Residents in Finley Farms, a large subdivision in Gilbert, had a recall vote on Wednesday and ousted the Home Owners Association (HOA) President and Vice President.
The Arizona Republic story reports that residents "were fed up with how their homeowners' association ran meetings and handled requests to change house façades…"
I served on my HOA's Board of Directors for two years, and can attest that it's a difficult, thankless job. I didn't run for re-election earlier this year due to not being able to give the position and home owners the time they require. The rest of my fellow board members, some *outstanding* people who ran one of the best HOA's I've ever seen, all chose to run again. And all were defeated, giving our HOA an entirely new board — that I haven't seen a thing from since; good, bad or indifferent.
Granted, my (former) HOA board may be an exception. Believe me, I've seen some horrific HOAs do some moronic things, in Phoenix and elsewhere.
HOA bashing seems to be a popular subject (just read the comments in the Finley Farms AZ Republic story, or any HOA forum out there). The problem I have is it seems the vast majority of people bitching about HOAs don't remotely attempt to do anything about it.
Some will say, "If you don't want to live in an HOA, move". That often isn't a viable option. But sitting back and whining about things clearly won't help. There are things that can be done. If you want to fix your HOA, then read your CC&Rs, run for the board, attend board meetings, speak at meetings, vote. If all that is too time consuming or irritating, spool up a grass roots effort and do what some of the residents of Finely Farms just did and affect some real change that way.
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Tim Wallace My Arizona Home Team 10.27.07 at 12:02 pm
Jay, I serve on my board as well and agreed to another term. You are on the money with community members. They never show up unless they want to complain or ask for fines to be waived. We have 537+/- homeowners in our association and other than board members and committee members, we rarely have over 2 or 3 homeowners present. We view our responsibilities very seriously and have to manage enormous budgets, take care of the community, deal with contractors that don’t do what they are supposed to do and on and on. Our responsibility is to enforce the CC&Rs and yet so many homeowners think we are out to “get” them and hand pick those who are fined etc…. I wouldn’t live in a non-association community personally. Another part of the problem is that people don’t read the CC&Rs of the communities during their inspection period if they even get them. Unless their agent at the time of purchase, if they had one, is on top of things, more than likely they pay little attention to that document until they get a citation. Then somehow it becomes the fault of the board that they are in trouble. AARRRGGHHH!!!!!
Brent Hanks 10.29.07 at 9:37 am
Jay - I’ve been a member of the Architectural Committee of the Finley Farms North HOA for a number of years and have worked closely with both of the gentlemen that have just been removed from the Board by a number of disgruntled homeowners. What the papers don’t point out is the recall effort was spearheaded by two families that have not complied with the CC&R’s. The HOA had to finally get the attorneys involved and then when the families were not succecful in trying to overturn the Committee and Boards findings of noncompliance they decided to remove those that were trying to enfore the CC&R’s.
Unfortunalely, working on an HOA Board or Committee is a thankless job and the only ones that your hear from are those that are not willing to abide by the CC&R’s. I was sorry to see two fine individuals that have given so much of their time to be kick in the teeth by those that want things their way.
Jay - The Phoenix Real Estate Guy 10.29.07 at 10:28 am
Brent - thanks for stopping by and filling in the parts that the mainstream media invariably leaves out.
Our entire board was basically ousted by 3 or 4 homeowners that had architectural requests denied (all *clearly* violated existing CC&Rs and architectural guidelines). They walked the neighborhood and got enough people fired up to vote them onto the board (all it takes is 10% of the home to have a quorum — 30 homes in my neighborhood.)
Several of the ousted board members had served for years, and given literally hundreds of hours of their time — gratis of course — to the neighborhood.
Since the election, I have neither seen nor heard a peep from the new board. I suspect if I drove by their homes though, I’d see some newly approved changes in progress…
They will likely get what they wanted, to the detriment of the neighborhood.
Joe Perrone 11.01.07 at 8:38 pm
Jay- Hi I’m one of the so called 2 families that Brent Hank is talking about.The one thing Brent leaves out is in the last year he has not been to a board meeting.Yes he sit’s on the architectural committee,but dosen’t know what has been going on in the hoa meeting. He talks about how they had to get a attorneys for my violation. What he dosen’t tell you is I tried to talk to those board members who where recalled and come to a compermise,but they told me and my wife to talk to there attorney. These 2 recalled members also sat on the architectural committee. One also had his wife on that committee. Jay I could go on with some of the other things they did,but as a community we got together and we are now takeing back OUR community and makeing it the place we fell in love with and moved there for.
Dave Keeler 11.03.07 at 10:23 am
Jay –
I’m a member of the Finley Farms North HOA and an original resident there since the tract came on the market. I had been a member of and past President of an HOA at my former residence for six terms. Being a member of an HOA board can be a thankless and tiring task, however it is essential that a Board equally apply the HOA rules and further by example, follow those rules themselves. I am very familiar with and understand the workings of an HOA, the role of the Board and have also served on a Board of the Town of Gilbert.
The purpose of the HOA CC&Rs is not only to set boundaries upon the members but also to protect the rights of the homeowner members. Mr. Hanks would have you believe that this dispute revolved around two individual homeowners, it involved numerous homeowners. The alleged individual violations pail in comparison to the actual harm placed upon the community by the two removed members of the Board in their contempt, disregard and corruption of the community CC&Rs.
At every instance that a protective clause should have provided an avenue of recourse and appeal, the Board chose to disregard those rights to the extent of claiming the protective provisions were not legitimate, had been revoked or never in existence. When documentation (as required by law) had been requested by homeowners to support such claims, the Board failed to provide documentation, while belittling those that had made such requests.
The situation that erupted in the removal of the two Board members of Finley Farms North was considerably more complex than some would care to acknowledge. The Board and the Architectural Committee had failed to hold or announce meetings, held meetings in private, failed to maintain proper documentation of meetings, failed to provide meeting documentation to the management firm for permanent record and access by the membership, and often failed to respond to homeowner architectural submittals within proscribed time limitations – thereby rendering untimely decisions unenforceable.
Quite simply: if the judges in our court systems were to issue citations, prosecute defendants, and render decisions on actions which they themselves initiated; that would not be considered fair or just. We had a Board of Directors who had appointed themselves and proxies to the Architectural Committee, revoked all avenues of architectural appeal, and went forth as the members of the rump Architectural Committee to issue alleged citations to homeowners. Clearly this too was not fair or just.
The homeowner members had the responsibility to restore the proper functioning of the Board and Architectural Committee equally applying the provisions of the CC&Rs in protecting the rights and protections of the community as a whole. That was the action that was taken by the Finley Farms North HOA in removing the two directors from the Board.
For reference, I had no violations or disputes with the HOA and have not been delinquent in any of my assessments. This matter revolved around the inability of the Board itself to properly consider and follow our CC&Rs.
Dave Cisar 11.04.07 at 9:16 am
Jay-
I too have lived in Finley Farms now for over 11 years. The gentlemen that Brent Hanks refers to were removed not because of the two families that did not comply with the CC&r’s, but were removed for the following reasons:
• The backing of our original property manager:
a. who violated state laws,
b. forged documents regarding homeowner’s architectural submittals.
c. illegally removing homeowner’s personal property, with the approval of the president of the board.
d. removed homeowner’s personal folders from the management company.
e. was very unprofessional at board meetings.
f. was terminated for his actions by the property management company.
• The lack of response to questions posed to them at meetings.
• Board members and their family serving as judge, jury and executioner on the Architectural Committee, when there were several homeowners that wanted to volunteer to sit on the committee and were denied consideration.
• Having only seven Arch. Comm. Meetings since January 2006 up to October of 2007.
• Providing no appeals process in which ASR 33-1803(planned communities) states “A description of the process the Owner must follow to contest the notice of violation”. (Having a hearing amongst the board that is on the Arch Comm. Is NOT a way of contesting).
• Paying $35,000 out of HOA funds for the replacement of park equipment that was supposedly “out of code” (give or take a thousand).
• Unnecessary expenditure of HOA funds for legal fees.
These are just a few reasons these gentlemen were removed from office.
Brent, contrary to your belief, these are the facts. Their letters of slander and false statements without any facts leads me to believe that this is nothing more than a personal vendetta. Or are they trying to hide something? Maybe if you would have attended just one board meeting since Nov. 2006 you would be a little more educated to the truth.
Jay - The Phoenix Real Estate Guy 11.04.07 at 10:49 am
I appreciate everyones comments. I don’t live in Finley Farms so I don’t have all the particulars. There are always two sides to every story and I appreciate everyone sharing their thoughts.
HOA issues and concerns are often quite emotionally charged!
Art Soucek 02.01.08 at 2:56 pm
Finley Farms (North) held their annual election of Board members last night with an all time high level of participation. Over 110 votes were cast out of 373 Association members. The community was left without a valid Board since October as a result of a recall of some Board members. Any HOA considering a recall should reaearch very carefully their CC&R’s to avoid a lapse in leadership, it is indeed a hardship on all concerned. The new Board is void of any members of the Old Board or of the recall effort. The community has spoken, and made it clear they were tired of all the conflict of the past year. This gives the community a great opportunity to heal wounds suffered by both sides of many issues over the past fifteen months, move forward with fresh thinking and new ideas, and continue the quest to maintain the desierability of the community as well as property values. I congratulate the five elected, and look forward to seeing the community return to smooth and uninhibited operation.
Jay - The Phoenix Real Estate Guy 02.01.08 at 5:06 pm
Thanks for the update Art!
“Any HOA considering a recall should research very carefully their CC&R’s to avoid a lapse in leadership, it is indeed a hardship on all concerned.”
Sage advice…