› Flat Chat Strata Forum › The Professionals › Current Page
- This topic has 8 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 11 years, 4 months ago by .
-
CreatorTopic
-
23/07/2013 at 8:17 pm #8944Hello thereI wonder if you could please help…We held our AGM in June and voted in General business to remove a planter box with artificial plants in our unit block, from common property.We have now been told by the Strata Manager that “we are unable to proceed as this wasn’t formally voted on as it wasn’t a motion on the agenda”10 of the 12 Owners were represented in person and or by proxy at the meeting.
Please advise. If more details/information is required please let me know. Thanks
Welly
-
CreatorTopic
-
AuthorReplies
-
23/07/2013 at 10:10 pm #19066
Welly – it’s possible that the other two owners could have come up with some really convincing arguments that may have resulted in a different decision about the planter box, but they weren’t there to put their points of view because that wasn’t a Motion on the Meeting Agenda.
That’s why (in NSW) there’s no General Business permitted on the Agenda for General Meetings, and I’m afraid that your Strata Manager’s advice is correct.
If you want the planter box removed, then put that as a Motion on the Agenda for your Plan’s next General Meeting, or provided it’s not in any way fixed to the Common Property, then request your Executive Committee to consider it as a formal Motion on a published Agenda for their next Meeting.
26/07/2013 at 1:54 pm #19079Whale & Welly,
The way I see it, if the planter box is indeed common property (whether or no it is affixed to common property) then it’s removal would be considered to be altering common property. Therefore this would IMO require a special resolution under 65A.
26/07/2013 at 4:07 pm #19080‘Just’ – l know that the wording of the current Act requires a deal of interpretation, but I was coming from the angle that if the planter box is fee standing, then the E/C wouldn’t be altering or changing any areas of the Common Property by removing it.
If on the other hand it’s fastened to the floor or to a wall and the E/C or the Owners Corporation (O/C) for that matter wants to remove it, relocate it, or make it bigger/smaller, then S65A would apply in each of those scenarios.
For Welly’s info., in NSW S65A is a section of the Act that deals with changing or altering Common Property. If necessary in your case, that action requires a Special Resolution of the Owners Corporation where at least 75% of those Owners present at General Meeting both personally and by proxy need to be in favour of the Motion, with that percentage determined from the unit entitlements of those Owners ÷ the aggregate unit entitlements for the Strata Plan.
31/07/2013 at 9:18 pm #19113Thanks. Could you please advise if matter can be raise in General Business or wether it needs to be on this notice of motion on the AGM.
Thanks
Welly
31/07/2013 at 9:41 pm #19114@Welly said:
Thanks. Could you please advise if matter can be raise in General Business or wether it needs to be on this notice of motion on the AGM.There is no such thing as “general business” at a General Meeting – you can only vote on things that are on the agenda and each agenda item has to be specified in a motion. So your Strata Manager is absolutely right.
However, this is something that could be handled in an EC meeting and doesn’t really require a general meeting to make a decision. If the EC is acting against the wishes of the majority of owners, an Extraordinary General Meeting can be called to instruct the strata manager to undertake the required action.
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.
27/09/2013 at 8:57 am #19620Does anyone know if the General Ledger Transaction Report must be provided to owners with the AGM Notice?
The SSMAct (106) is not specific about the type of financial information that must be provided to owners with the AGM documents. Apparently, according to an email received from the NSW Fair Trading in May 2013, Sect 106 (4) (c) does not mean the General Ledger Transaction Report.
As a large scheme (over 100 lots) we receive an audited report but this does not include the individual transactions that make up the items in the report. An example last year was when over $130,000 was paid for consultants. The strata manager was contacted before the meeting and asked for the General Ledger Transaction Report (emailed as a PDF) but declined advising in the email that the Owners Corporation had instructed that this document was not to be made available to owners. At the AGM this was discussed and it was later posted on StrataMax. I have asked for this to be available (on StrataMax – no printing costs) before the next AGM in 2014 but the strata manager will not respond to my email.
I have also wriiten to the Minister asking that the revised SSMAct be more specific about the financial information that should be available to owners at AGMs. The NSW OFT was also contacted and suggested I inspect the OCs records. The strata manager has also offered that I conduct an inspection of the OCs records but I would need to take time from work which like most owners is not practical and I consider unnecessary to find out how our levies are being spent. This information could easily be made available on StrataMax for owners once a year to access by secure log in.
In response to –
66. Are annual financial statements sufficient?
The Act needs to be more specific about the contents and availability to owners. I would pay for the General Ledger Transaction Report to be printed and posted.
27/09/2013 at 10:21 am #19624larry – I agree that in some circumstances the (NSW) Act’s requirement for the financial statements to include “the particulars and amount of each item of expenditure from the fund during the current period” is insufficient as it implies that only the total expenditure against each chart of account “item” needs to be provided with the AGM Agenda.
So if you want to see the detailed transaction report but are unable to make the time to do that, even outside of normal work hours by arrangement with your Strata Manager, then your second best option is to place a Motion on the Agenda for your 2014 AGM that’s worded such that it’s applicable to that and all future General Meetings until such time as it’s rescinded by the Owners Corporation (O/C).
That reported O/C instruction about not making the transaction report available to Owners seems odd to me. Have you tried a direct approach to the Treasurer of your Executive Committee to check the veracity of the Strata Manager’s comment in that regard?
27/09/2013 at 6:49 pm #19636Thank you, I will write to the secretary and ask that this motion be placed on the next General Meeting as an item on the agenda.
In relation to the instructions received by the strata manager not to provide the General Ledger Transaction Report prior to the AGM, I did write to the strata manager after the meeting asking who instructed them to do this and they replied that the scheme had chosen the interpretation of the SSMA ‘that each line item of expenditure be disclosed for the purposes of the meeting, not each individual payment’. She also advised that she was instructed by the Executive Committee not to release this information.
I followed up to find out who gave these instructions and she replied “feel free to attend our office and undertake a S108 search to satisfy your enquiry.” No where in any Executive Committee Minutes were there instructions of this nature recorded. Whether it was in email to the strata manager from an Executive Committee member will test the extent of records available under a S108 search.
I have asked the strata manager to resign over this lack of financial transparency and other matters.
-
AuthorReplies
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
› Flat Chat Strata Forum › The Professionals › Current Page