hand the common sense good business practices we proposed ... like routinely sending financial statements to Owners, getting multiple bids for projects over $10,000 etc.  Very sad. Hopefully a future, a more reasonable Board will be willing to make these fixes.

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