Town backs opt-out rules for condo act

Says senior communities should have alternatives

By: Stephanie Brown
   MONROE — Residents of gated communities who do not want to be included in a proposed bill that would create uniformity among homeowners associations are making themselves heard.
   The Township Council passed a resolution Monday night supporting those residents in age-restricted communities who want to be specifically excluded from the New Jersey Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act bill.
   Assembly bill A798, sponsored by Wilfredo Caraballo (D-Essex) and Peter Biondi (R-Somerset), was passed by the state Assembly in March and would standardize guidelines for all types of community associations, including age-restricted ones.
   A Senate version of the bill sponsored by Sen. Joseph Doria (D-Hudson), is currently in the Community and Urban Affairs Committee.
   The Caraballo bill requires board meetings, including working sessions, to be open to unit owners, and specifies comment periods which must be set aside for unit owners wishing to participate in meetings.
   The bill also provides new guidelines for easy accessible records, public disclosure of bidding for certain contracts, and procedures to ensure fair and open governing board elections.
   Council President Gerald Tamburro said homeowner associations are "quasi-governments." He said homeowner associations that don’t already operate democratically would be forced to do so under the bill. As a result, resident in those communities would gain greater protections.
   "Think of it this way, Greenbriar has approximately 1,600 units with two people per unit — that’s an overestimation of 3,200 people," he said. "Helmetta has 3,000 people. So the residents of Helmetta have greater protections because they’re in a municipality than the 3,200 people in Greenbriar. And that’s where these bills came about — trying to give those residents in gated communities protections that people in a municipality get."
   However, some members of age-restricted communities say they are satisfied with how their homeowner associations operate and are pushing for an amendment to be excluded from the bill.
   Hadassah Linfield, a resident of Greenbriar at Whittingham, spoke to the Township Council on behalf of the Committee Against State Regulation of Private Communities — a local group of the bill’s opponents — and explained why they did not want to be a part of it.
   Ms. Linfield said they believe the bill would increase association fees, which retirees on fixed incomes cannot afford, grow government at time when the state is seeking to consolidate, and set requirements already being met in the township’s age-restricted communities.
   "In other words," Ms. Linfield said, "they will not aid in the government of the communities."
   The council passed a resolution supporting a proposed amendment to the bill that would exclude age-restricted communities and allow communities to opt in if a majority vote is achieved.
   Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein, a Democrat whose district includes Jamesburg and Monroe, sponsored the proposed amendment.
   Ms. Greenstein said she hoped that the amendment would satisfy those homeowners who want protection under state law, as well as those who are happy with the way their community is governed.
   "It gives people on all sides of the issue an opportunity to get what they want," she said Wednesday.
   In addition to the Doria and Caraballo bills, the New Jersey Legislature is considering another bill that would regulate and provide oversight to the state’s community associations.
   Sens. Shirley K. Turner, a Democrat from Mercer County, and Ronald Rice, a Democrat from Essex County, are sponsors of another Senate bill S1608 called the Owners’ Rights in Common Interest Developments Act.
   The Senate Community and Urban Affairs Committee will hear testimony Monday on the laws governing common interest communities and the rights and powers of unit owners, boards and associations at Essex County College in Newark.