Presidency or Dictatorship!

This has been a very interting thread. Very impressed with Diaoackly and Roberto's posts

It does seem that there is a lack of organisation by the troops. That lets the officers have it all their own way. Not always to the advangage of the community.

It is not easy but essential that owners have each others contact details. After all they are all neighbours. That way those who pay little attention to the shenanigans, may be surprised to hear what goes on in their name.

As for the proxy vote saga, our community has been down this route and consulted the law. There was an attempt to restrict the proxy holder to holding 3 proxies. This is against the law ! No one can disenfranchise an owner for selecting an unpopular proxy holder. Nor is there any limit to the number of proxies held by one person. A paid up owner can chose their own proxy holder and they need not be members of the community. A total outsider, if trusted is just a legal. The difficulty for owners not attending an AGM, is to know WHO exactly will attend. It is inevitable that the president will be there and if he is trusted, then it is logical that he will be the right proxy holder.

Another way of owners communicating without disclosing their e-mail address is via Face Book or if there is a member interested in making a Forum, it can be set up for people to chat amongst fellow neighbours at any time. Not always popular, as it is a bit of work for the moderator and some owners may not be PC competant, others totally disinterested. Such are the many problems of living in a community. Some work needs to be done to get your community into a solid democratic group, all with an opportunity to speak other than once a year at an AGM.

No one says democracy is perfect but it's a helluva lot better than anarchy.

Cheers

Leo

If you don't attend the AGM, you may not have an option to influence a decision taken about a subject which is raised at the meeting but not on the agenda.

I think the Law of Horizontal Property allows an owner 30 natural days after receipt of details to 'vote' on a resolution.
Also I think it is permissible for an owner to withold payments for a particular expenditure with which they are not in favour.
The owner runs the risk of being excluded from the benefit of the expenditure they do not wish to contribute to though.

I would suggest that you make sure that any action you decide on is within the law before taking the action.

I remember being rather surprised to find out that a candidate for President need not announce an intention to stand before the Meeting.
That makes it difficult to tell your Proxy how you wish your vote to be cast.

In the past we have been very specific about how we wished our Proxy to vote on all items on the agenda.
We ask the Proxy to vote against any resolution not on the agenda.
This may seem silly, but by doing this, we hope to encourage more openness and forward thinking.

The real shame of AGMs in Spain is that far too many of those who attend them wish to use them as a platform for a slanging and finger pointing oportunity.

Openness and clarity in all Community things would seem the best way, but it is amazing how many owners are frightened of hearing things as there are really are rather than as they look.

With ownership comes responsibility.
All members of a Community share ownership of a very valuable capital asset.
I am often surprised that some owners do not seem to recognise this.
 

On the nail again Dai.

However I was under the impression that if an item was not on the agenda, then it could not be voted on. It belongs under any other business, if a decision is required it must await the next AGM or EGM for approval or confirmation. The president of course does have a limited right to make decisions on many issues, providing it does not exceed a certain proportional percentage of the community fees.

Most certainly openness exposes any dubious practices. Your community must get itself organised. Begin by collecting contact information of all owners. Alas in a democracy you may discover that the majority are in favour of how the community is presently run. At best, perhaps they just don't care. Then you are banging your head against the wall.

I wish you success in your endeavour. Nothing worthwhile is easy to achieve.

Cheers

Leo

Thank you very much for your pointers too Leo.

The subject of the accuracy of minutes of general meetings was raised.

On inspection of our Community's Minute Book, it became clear that there was no record of any resolutions which had been adopted at general meetings.

Some owners had acted in accordance with what was approved at AGMs only to discover that the decisions had not been recorded and therefore did not stand.
In one instance, one owner threatened to take legal action against another for what was described as 'illegal' additions.

As the actions involved alterations and additions to owners' properties - creation of sun-rooms etc, it was necessary to propose that all adaptations, additions and alterations up to and including the date of that particular AGM would be deemed as approved.
This proposal was adopted unanimously and minuted fully and correctly.

I understand that there have been instances where a President has insisted that work should be 'undone'.
It may be worth checking your own Community's Minute Book to make sure you don't find yourself on the wrong end of an inefficiency stick.

Dai.

Just started reading this communication and amazed at the number of Dictators calling themselves Presidence, had thought it was just mine.

Our president is also the Administrator and receives !8,000 euros plus out of pocket expenses which he classes as Tax and Insurance giving a total cost to the Community of over 31,000 euros. He also decides what does and does not appear on the A.G.M. agenda, if he does not like the item or proposal he refuses its entry. At our last meeting a vote was taken to replace him but it was claimed a recount was required and the result would be sent out by E-Mail which gave him time to obtain further proxy votes and keep his position. He also writes off  substancal debt as he likes. How does he get away with it you may ask, two or three big proxy holders support him god knows why.

o 

1st December 2015

Dear Davidg

It is worth checking out the current Law of Horizontal Property to see if the clause which disallows employees of a community from being officers.

Clearly an Administrator is employed by the Community.

Also an Administrator is required to carry out any legal instructions of the Presdient.

Although the Law is often considered as a perfect nuisance in many ways, it may be your best ally in tour case.

Keep safe and well,

Best wishes.

Dai.

I don't think there is anything in the HPA which stops a President or an owner acting as Administrator if he/she feel they can do a better job than a professional company, as long as the majority of owners approve.

what can and should be challenged is renumeration, expenses and fees paid for the job and all owners should want a day on whether their affairs are being managed correctly.

to call an EGM to discuss a particular issue you need a request from at least 25% of owners and you would need to rally enough support to question the fees etc.

if necessary you need to ensure a qualified lawyer is present at a meeting to represent the views of the dissenters and ensure they have a proxy so entitled to attend.

Well done hugh-man, after a quick look at several different translations of the HPA, it looks as if you are right.

Your other advice also seems to be very sound.

It would appear that a Community can do pretty much what it wants to within the terms of the HPA provided what they decide to do is allowed by the Statutes of the Community.

Looking back at our own Community, the Statutes, such as they were, were drafted by the first Administrator who was appointed by the developer who still owned many properties within the Community.

Since then we have changed Administrator twice but in spite of that things still don't seem to run entirley as one would think they should.

So much hinges on the integrity of the President. We are lucky that we have had some good ones.

The problem of having an autocratic President who is also Administrator is that things are somewhat circular.

It will be necessary to grin and bear it unless you can be sure of proposing and winning a motion at a General Meeting.

It is also extremely important to make absolutely certain that the resolutions of the Community at a General Meeting are actually recorded in the Official Minutes which must be in Spanish, signed by the President of the Meeting and lodged at the Land Registry.

Inclusion in the Community's Official Minute Book which has numbered pages if it is kept by a Member of the Local College of Administrators seems to be sufficient to equate to lodging minutes at the Land Registry.
This may not be the case if an Owner is performing the Office of Administrator - worth looking into.
It may be necessary to number and sign each page manually to make sure that none go absent over time.

I mention this because some of our owners made relatively costly additions and alterations to their properties, believing that the works had been approved at an AGM.
None of those resolutions had been included in the Official Minutes.

The only solution was to propose that all alterations and adaptations in place on the day of our 2012 AGM would be deemed to have the approval of the Community, which should not be confused with approval of the local planning authority.

Keep safe and well,

Best wishes,

Dai.

Davidg, your President sounds truly outrageous. 

Is he paying some of his "salary" to his supporters?  A rhetorical question, but there must be a reason they're supporting him. 

But he's probably not declaring the income, so a note to the Hacienda may be appropriate?