[Jimmy-T]

That’s a new one on me but I can see how a by-law like that, which was proposed without any reasons given, might be considered harsh.

I’m pro-pets myself but I do understand people who just don’t want to have them around, for either cultural or medical reasons.  I think we have to allow the option where the vast majority of owners are strongly opposed (rather than not caring but happy to go along with one forceful character).

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[Jimmy-T]

Depending on the breakdown of unit entitlements, you only need two other owners to go to the meeting with you (or send a proxy)  to stop the motion going forward.  If you can’t garner that much support in the building then you’re really living in the wrong block. 

Get the mail addresses of any investor owners and send them a letter telling them basic facts about how buildings that don’t allow pets are less attractive to potential buyers and renters than those that do.

And go to the meeting and challenge every vote in favour of the motion on the basis of whether the owner is financial or not and if their proxies are on the correct form.  

But don’t make it personal because then you are asking people to takes sides  against someone they may not agree with but personally like.

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[Jimmy-T]

@peaceandquiet said:
I’m surprised a simple matter has received an aggressive response—from two different tenants! Is this normal?

Well, there’s a fair chance that they have compared notes but that doesn’t make any difference to the facts of the matter. Evidence of an abusive response can only work in your favour if you ever go to a tribunal.

Is it also normal to make a polite, factual complaint as part of a standard process; and then the resulting, quite personal hate mail be forwarded to us and all the other stakeholders by the OC?

It’s not normal but it’s not uncommon.  Look at it this way, if they were decent and considerate people you would not be making a complaint in the first place. You should be glad that other residents are seeing their hate mail – it doesn’t cast them in a positive light, does it?

Since both tenants now deny the noise, the OC has requested that we record any further incidents for its use as evidence. We have responded that the OC should check the legality of this request and suggested the tenants who might be recorded may need to know about it.

This is one of the great furphies of modern living – that you can’t record the noise of a party in case you record a conversation.  Privacy laws relating to recording devices basically say you can’t record someone’s conversation without their knowledge (NB the key word is ‘knowledge’ not ‘permission’).

If you tell someone you are going to record their conversation and they say they don’t want you to but keep talking and you are clearly still recording, that’s their problem, not yours.

So, if you think you are going to have to take this further, you send them a letter saying that you have been asked to recorded excessive noise in your unit and if they are talking so loudly that they can be recorded in your unit, then they should be aware of that. 

There has been no further unreasonable noise since the second complaint.
What now?  

What do you want?  You have complained, they have vented, but the noise has stopped.  There’s nothing you can do about future noise except to get a noise abatement order at your local court and you are a long way off that.

Enjoy the peace and quiet.

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[Jimmy-T]

Your website loooks great and this is an admirable effort but your basic problems are privacy, accessibility and management.

Privacy is not an issue within the community but it is if your information is available to outsiders.  That could mean passwords which should be changed frequently for all subscribers.  This is easily done by a monthly mail-out

Accessibility is an issue for people who don’t have computers or don’t access them very often – how do you prevent your building from being run by a “geek elite” because the non-connected don’t know what’s going on?

Finally, your website looks great but what happens when you get too busy or move away?  Does the committee really want to take on that role.  Even if they love the website, the answer is probably “no”. 

That’s why I am coming round to the idea of commercial website providers like our sponsors Stratabox

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[Jimmy-T]

I have combine the posts above from two topics as they are basically just the same question (which as Scotland X has pointed out, is an absolute no-no here).  This poster is fortunate that they are being suspended from the forum – the instructions clearly state that multi-posting on the same topic is not allowed.

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[Jimmy-T]

In view of the actions of this owner to try to bend the law to suit her purposes, I would say a definite YES to getting advice from an experienced strata lawyer.  You might also try to get costs awarded while you’re at it (although I’m not sure where NCAT sits regarding costs these days).. 

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[Jimmy-T]

I just want to add in Austman’s defence, there are plenty of strata schemes – and possibly the majority of smaller ones – that a) just allow the strata manager to get on with it and b) do make decisions on an informal “any other business” basis.

They can do this because nobody is particularly bothered and it works until someone is.

In any case, my points were based on the original poster’s comments where they are taking over a strata committee that had been neglected and wanted to do things properly.

In that kind of situation, I would say the more you can play by the book, the better.

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[Jimmy-T]

I don’t want to get into get into a war of words over this  but your insistence that your personal experience of being chair of several schemes is a guide to what happens everywhere is well off the mark.

I’m not disputing that committees make a lot of important decisions but there is a very strict limit in NSW (and elsewhere) on the kind of decisions they make (as there should be).

If an important decision that I didn’t agree with was made under “any other business” at an AGM in NSW I would challenge it all the way to NCAT and I would win because it would have been in clear breach of regulations.

If I was in a building where the SM set the agenda and budget without consulting the committee, I would have them removed at the first opportunity.

And of course people feel excluded if they aren’t consulted. Expecting people to turn up for a meeting when no one has bothered to ask them if they have any issues that they want to have discussed is pretty much guaranteed to keep them away in droves.

You may have as many discussions as you wish under “general” business but if you make any decisions based on items that are not specified in the agenda, in most states – and I include Victoria – you leave yourself wide open to a legal challenge by a disgruntled owner.

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[Jimmy-T]

@Austman said:
Basically because, at least in Victoria,  AGMs don’t much matter anymore.

I’ve been to hundreds of them and they are mostly just formalities except for “other business”.  

There’s no “other business” allowed at NSW general meetings. If it’s not on the agenda, it shouldn’t be discussed and certainly can’t be voted on.

Most owners don’t even bother attending.  I’ve never yet been to one that has achieved a quorum (in nearly 40 years).  I’ve been to several where it was just me and the strata manager.  The budget is usually just a projection based on the past year’s expenses.

At the risk of sounding flippant, why would people attend when they are totally excluded from the decision-making process?  Seriously, there’s a correlation to be made between lack of engagement and lack of attendance.

Reading the rest of your post, I think it’s fair to say that the system in Victoria is totally and fundamentally different from NSW and so it’s probably unwise to project what works in one state on to the other.

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[Jimmy-T]

@Austman said:
To be honest I don’t think it’s so important.   An active strata committee has very many other options in the general running of an OC/BC.  

I couldn’t disagree more.

I accept that strata managers have those delegated rights in most contracts, confirmed at their AGMs, but that is really to make sure the OCs where owners don’t care, don’t understand or can’t be bothered, can continue to function.  Those delegated powers can be removed at any time by a decision of the committee and that’s how it should be.

Committees are part of the community and they should be setting the agenda – even if it’s just by telling the strata manager to add an item  before it goes out.  Important issues like by-laws and the transfer of common property, not to mention major renovations, and legal action require motions to be put on a general meeting agenda. 

If the strata manager is just going ahead and setting the agenda and the budget without consultation with the committee how can a building change for the better?

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[Jimmy-T]

If you have items that you want to have discussed at your AGM, instruct the strata manager to withdraw the notice (at their expense) and reissue when you have an agreed agenda and budget.

The regulations only require meetings to be held every financial year – not on or near the anniversary of the previous one, as was the case before.

If there isn’t anything you want discussed that isn’t on the agenda, let this one go through to the keeper but with a stern written warning to the strata manager not to do this again. 

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[Jimmy-T]

@peaceandquiet said:

Now the apartment with the courtyard is at it again *one day* later. It’s a Tuesday night. All we can hear inside our completely closed up apartment is their loud conversation.

What can we do next?  

You don’t say what your by-laws (rules) say about noise but I would imagine they include the universal rule that residents can’t make a noise that disturbs other residents’ peaceful enjoyment of their lots. This applies at any time of day and night  and there is no allowance for parties or anything else.

Start proceedings which, in Victoria, I believe means an internal mediation leading ultimately, if that doesn’t work, to action at VCAT.

Your strata committee can’t just ignore this. They have to either do something or tell you why they are doing nothing.  

Have a look HERE and it will tell you how to proceed with this complaint.

Try to deal with this using your existing rules.  But if the committee and management say this is a persistent problem and “there’s nothing we can do about it” it’s time to look at both tightening up the rules and enforcement of them.

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[Jimmy-T]

@twosailram said:
Re point 1 of suggested NSW rules, I don’t understand what is meant by Acting or proxy. The previous Act provided for, subject to EC approval, for substitute EC members. Clause 10 (1) schedule 2 I think covers the same substitution whilst being more general in how the committee determines the substitution is enacted. The definition of ‘Person Present’ specifically refers to Clause 10 Schedule 2 of the Act, which counts such a substitution as being present for quorum purposes.
Can you please clarify if this is so.
Thanks  

Clause 10 (1) of Schedule 2 says this:

A vote at a meeting by a person entitled to vote must be cast in person unless the strata committee, by resolution, determines that a vote may be cast by some other specified means.

Section 12 refers to members who are present by other means (e.g by phone or Skype) not people who are represented by other members.

To make any decision, the committee must first have a quorum, if they don’t have a quorum, they can’t make the decision to allow a person to vote “by other means”

Section 14 of the Regulations refers to “voting by other means’ which is basically by phone or electronically: https://www8.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/legis/nsw/consol_reg/ssmr2016333/s14.html

So let me lay this out simply:

The committee can’t take a vote unless there is a quorum present.

Members who are intending to vote electronically or by phone can be counted towards the quorum.

Members who are not actively participating and just want to give their votes to others can’t be counted towards the quorum. 

It’s all about active participation.

Section 12 (3) refers to ‘permitted means other than a vote in person’ and it’s quite clear that refers to someone who is on the other end of a phone line or a computer connection and intends to vote.  

 

12 QUORUM

 

(1) Quorum required for motion
A motion submitted at a meeting of a strata committee must not be considered unless there is a quorum present to consider and vote on the motion.

(2) When quorum exists
A quorum is present at a meeting only in the following circumstances:

(a) in the case of a strata committee which has only one member, if the member is present,

(b) in any other case, if not less than one-half of the persons entitled to vote on the motion are present.

(3) A person who has voted, or intends to vote, on a motion or at an election at a meeting by a permitted means other than a vote in person is taken to be present for the purposes of determining whether there is a quorum.

(4) The quorum for meetings of a strata committee is to be calculated on the basis of the number of members last determined by the owners corporation for the committee.

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[Jimmy-T]

@twosailram said:
Re point 18 of suggested NSW rules, I cannot find in either the Act or the Regulations the prohibition on voting on ‘any other business’ in the Strata Committee.

There is no specific prohibition but there doesn’t need to be if you accept that the meeting must have a detailed agenda.

Owners are entitled to know in advance what’s being discussed and that can’t happen if you have a general “any other business” item. 

How can anyone anticipate what that means and then decide whether or not they want to attend the meeting?

That item is in the standing orders as a reminder (especially to inexperienced members) that only items on the agenda can be discussed.

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[Jimmy-T]

My understanding is that the ‘Who’s responsible?’ document was just a consolidation and interpretation of a number of issues related to common property. In it, it says original fly screens should be maintained by the owners corporation.

I also think (and I hope one of our stratagurus will correct me if I’m wrong) that the transfer of responsibility for common property requires the approval of the owner or owners who are taking on that responsibility.

It’s not the other owner’s fault that her neighbours have fixed up their common property at their own expense. Perhaps they should have been thinking more as a community and less as individuals.

My solution would be to offer to fit new fly screens at the owners corp expense provided she (and all the other owners) agrees to a by-law that transfers ongoing responsibility to the individual owners.

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