As a result of the Global Pandemic, Colorado’s legislative season of 2020 was thrown into chaos. Many bills that were introduced were either delayed, stripped down or pulled by the bill sponsor. Last year’s CCIOA Transparency Responsibility Competency bill, HB20-1333, was no exception. With an extra year to work on the bill, Rep. Brianna Titone has reintroduced the bill as HB 21-1229.
HB 21-1229 is all-encompassing, with very few parts of CCIOA left untouched. The bill touches on the following provisions, among others:
- Disclosure of documents: by requiring posting of association documents and transfer fees on a state owned web site.
- Board meetings and elections: by allowing election monitoring, taping of meetings, prohibiting use of secret ballots and prohibiting the appointments to the board to fill vacancies and allowing owners to petition the board for agenda items. There is also a component for mandatory board member education. Owners will also be able to demand notice of board meetings. Proxies will be limited as well.
- Xeriscaping and solar: by allowing non-vegetative turf grasses and establishing timelines for approval of energy efficient device applications.
- Association operations: by controlling repair phasing, establishing criteria for closure of the common elements and requiring multiple bids for work over $10,000.
- Document inspections and disclosures: by creating a presumption of $50.00 per day damages for failing to produce documents requested by an owner and creating a cause of action for a buyer for failing to produce accurate documents during the sale of a Unit.
- Transition: by revising the dates for transition from declarant control.
- ADR: by requiring mediation for all disputes, including collection matters if a payment plan is not agreed to between the parties.
- Loss assessment: by making the date of a special assessment the date of the loss for purposes of a “loss assessment”.
While this bill may be well-intentioned, it is flawed in a great number of ways. Please stay tuned and review our Legislative Tracker for updates on this bill.
This bill is unnecessary. May we assume Ms. Titone knows little or nothing about the operation of common-interest communities? Why does she attempt to micromanage them? I’m sure she comes well intentioned, but I really wish the Legislature would leave us alone. There is no way to enforce the provisions of CCIOA except for the aggrieved homeowner to hire an attorney and take his association to court. This is no way to resolve issues, and it is costly to all parties. Most courts already require mediation before going before a judge. I have not had good experiences with mediators, and the legal process is lengthy. Plus, it pits homeowners against their own associations.
What is needed is binding out-of-court arbitration for all disputes, except for collection matters. This would include alleged violations of laws and governing documents. We all know that very few complaints are valid or substantive, so there would have to be someone in the State HOA Resource Office to vet the complaints and determine if they are valid. If not valid, that person should explain why they are not. Usually, it just takes pointing out the applicable provision(s) in the law or in the governing documents. 99% of complaints can be resolved in this way, so the system would not be overloaded. Under the current system, the parties would have to go to court just to find this out.
This really can be logical and easy.
HB 21-12299, HOA Reform, flawed, vague accomplishes nothing for homeowners and continues to allow the practice of HOA property management companies to charge HOA transfer fees without providing the payee with an invoice detailing what was done, when and line item cost: the only business that can get away with this in Colorado. The recommendation on dispute resolution is a mess, vague: it doesn’t address the cost, availability of trained-knowledgeable mediators; anyone can be a mediator as they have no license or credential and don’t have to have an understanding of the law or HOAs; the proposals requires an upfront fee that will be $400+ for a mediation session that provides no guarantee of agreement and any agreement can be ignored and thus the homeowner ends up in court which it what they wanted to avoid; this will cost taxpayers over $1 million a year to administer and hire staff (based on previous legislative fiscal note); most homeowners can’t risk $400+ on a simple case or enforcement of CCRs and thus this is an empty solution; the Sunset Review of the State HOA Office in 2019 recommended dispute resolution in the HOA Office (the cost would be on the high end $1.50 per home per year); other issues in this Bill a vague and too general to implement into law and are also already addressed in current law. Homeowners need effective HOA laws and not just more HOA laws. What should be implemented are the Sunset Review recommendations that are effective, straightforward and solve problems and fund all new measures via HOA registration fees than with taxpayer dollars. This Bill is empty and should be killed.