There’s a couple of issues that merit close examination this week. The first is the plight of someone stuck at home and unable to get a minute’s peace because of kids in the flat downstairs who are constantly screaming.
The other is a slightly more subtle form of intrusion – a committee member who issues emails and even instructions on how to vote – without the permission or even agreement of the rest of the committee.
Taking the screaming kids issue first. There is a basic principle in strata law that you or the people in your apartment can’t disturb another resident’s peaceful enjoyment of their home.
That is a basic strata by-law and you’d be hard-pressed to find an apartment block anywhere in the country where that doesn’t apply to some extent or another.
There is also a basic principle – set in law – that you can’t exclude children from normal strata schemes. I say “normal” because schemes that are set up for the over-55s can and do exclude children, as part of their planning approval.
Otherwise, this might feel like an irresistible force meeting an immovable object, but it isn’t.
People will say that you shouldn’t expect kids not to scream when they are excited. And there’s nothing wrong with kids getting excited. Both of these things are true.
But there are limits. If the kids are screaming all the time – if that is their default setting, then they could be creating a nuisance for other residents.
Children have no absolute right to make noise regardless of the consequences and their parents have not right to allow them to do so.
So it all comes down to the parents. Are they incapable of controlling their children or do they have no desire to do so.
In the latter scenario, you might find that the potential for sanctions, such as fines, might generate that missing desire to curb their kids’ worst excesses.
But if they simply lack the parenting skills to get their kids to keep the noise down when they are in the flat or on the balcony then you have another problem entirely when you could find yourself making frequent trips to the Tribunal. After a very short time, it could seem that you are the unreasonable party in all this.
I’m reminded of communications from years ago about a small scheme built around a swimming pool. A family had bought in there specifically because the pool would be there for their kids.
Shortly after they moved in, the owners corporation announced that they had decided to fill the pool in and replace it with a garden. They said it was the cost of upkeep, but some residents admitted it was because of the noise from successive families and their kids.
Presumably it wasn’t just the newcomers’ who’d prompted such radical action, but maybe they were the last straw.
Have you had a problem with excessively noisy kids in your apartment block? If so, what did you do about it? You can join in the discussion HERE.
Strata bully
On a quieter note, we hear this week about a scheme where one member of the strata committee takes it upon himself to send out messages from the committee to owners, without the other members’ knowledge or approval, but passing those missives off as committee messages.
This kind of behaviour is by no means unique to this scheme and it’s worth noting that when NSW updated our strata laws in 2016, they made a subtle but significant change to the designation of committees.
Out went “executive committee” and in came “strata committee”. Why? It’s reasonable to assume that they didn’t make this change for the fun of it, and in fact it’s easy to divine the thinking behind the change
The word “executive” is all about power and privilege. Executive jets, executive boardrooms, even executive toilets – they are all signals to the ordinary people that the bearer of that title is just a little bit better than you or me.
And, inevitably, there are certain type of people who see themselves that way too. Now, put someone who has that self-image in a group that he or she can bully, and you have all the seeds of a dictatorship.
Bullies are a problem in any social or political group. It’s hard to tell them to pull their heads in when they don’t see any reason why they should. And they will intimidate those who might otherwise support moves to keep them on a shorter leash.
The problem in this case is that anybody can send anyone else an email and unless the message is offensive, there’s not much you can do about it … except to do the one thing that bullies hate – call their bluff.
You can pitch in with your thoughts on how to solve this problem, right HERE.
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