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Scott13 – I can’t see electric motor vehicles becoming a cost-effective proposition any time soon so perhaps your Owners Corporation (O/C) is being just a little over-cautious, and whilst I’m not sure why residential carparks have power outlets I’ll bet there’s a Building Code or similar that requires them to be fitted and to be accessible.
So I’m not sure that lockable power outlets would comply with whatever Code requires their presence, but perhaps suggest to your O/C that upon application it charges residents an annual fee for a key to specific outlet/s, with that fee being reflective of the both the anticipated electricity usage/cost and a “convenience” factor to the key-holder, both annually reviewable.
If you want this type of approach formalised, then why not suggest that yours be a test case, and then put a Motion in that regard on the Agenda for your next General Meeting.
To conclude… this may be a bit left-field, but IF there’s a power point adjacent to every carspace, then I wonder if they’re wired back to the supply serving the individual Lot/s concerned; and electrician could determine this.
YES that’s correct unless the “trigger” that I earlier referred to or one imposed by NSW Fire & Rescue by way of a Fire Control Order has been imposed since 1988.
As I’ve mentioned in other posts, whilst an Annual Fire Safety Statement may not be appropriate for Plans such as yours as there’d be no development-based Schedule to define its scope, it’s a good idea for Owners Corporations to regularly commission some kind of voluntary inspection of any fire-related items such as extinguishers and smoke alarms on the Common Property, just to be sure.
fuco – in NSW it’s not up to the Building Manager, but rather your request needs to be considered by way of a Special Resolution placed as an Item on the Agenda of a General Meeting of the Owners Corporation (O/C) together with plans / diagrams / photos etc, where you’ll need a minimum 75% of those present by unit entitlement, both personally and by proxy, to vote in favour of your proposal in order for it to succeed.
If Consent is granted by the O/C, then it would customarily include Conditions such as (but not limited to) making you entirely responsible for maintaining that part of the Common Property (roof-space), you granting the O/C and its Agents (e.g. contractors) unrestricted access to other parts of the roof-space via your Lot where that’s necessary, and requiring you to make regular payments to the O/C to account for the increased value of your Lot consequent to it having exclusive use of a portion of the Common Property, and with all of the above being incorporated in a Registered Special By-Law attached to the Strata Title of your Plan at your cost.
Part 5 / Division 4 of the NSW Strata Schemes Management Act (1996) applies.
Homegirls – firstly, in NSW all residents (i.e. owners and tenants) are required to comply with the Plan’s By-Laws, and in order for those to be legally enforceable in general terms they need to be either the “Model By-Laws” provided in the Strata Schemes Management Act for Plan’s registered after 1996, or in the Regulation for Plan’s registered after 2010, or to have been properly adopted at a General Meeting of the Owners Corporation from either of the above Schedules, or as “Special By-Laws” specifically for the Plan and be Registered on its Strata Title.
Obviously, there is no relevant provisions in the “Model By-Laws” about leaving gates open or otherwise, but I suspect from your post that something’s been mentioned about an open gate detracting from the appearance of the building; right?
There are Model By-Laws that relate “the appearance of the lot” but they’re not applicable to the circumstance that you describe, but even if they were, there’s a specific Form that the Executive Committee needs to provide residents with after it has met to consider whether or not a breach of a By-Law has occurred.
What to do?
Well… you could take Peter’s advice (post #2), or just ignore the missives which after all have no standing unless they’ve been decided upon by the Executive Committee as a whole and have been issued in the form required (as a Notice-to-Comply with a relevant By-Law), or maybe in this instance just close the gate.
watchman said… The landlord can also lodge the bond form without the tenants signature and often do.
Yes that’s correct, but in those circumstances and IF they’ve been provided with a forwarding address by the outgoing tenant, the Rental Bond Board will write to that tenant to advise them about the Landlord’s Claim, and to provide them with a opportunity to dispute it before any payment whatsoever is made to the Landlord.
So the message for outgoing tenants in NSW is to always provide a forwarding address directly to the Rental Bond Board before leaving rental premises.
I can see the logic in all the perspectives so far expressed, and whilst we can logically assume that whatever2008 doesn’t agree with the E/C’s decision re the pot plants, we don’t know how much of that disagreement is due to the amount of expenditure involved, how much is due to the possibly autonomous nature of the E/C’s decision to make that purchase – and if that decision really matters in the big-picture scheme of things.
Under either circumstance, I’m of the opinion that the E/C’s actions would need to be more in accordance with the budgeting and expenditure provisions of the Act than with Sect 65A, where I’ve always interpreted additions and alterations to the Common Property as being those of a type that, if undone, would result in some rectification being necessary in order to return the Common Property to its original state, and I doubt that would apply to potted plants.
On the basis of an absolutely pedantic expenditure perspective and my assumptions about whatever2008‘s position, then the purchase of the pot plants should have been a sinking fund expense, and unless a $ amount is shown in the current budget for an item that relates to the acquisition of personal property by the Owners Corporation (O/C) or to a closely related matter, then the expenditure on the potted plants would be contrary to Sects 75(2) and 71(1)(a).
Although as Peter has observed (post #4), the E/C could assert (imo incorrectly) that its expenditure was under a vaguely related matter such as the all-encompassing “gardening”.
It’s pretty straight forward really, and whilst I’d urge you to have someone with legal training prepare something that’s specifically suitable for your Plan, you could incorporate some or all of the following:
- Include some words that captures any existing installations and makes the current and future Owners of those responsible for all on-going maintenance, repairs, and replacement of their property.
- Develop some base-line standards for future installations such as acceptable locations (e.g. on balconies), max. noise levels, screening of all visible components, condensate disposal etc
- Require Owners to provide the Owners Corporation with written details of their proposed installations, including make/model, kW rating, noise level, and of its compliance with whatever’s in #2.
- Require the Owners Corporation’s written consent to be obtained in advance of any future installations.
- Require Owners of consented installations to be responsible as in 1)
- Include some words to make Owners responsible for the costs of aircon. installations
- Require Owners to use licensed tradespeople and for those to hold liability insurance.
- Prescribe days / hours during which installations may occur and how rubbish/ packaging etc must be disposed of (e.g. off-site).
- Owners to indemnify the Owners Corporation against any damage arising from the on-going maintenance, operations, and replacement of their aircons.
- Same as the above for any damage caused to Common Property during installation, maintenance, operations etc etc
- Restrictions on the hours of operations in accordance with the Protection of the Environment Operations Act or whatever may replace it from time to time
- Owners receiving consent to acknowledge that if they don’t properly maintain their aircon. then the Owners Corporation may enter their Lot to do so, may if necessary remove the aircon. and reinstate its Common Property as necessary, and may bill the then Lot Owner for all its costs of the above.
- Make sure that the wording captures not only the Owner doing the installation, but additionally all future Owners of the Lot where the aircon’s installed.
That’s the bare bones of what should be included, but just make sure that whatever you decide upon specifically suits your Plan; you are after all starting with a clean sheet. Oh, and you do know that your final version needs to be “specially resolved” by those present at a General Meeting (i.e. with ≥75% voting in favour by unit entitlement) prior to its Registration on your Plan’s Strata Title; right?
You should yourselves investigate the options for restricted access to the commercial Lots, and if you’re the Owners of those Lots you should put your preferred option as a Motion on the Agenda of the next General Meeting, and if you’re the tenants of those lots then put that preferred option to your Landlord with a request that they raise it with their Executive Committee or place it on the Agenda of the next General Meeting Agenda themselves.
kenc – I imagine that the insect screens would have been incorporated in Council’s Development Consent by way of an item on the attached Fire Safety Schedule, in which case a call to that Council should see them get the Developer moving.
Terry – be careful what you wish for by inviting Council onto the site, but in any case I doubt they could do anything about the problem unless the motor bikes are parked within designated visitors’ spaces or they’re encroaching upon designated passages of entry, egress, and maneuvering for vehicles within the carpark; both of which would be conditions of their Development Consent.
If you feel strongly about the matter, and particularly about your E/C’s unpreparedness to do anything about this Breach of a By-Law (i.e. parking on common property, where by the way “consent” relates to a specific instance such as loading / unloading a vehicle and not a regular occurrence), then consider taking your Owners Corporation to Mediation using THIS form or by using the services of a Community Justice Centre.
Cobra – in response to your questions:
1) – As the smoke alarms are “stand-alone” within individual Lots and not hard wired back to a central control panel on the Common Property, then they’re the responsibility of the Owners of those individual Lots; so YES.
2) – Annual Fire Safety Statements arise from a physical inspection by a suitably qualified person, and are required wherever an Approval Authority such as a Local Council has imposed a Fire Safety Schedule on the Builder / Developer at the time of the building’s construction OR at the time of any significant alterations or extensions to that construction OR if some event (such as a complaint) has triggered an inspection by Council or by NSW Fire & Rescue and a Fire Safety Order is issued. So as your building was constructed in the 1970’s and Fire Safety Schedules only came into being in July 1988, then provided none of the “ORs” apply, your Owners Corporation would not be required to commission an Annual Fire Safety Statement; so NO.
3) See above
4) & 5) – Whilst the Regulation stipulates the types of smoke alarms to be fitted, where they’re to be fitted, and that they need to be working at the commencement of each tenancy within residential units, it doesn’t require the regular checking of those stand-alone models other than via annual media announcements urging residents to change batteries and/or check correct operation usually at the commencement of daylight saving time each year. So NO, unless your Owners Corporation (O/C) resolves at a General Meeting to not only continue with its annual “fire safety inspections” but to also concurrently undertake at its expense all necessary repairs to and replacements of faulty smoke alarms within Owners’ Lots – which is not a bad idea especially as those Owners are paying for it anyway via their Levy Contributions.
In conclusion – just because an O/C may not be required by Law to have annual Fire Safety Statements prepared, it’s a good idea in my opinion to have a general inspection of fire-related items such as portable extinguishers and smoke alarms on its Common Property regularly undertaken on a voluntary basis, and to include stand-alone smoke alarms within individual Lots provided access can be easily arranged.
Costa said … I think I sense a terseness..
No… I wasn’t being rude or unfriendly, but rather using your term perhaps inappropriately to express my frustration with the fact that your questions had been answered, good advice had been given, and yet you had come back with substantially the same questions perhaps expecting a different answer (?).
You’re not the only one by the way!
Anyway, at least you’re happy with the new E/C Member even though it’s not you, and as the last few posts illustrate, there is as you’ve observed some inexactness around interpretations of the Act – but at least that keeps the Tribunal occupied whenever one of those oft-used (interpretations) suddenly doesn’t “work” for a particular Plan.
Good on you Poirot, but unless you have the energy to regularly wind-up the desk-bound sleuths at the NSW Department of Fair Trading, don’t expect any worthwhile result there any time soon!
Depending upon your Building Manager’s terms of appointment and their duties, you may have a case against them also.
Sorry Jimmy, but I don’t think that’s right, and whilst I hate quoting bits of the Act, Schedule 3 (with my emphasis underlined and an explanation in italics)….
Cl.2(3) states “The members of an executive committee must be elected at each annual general meeting of the owners corporation“; and
Cl.4(2) states “When a vacancy occurs in the office of a member of an executive committee [otherwise than by reason of subclause (1) (d) (i.e. at the end of their term)], the owners corporation must appoint a person eligible for election as a member to fill the vacancy. Any person so appointed holds office, subject to this clause, for the balance of his or her predecessor’s term of office”.
So in as much as both delaying the filling of a Executive Committee (E/C) vacancy until the next AGM an convening an EGM just for that purpose may be undesirable, that’s what I believe is the intent under the provisions of the Act – despite the fact that in some other situations a decision of the E/C is taken to be one of the Owners Corporation.
Again, whilst Cl.3 provides for acting E/C Members to be appointed as you describe, I am of the opinion that means a personal attendance by another Owner in that acting capacity and not a written proxy by the absent Member in the form and with the intention allowed at General Meetings.
Always learning, so I’m happy to be corrected though.
Costa – no sour grapes from me either, but your question was answered by Stevecro way back in post #3, but to reiterate, there is no provision for votes by proxy at Executive Committee Meetings, and Members are elected by the Owners Corporation at General Meetings.
So even though, as Jimmy foreshadowed in post #5, the remaining Members of your Executive Committee rushed to elect anyone but you to the empty chair, that process was contrary to the Act, Mr X is not a Member, you should at least inform your Secretary of that fact, and perhaps reconsider proceedings under Sect 138.