Management of your association is accomplished by various boards and committees as designated by your governing documents. They are made up of volunteer owners who are members of your community. One thing they all have in common is the need to have meetings. State laws standardize certain procedures, the first of which is “notice of meetings”.

Generally, unless they are considering a regular or special assessment, your board of directors must provide 48 hours advance notice of their meetings by posting a copy of the agenda on the association property. Otherwise, or in the case of membership meetings, the owners must be notified at least 14 days in advance by mail, personal delivery, or electronic transmission. Annual meetings, election meetings and certain special meetings have additional requirements.

Flagler Coastal attends to the clerical and administrative details and provides support to help you conduct productive association meetings. We can assist in explaining Robert’s Rules of Order when there is a procedural question. A representative of management will be available to attend monthly board meetings and may serve in the capacity of recording secretary to keep minutes, if requested.

Since delays of 10 days or more can result in fines to the association, Flagler Coastal will maintain the official copies of the association minutes of board, membership and committee meetings and will administer requests from members for access, inspection and copying of those records unless otherwise instructed by the board.

As a rule, you should keep your meetings confined to the topics announced on the agenda. Do not allow the “new business” and “old business” segments of your meeting to degenerate into lengthy discussion of major topics that will necessitate further research, discussion and, ultimately, another meeting. When such issues arise, make a note of the subject matter, table the discussion and have the topic listed on the agenda of the next regular meeting.

A little advance planning in the preparation of your agenda will pay you dividends in keeping your meetings moving forward. Always be mindful that the participants in your association meetings are volunteers and respect their time and interest. Ask your association manager what suggestions they have to keep your meetings to within 90 minutes, or less.