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@Silly Cow said:
Are there no enforcement remedies for breach of NCAT orders contained in their legislation?I don’t know about the NCAT. In the ACT, the ACAT can make orders but does not have the power to enforce those orders. Nonetheless, failure to comply with an order is an offence.
Where I live, we had an owner who failed to comply with an ACAT order that she must remove an unapproved structure from her unit. In order to have the order enforced, we had to go to the Magistrates Court for an ‘enforcement order’. The owner attempted to use the magistrates court to re-argue her case that she should not be required to remove the structure. The Court was very clear that the matter had been examined by the Tribunal and it would not entertain anything other that determining how the owner would comply with the Tribunal’s order. At the Tribunal, we (members of the OC’s executive committee) had anticipated that if we received the orders we were seeking, the owner might not comply with the order and we asked the Tribunal how they might then be enforced. The Tribunal helpfully set out the enforcement procedure in its written Decision and Reasons document. Essentially, we needed to seek an enforcement order from the magistrates court pursuant to a particular magistrates court rule. The Court gave us the order we sought and the owner then complied. We did not apply for an order that the owner pay the fine for failure to comply with Tribunal order. We just wanted the unapproved structure removed with the least fuss and ill-will.
There is no general answer. The larger items may be:
– a managing agent’s fee. You could ask several agents to provide a quote.
-a grounds maintenance contractor and/or cleaner. Again, you could check if their fee seems reasonable on an hourly basis for what they do.
-other routine maintenance. What did it actually cost for the last few years to do routine things like replace light globes or get gutters cleared. Do you usually need to get an electrician or plumber out a couple of times a year? If so, factor that in.
-building insurance. My observation is that this goes up gradually every year then every 5 years or so one of the strata insurers decides to substantially undercut the others and we get a windfall from changing insurer. Get quotes.
-sinking fund plan (or whatever other states call it). This is the long-term planning for things such as remaking sections of damaged path, resurfacing asphalt, having a contingency provision for a burst water main, infrequent scheduled maintenance of machinery such as lifts or fans or whatever, repainting, replacing carpet when it gets worn. Start with a list of everything you have on the common property. You might find it is relatively simple and you can make some sensible estimates of the cost and frequency of repairs and replacements and a generous contingency margin. You might find it is complex or some major items are difficult to estimate with confidence. Then get advice. However you work out a schedule of costs over 10 or more years, then work out how much needs to go into an interest bearing account each year to cover it.
-utility bills. What have they been for the last year or two?
-other minor bits and pieces. Do you print a newsletter?
-Are there improvements that a general meeting might consider and approve? These could be a park bench for under a tree in the grounds through BBQ facilities to solar electric equipment to offset the OC’s electricity costs.
Anyway, just work out the various parts and the sum of those plus a bit of contingency is what your levies should be.
@Quirky said:
In my building, the Strata Manager emails the meeting notice out – but owners without email get it by post, and I believe the Manager posts those 4 days earlier than when the email goes out. We only get the bare 7 days, unless one of the snail mail owners talks to the majority who have email.Once the meeting papers are ready to print, why would the manager not also email them out then? What is the point of giving only just sufficient notice to be compliant with the law? Where I am, we always make sure we have things ready in ample time and give more than the bare minimum of notice. If nothing else, it keeps us legal if something causes a last minute, unexpected delay. It is also about be fair and decent, democratic and polite etc.
@Homestation99 said:
… 1 of the 4 owners is currently overseas with a sick relative and won’t be back until next year. I’ve been doing some research and it appears that voting on a proposal can be done via email as well (I could be wrong) …
It should be possible for the absent owner to either 1) send an absentee vote. An electronic image of the filled in voting form should be acceptable, or 2) appoint a proxy to vote on their behalf.
It might be a worry if someone is doing stuff unilaterally without at least talking to a few people about it. With only 8 units, it can’t be too hard to quickly check that everyone is happy to have a new keypad installed. If your committee has approved the work and someone on site has the skills and enthusiasm to save everyone some delays and money, then let them, so long as it is not something that requires a license. A standard strata insurance policy should include cover for volunteers.
Where I am, there are people who check and change globes in all the public lighting and make other minor repairs that stop short of the sort of thing that needs an electrician. Others do some gardening that lets our gardening contractor’s allotted hours be used to better effect. Some volunteer to re-oil the outdoor furniture and playground timbers. I split timber for our communal pizza oven and recently worked on constructing beds for our community garden, which avoid the cost of having them put together by someone paid. The OC only had to pay for materials.
A general meeting resolution that bins must be stored in a particular place on the common property or taken back to within individual unit areas seems a good rule to establish, ideally as a registered by-law. it would then carry legal weight, should it come to that.
With only 7 units, how hard would it be to call a general meeting (with proper notice etc) any time the committee feels there is a need to authorise some unusual spending that goes beyond being reasonably consistent with the budget approved at the AGM? By definition, unusual spending does not happen very often, whereas usual spending should be anticipated in the approved budget with varying degrees of accuracy depending on the nature of the expense.
By ‘reasonably consistent’ I mean that while some items can be predicted with great accuracy some other ordinary expected expenses can vary a bit without that being unreasonable. Eg. where I am with over 100 units and lots of trees on the common property we always have some tree surgery and the annual admin fund budget has a line for it. We might budget $6000, which is a typical amount to spend but some years we only need to spend $4000 and other years we might need to spend $8000, but we still do what needs doing when it needs doing. The budget carries over enough surplus from one year to the next to accommodate a bit of wobble in the items that are harder to predict precisely.
Whether the noise/nuisance is excessive is hard to judge without being there but it sounds to me like you have a fair case. I would say that the committee was only authorised to install substantially in accordance with the information provided to the general meeting. Your reference to the standards is very likely to help your case. I don’t know of any helpful Tribunal cases.
If it does end up as a Tribunal matter, asking to start with a ‘view’ on site could be useful. Then you can demonstrate the noise and confirm the location indicated in the general meeting documentation. This could avoid getting bogged in arguing details or having the Tribunal member visualising things inaccurately from photos or diagrams.
It would be useful to know which state you are in. There could be differences.
In the ACT, where villa/townhouses are generally what is termed ‘class B’ units, it is unequivocal that if the driveway is shown as part of the lot, then the owner is responsible to maintain it entirely, not just the surface.
Elsewhere, I would be surprised if a similar view did not prevail. I suspect your owner is just ‘trying it on’.
If I were on your committee, I would advocate a decision of the committee, all duly minuted etc, to write a formal letter to this owner from the executive committee stating:
-examples of instances when it appears that the owner has misrepresented herself as a representative of the committee.
-that it is a function of the committee to represent the interests of and exercise the functions of the owners corporation.
-that maintaining good relations with potential suppliers of goods and services to the OC is an important function of the committee.
-that the committee requests that she desists from representing herself as being a committee member or giving that impression to potential suppliers of goods and services.
-that she explicitly makes it clear that she is not a committee member and is enquiring in a private capacity if she does talk to potential suppliers of goods and services.
-that the committee appreciates her experience and enthusiasm for proposals for the improvement of the property but would prefer that she bring her ideas for discussion with the committee before being advanced too far.
-that if the owner persists, the committee will seek an order from the Tribunal that the owner desists from representing herself falsely as a representative of the committee to the detriment of the OC’s interests.
I suggest that a copy of the committee’s letter be also sent to the managing agent.
You have my sympathy. I have been in a similar situation as a committee member. An owner who had previously been a committee member sought to ambush the committee at an AGM with quotes for certain expensive (but unnecessary) maintenance as part of her effort to dissuade owners from agreeing to spend money on an unrelated proposal. i.e. Panic people into thinking we needed to urgently spend lots of money on one thing so there would be no money left to spend on the other thing. By chance I contacted the same supplier who was surprised I did not already have his quote. He then sent it to me directly and it became clear that the owner was also doing some selective quoting of that supplier’s advice. Almost a decade later the thing she wanted us to spend lots of money on has still not been done, still does not yet need to be done, and our sinking fund has ample provision for it when it eventually does need to be done.
If the door to the communal parking area were damaged and the committee repaired it by replacing it, then I would say the committee is carrying out one of its functions which is to repair and maintain the common property. It often occurs that an identical replacement is not available and a committee has to do the best it can to find a reasonable, near equivalent. So far, so good.
If the committee has replaced a part of the common property with something of “a completely outlandish new look”, then the committee would seem to have gone beyond proper repair and maintenance. Presumably, the committee don’t think it looks ‘outlandish’ and perhaps they have a reason for the non-identical replacement. Perhaps the door needed replacement anyway and this door functions better in some respect or perhaps it was the only sort they could get for the situation?
I would look to your rules/by-laws/articles on unit alterations. In many places it takes an unopposed resolution or a special resolution of a general meeting to approve altering the appearance of a unit. In some places a committee decision is sufficient or it is empowered to make certain classes of decision within guidelines. Rarely has an owners corporation resolved to allow a complete laissez-faire.
Might be worth finding out whether the council approval had a time limit? It might be that the neighbours would need to go through the whole process again and when they do they might need to consult the current neighbours. Certainly ask for written evidence of the owners corporation and council approvals.
One week does not sound like sufficient notice for the AGM. In the ACT, where I am and I am more familiar with the legislation, at least 2 weeks notice is generally required. This does not mean that meeting papers can be put in the mail 14 days before the meeting date. The committee must also allow sufficient time for postage to be deemed to have arrived. From memory I think this 5 working days. In effect the papers need to be mailed out at least 3 weeks ahead. When I was a committee member, we generally did 4 weeks just to be safe.
I don’t know if there is anything peculiar to Victoria. In the ACT, where I am, a general meeting resolution without an explicit time limit would continue to direct and oblige the committee until it was rescinded or superseded or otherwise became obviously redundant.
That said, if the matter really is urgent, and two quotes are very similar, and you did diligently attempt to comply with the 3-quote general meeting decision, I think the committee could defend a decision in this instance to go ahead with only two quotes if it found itself being criticised. Make sure the reasoning and decision is clearly minuted!