Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Bylaw amendments

[John Carver (jcarver]

On 14/04/2013 8:18 AM, Pam Gilchrist wrote:
> Laws vary by states, but are there other cohousing communities who would
> share their experience amending bylaws to insert the consensus process
> with a fall back voting option?

Well, here in BC it's called strata property and we're governed by the 
Strata Property Act. Here's what Pacific Gardens has in the bylaws:
> 16 Voting at council meetings
>     (1) At council meetings, decisions will be made by the consensus 
> process outlined in the community
> guidelines.
>     (2) If a decision cannot be made by using the consensus process, 
> the matter may be resolved with a vote
> of 3/4 of voting members present.
>     (3) Voting is restricted to owners of strata lots only, one vote 
> per strata lot.
>     (4) The results of all votes at a council meeting must be recorded 
> in the council meeting minutes.

Subsections 3 and 4 are straight from the standard bylaws prescribed by 
the Act. There's a little more on process for AGMs but the effect is the 
same.

Note that in (2) there is no attempt to clarify how to determine when a 
decision cannot be made by consensus, or at what point you fall back to 
3/4 vote. Also the consensus process is not spelled out in the bylaws. 
These clauses were put in the bylaws to satisfy the requirements of the 
Act. Our process is consensus, and in effect if you have consensus you 
at least have 3/4 agreement.

Another thing to note: we define strata council in the bylaws as 
consisting of all owners, tenants and occupants. Everyone can 
participate in consensus. Ss (3) would presumably protect against a 
majority of non-owners voting something detrimental to the owners' 
interests.

So how does that work in practice? Well, so far we've never had to fall 
back to a vote. In general when we've reached a point where we are as 
close as we're going to get to full agreement then a decision has been 
reached. Granted sometimes we never get there, but no one has asked for 
a vote. I think we would only do that in the case where a critical 
decision, like the annual budget, was being unnecessarily delayed.

John Carver
Pacific Gardens Cohousing Community
Nanaimo, British Columbia
http://pacificgardens.ca/

ps We have suites for sale, and places for rent. It's a lovely spot on 
Vancouver Island on Canada's west coast. Check us out.