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You can however ask – and in my experience such a request has never been refused – that votes be recorded by lot number instead of a simple “resolved” or “defeated”. You must do so at the beginning of the meeting.
In NSW an owner can call for a “poll” vote at any point, even after a show of hands has been taken. A poll vote, based on unit entitlements, would by necessity record which lots voted in which way.
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Make sure you have evidence of a motion passed at a general meeting, if you did not authorise the strata manager to issue such notices.
This would be a motion to delegate the committee to act on behalf of the owners corporation – a standard motion at most (but not all) AGMs.
There are laws about “abandoned goods”.
I had a look at these too. They are generally about stuff left behind by residents who have moved on. I don’t think they would apply here.
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Jimmy you may raise this point with David Bannerman when you do the lawyer in a hotseat this month. As the issue of Strata Roll disclosure was confirmed to Stephen Brell in a SCA Webinar last year, by David.
I certainly will and I would love to be able to publish some of Brell’s comments to me made when I was trying to get the strata roll for our investment property which, sadly, is managed by Netstrata. However, they were part of a private discussion and protocol forbids me from making them public except to say I described them at the time as “pretzel logic” (shout out to Steely Dan fans).
This topic is now closed until someone PROVES with proper legal references from courts or tribunals that I am wrong.
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I have shown you why that if one meets 178 1(b) then (c) does not apply. I have shown you the State’s own website does not say you have to give it if you have it, which i believe it would if there was the requirement you press.
You haven’t “shown” anything except your opinion. There is no proof or ruling cited. And, by the way, I assumed you were excluding yourself from the “plebs” because you said that it wasn’t something for “plebs” to interpret, then you interpreted it.
Finally, I would draw your attention to the adjacent post from SPmanager.
Once I have responded to that, because we are just expressing competing opinions, I am shutting this discussion down until someone provides authoritative proof, in an uncontested court or tribunal ruling, that I am wrong.
Until then, Flatchatters, this is my position:
- The NSW SSMA 2105 says strata owners are entitled to see their strata rolls (and most other documents related to the strata scheme)
- The SSMA also says the strata roll must include the email addresses of strata owners, if they have one.
- There are no relevant privacy law issues here.
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Firstly, the owners corporation can certainly acquire personal property and then designate it as common property. Your problem here may be that you will need everyone to agree to giving up their limited right to do as they please with their property. Why would anyone do that? I can think of half a dozen reasons, none of which are logical or reasonable – but that’s strata for you.
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Yes that is what the law says but what does it mean is not for plebs to say unless we are quoting the Courts.
Again, you seem to think the rest of us are plebs because it IS for you to say what this means. Or am I misinterpreting that too?
I would go to the barricades on this one as I did recently with Netstrata and, to great and vociferous length with their boss and now departed president of SCA Stephen Brell. Upshot, my strata scheme got the strata roll with the email addresses of the owners attached. Even plebs can prevail, just by following what the law says and not by what it might mean if you turn the words around a bit and take out a couple here and there.
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Yes that is what the law says but what does it mean is not for plebs to say unless we are quoting the Courts.
Agreed. So please point me in the direction of a court ruling that clearly states that this clause doesn’t mean what it says. Unitl I can read that, I will join the other plebs who don’t apply pretzel logic to find a meaning that doesn’t seem to be the intent of the law.
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You’re probably bound by the contract.
Yup, but procedurally the strata manager should have advised the chair not to allow the motion, so that reason was at least recorded for future reference. Next step, remove that clause from the contract at the next opportunity. But be aware that debt collection fees and sweetheart deals with favoured lawyers is the next scandal after insurance commissions.
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I’m trying to figure out if I have a case against them for not fulfilling their responsibilities.
Against whom – the committee or the strata manager?
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The lot owner has been breached multiple times and has received a notice to comply.
and
…we’ve been told mediation is the next step and after that NCAT tribunal which could cost upwards of $20K.
Sounds to me like you are getting bad advice. The resident has not been “breached” until they receive a Notice to Comply. I hope you haven’t fallen for the nonsense that you need to send three warning letters before you can issue an NTC. If the owner has been sent a Notice To Comply, mediation is not required: you go straight to NCAT and seek a fine if the breach notice is ignored. Also, if they defend the NTC when it is clear that they were in breach and knew they were, you have a fairly reasonable chance of having costs awarded.
Whoever is giving you advice is either not giving you the whole picture or isn’t explaining themselves well.
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It is just not true that anyone “should” and “must”.
OK, for the umpteenth time, here is what the law says:
178 Content of strata roll(1) Information about lots
The following information must be recorded in the strata roll in relation to a particular lot in the strata scheme—
(a) the name of the holder of the estate in fee simple in the lot (in the case of a freehold strata scheme) or the holder of the leasehold estate in the lot (in the case of a leasehold strata scheme),
(b) an address for service of notices,
(c) an Australian postal address, and an email address if the holder has one, if not provided as the address for service,
There’s more, not relevant to this point,but if you editt out the padding an legalese it says:The following information must be recorded in the strata roll… an email address if the holder has one, if not provided as the address for service,
Can someone please explain how or why that means anything other than you have to supply an email adress if you have one. Seriously, I’m intrigued to know on what basis some people are uterly convinced that I am wrong (and are not slow to tell me). If I have somehow misread this, I will retract and apologise.If you want to be alerted when anyone replies to your posts or responds to this topic, please register and login, then you will be able to subscribe to the topic. The opinions offered in these Forum posts and replies are not intended to be taken as legal advice. Readers with serious issues should consult experienced strata lawyers. NB: Longer threads may spill over to additional pages - look for the numbers on the bottom right, under the last post.
But because he’s refusing to give me the details about it all (he’s claiming that I can’t access any of that detail because it’s only the strata committee that are allowed to see it),
This where the committee member is playing in the grey areas. They don’t have to provide you with the documents but you or your agents are entitled to see ALL the documents at your strata manager’s office. So perhaps it’s worth hiring a strata search specialist and I’m not sure how much that will cost.
Personally, I would tell the committee that if they try to push through this by-law, you will challenge it as being “harsh, unconscionable or oppressive” as well as being in breach of section 136: “A by-law has no force or effect to the extent that it is inconsistent with this or any other Act or law.”
Let them do the leg work and find out which side of the law they sit. For what it’s worth, I believe that if an owners corporation has chosen to save money on the premium by including an excess on the policy, they can’t expect an individual owner to make up the shortfall when a claim is made.
And if they push ahead with it, this will stand or fall on the legalities, not on what their motivations may or may not have been, so pursuing a conspiracy may be a waste of time and money.
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Forget the forensic examination of strata records
I’m looking at engaging a professional to do a forensic search of the strata records to see if there has been any correspondence that would prove bias or unfair treatment that I can use at mediation.
Forget forensic examination of the records. Get an experienced strata lawyer to look at the legality or otherwise of this. Basically the OC would be asking individual owners to cover a shortfall in insurance cover that the OC has used to save all owners in lower insurance premiums. In other words, they want to save money on the premium then save again on the claim.
Somewhere in the dim recesses of my brain, and I could be wrong, I think there’s a principle that if a by-law has an impost on an individual, they have to agree to it.
Otherwise, this smacks of strata committee owners resenting the fact that you have been covered for repairs and received something they didn’t. So yes, you may be up for a fight and whether or not it’s worth it depends not just on the cost versus benefit, but the “social capital” cost too. I would go to an experienced strata lawyer and ask if this can be done legally and to send the SC a letter explaining why, if it can’t.
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It was my understanding that a vote at a general meeting would be required to approve/deny the request, so I was shocked that the very small committee (4 people) were able to outright reject something without taking it to the rest of the owners (48 in total) for vote.
First things first, this sounds like a proposal that may appear to straddle the line between minor and major renovations (terms used in the Act), the difference being whether or not there is structural modification to common property and changes to waterproofing. It also sounds as if the committee doesn’t really know what it’s doing – the concept of precedent doesn’t really exist in strata decisions – every application should be considered on its own merits.
The good news is that the committee has rejected the proposal so you can move on with this and, if necessary, seek orders at NCAT under Section 232, covering the committee’s failure to fulfil its responsibilities.
But before that, write to them and politely ask them to reconsider and tell them that you will undertake to provide binding assurances that you will repair and maintain any changes to common property that may be required.
Failing that, you can suggest that you might seek orders at NCAT (strata Act section 232.2) on the grounds that their refusal was unreasonable, without foundation in law and had serious implications for your family’s health and the structural inegrity of the building.
Finally, any decisions by the committee can be overturned at a general meeting but that usually means waiting until an AGM and often finding, as the readers did in this post, that the committee comes out with all guns blazing, sending out propaganda to persuade owners to reject the proposal without giving you any real chance of reply.
With that in mind, you might want to get an experienced strata lawyer involved to make sure you are making the right approach on the right grounds. That may be enough to make them rethinnk.
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