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Someone has put the following item on the agenda for our AGM which is coming up in a Sydney block of 38 units. Is it a legal, and legally put motion, can someone tell me please? Wording-wise, notionally and everything else.
This is a verbatim quote:
“Motion 13.1. Resolution: The owners corporation confirm that owners and occupiers must not contact members of the strata committee directly, but instead direct communications to the strata agent. An exception is where a strata committee member has agreed to communicating directly with an owner.”
(Without meaning to muddy the waters, the strata manager is ALWAYS slow to respond, act and is rude, while the Strata Committee are 6/7 seat-warmers with one an autocrat.)
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If this is meant to be binding on owners (IE as a bylaw or rule), then I would think it has to be a special resolution. It could be intended as a statement of what owners and residents ‘should’ do, in which case it might be regarded as an unenforceable ‘house rule’ and then an ordinary resolution would be OK.
However, it might be inconsistent with some provisions of the Act. For example, where I am in the ACT, “The owners corporation may enter the unit without notice to the owner or occupier of the unit if the access is required in an emergency.” So, what is the resident to do if 1) there is water pouring out of a unit doing damage, and 2) nobody responds to knocking on the door and 3) the resident could quickly and easily tell a member of the committee, who could represent the owners corporation and enter the unit to investigate and prevent further damage. At the least, the motion should be less absolute and allow for emergency contact.
However, all that aside, is this a sledge-hammer to crack a nut? Is the committee fed up with constant communication from a few owners that verges on harassment? I suggest that it would be far more reasonable for the committee to put a motion along the following lines:
“That owners and residents are requested to avoid direct contact with committee members except in an emergency and to submit queries, suggestions and requests in writing through the managing agent and/or the secretary of the committee whose email and mail addresses will be publicised from time to time.”
If someone says they just want to talk about some issue, that is fine (and is generally to be encouraged): The written request could be for a committee member to phone the person back or visit to talk about some specified topic. Providing the second avenue of communication still provides a filter, if that is what the committee wants, but gets around a slow managing agent.
The secretary could set up a non-personal email address for the purpose such as ‘SecretaryPoshNameFlats@gmail.com’ and management of that address could be passed on as secretaries change.
Why don’t the committee want to be contacted? Where I am, the new committee, after each AGM, distributes a contact sheet to each unit. It includes the managing agent’s details and the committee details. Most include their unit number, a phone number and email address. Only rarely has a committee member preferred to leave off one of those details. The same details are included on each newsletter which tend to be distributed every few months.
I do have some sympathy for committee members getting too much communication from a few owners but I have also seen the opposite problem. Another class of owner is too nice, doesn’t want to bother you, and will only tell you things when you happen to get chatting that it would have been good to have known about much earlier and could have been dealt with easily.
Ouch. I am not sure of the legality of the motion but it’s illogical to me. How do you know if an SC member has agreed to communicate with you without communicating with them?
Unless the Secretarial function of the OC has been delegated to the Strata Agent then I don’t see this resolution working.
Sounds like you need to rustle up some “no” votes at the very least.
@tharra said:
…but it’s illogical to me. How do you know if an SC member has agreed to communicate with you without communicating with them?…I wonder if underneath this is a committee that is happy to have communication from all but a few they regards as serial pains. Perhaps they envisage quietly letting most residents know they are happy to be approached. Seems a bit over the top and, as you say, illogical.
I don’t think this by-law would stand up to a challenge at the Tribunal. Section 139 says this:
(1) By-law cannot be unjust
A by-law must not be harsh, unconscionable or oppressive. (Note : Any such by-law may be invalidated by the Tribunal (see section 150).
I would be telling the committee that they need to consider the consequences of trying to silence owners who have a right to raise issues with the committee. If people don’t want to communicate with other owners, they shouldn’t be on the committee in the first place.
In the meantime, you could propose an amendment to the motion along the lines of “the strata manager will be required to respond to the owners in a reasonable and meaningful way within five working days or they will be considered to be in breach of their contract.”
That should put the strata cat among the snoozing pigeons.
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