July 2024 CT

MANAGEMENT TRENDS

Benefits of Board Member Training & Board’s Roles in the Community By Vincent Rapolla, AMS, PCAM, Taylor Management Company, AAMC, AMO

N ow is the most important time in our industry to ensure that community association boards and residents are the most informed they can be in order to make the best decisions for their communities. Board members often times forget they are a fiduciary that must make decisions on the better business judgement rule and not on straight emotions. With the increase in State legislation both administratively and structurally, it is critical that our boards are aware of what has been recently approved at the State level. Many board members and managers often forget the hierarchy of governance over community associations and lean towards their bylaws and master deed as the end all, forgetting that these are all trumped by local, state and federal laws. The new legislation has taken away many grey areas of governance for a community association. Case law is often not considered by boards when making decisions. This is why it is especially important to consult your community association attorney and keep these decisions in a file for future reference. From the management side, these new legislative acts have for once given community association managers a leg to stand on when providing guidance to our community associations. Educating your boards on board training and getting them into a program is vital to healthy relationships with your board, members of the community and management. The community association industry also may have the most resources available for educating our boards than we have ever seen. Best practices in the industry were often very hard to come by as there were none in place. Once your board has received the proper training, it is now time to work with them and how they, as the govern ing body for the association, should get involved.

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“Educating your boards on board training and getting them into a program is vital to healthy relationships with your board...”

As a manager do not be concerned that the board will know more than you. This will play into the success of the community. Practicing professionally as a corporate board is the best way for our board members to run the association. Not los ing sight of the decisions they make will have a long-lasting impact on their community. It is okay for a board to take time on a decision. In the past we would have our monthly board meeting. The asso ciation manager would provide a detailed management report and decisions were made, questions asked and actions assigned for the next meeting. Now more than ever there is a constant need for updates. When, in fact, an update from any particular Friday is likely the same as it is the following Tuesday. CONTINUES ON PAGE 36

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JULY 2024