Question: Is the committee required to obtain owners’ consent for an improvement to a common area before submitting a DA to Council?
Our committee recently submitted a DA to Brisbane City Council for a material change to a common area rooftop. The DA was submitted without owners’ knowledge or written consent. The chair and secretary signed the form that certified they’d lodged the DA with “body corporate consent for making a development application under the Planning Act 20l6”.
I’ve viewed Frank Higginson’s maintenance vs improvements webinar, and I believe the rooftop refurbishment is an improvement.
Is the committee required to obtain owners’ written consent when submitting a DA to Council, and, if so, what resolution is required?
The Brisbane City Council website states:
If the application is required to be accompanied by owner’s consent, an application cannot be accepted as ‘properly made’ without it.
Answer: I would very much suggest seeking legal advice before the Council approves anything.
Committees can make decisions for bodies corporate unless they are ‘restricted issues’. Those issues are then reserved for a decision at a general meeting and include things like proceeding (other than one for a levy recovery or a BCCM application). The catch-all is also a decision that changes the ‘rights, privileges or obligations of owners’.
I tend to think that the decision to make an application to change the use of common property is exactly that, but there is always more that goes into these, so I would very much suggest seeking legal advice before Council approves anything.
This post appears in the September 2024 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.
Frank Higginson Hynes Legal E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au P: 07 3193 0500