Question: Can non-owners be a proxy committee member in SA?
A lot owner’s family member resides permanently in the unit. They are a proxy for the lot owner at meetings. The proxy is renewed yearly for the family member to be a committee member. Can non-owners be committee members in SA?
Answer: If the units are used for residential purposes, no. A person who is not an owner cannot form part of the committee.
Simply put, if the units are used for residential purposes, no. A person who is not an owner cannot form part of the committee.
Both the Strata Titles Act and Community Titles Act do allow proxies to be given to others to attend the committee meetings. However, they must be a unit holder if the lots are used for residential purposes.
The Strata Titles Act states that if ALL units are used for non-residential purposes, the committee may include persons who are not unit holders. The Community Titles Act states that if 1 or more lots are used for non-residential purposes, the committee may include non unit holders.
Strata Titles Act
35—Management committee
- Subject to subsection (1a), a strata corporation may, by ordinary resolution, appoint a management committee of unit holders.
- Where all of the units comprised in the strata scheme consist of non-residential premises, the management committee may consist of, or include, persons who are not unit holders.
- A member of a management committee can appoint another person (who must, unless all of the units comprised in the strata scheme consist of non-residential units, be a unit holder) to act as his or her proxy at any meeting of the committee that the member is unable to attend.
Community Titles Act
90—Establishment of management committee
- Subject to subsection (6), where each of the community lots is used, or is intended to be used, solely or predominantly for residential purposes, all the members of the committee must be members of the corporation and for that purpose a person for the time being appointed by a body corporate that is a member of the corporation to attend and vote at meetings of the corporation will be taken to be a member of the corporation.
- Where one or more of the community lots are not used, or intended to be used, sole or predominantly for residential purposes, the committee may be comprised of or include persons who are not members of the corporation.
This post appears in Strata News #716.
Carrie McInerney
Horner Management
E: carrie@hornermanagement.com.au
P: 08 8234 5777
Over several annual meetings a majority voted on 50 being the minimum age,this is now being challenged by one owner who wants his young daughter to occupy, how do we solve this
Hi William, making resolutions like this may breech the various Discrimination Acts unless the development is aged care etc. You may wish to seek legal advice whether your resolutions are appropriate.
How does voting a committee member work when they nominate in the meeting and the quorum is achieved by proxy?
As an example in our last AGM a member nominated and got 1 vote and was elected.
24 units
8 unit owners were present
A quorum was achieved
The Strata Manager won’t provide evidence of the voting tally and the company refuses to clearly explain the process or accept fault cos he clearly didn’t get the majority.
People who think that there strata manager does everything by the book in the best interest to the committee need to wake up also you need to be aware of your management committee doing the dirty behind your back.ALWAYS LOOK OUTSIDE OF THE BOX
Your so right. They take your money in fees and promise so much in the blurb they give you to say how professional they are but truth is they don’t give a dam.
These strata managers have so many properties on their books to look after its a great money making business for them.
[comment removed by Admin]
In a large strata title building in SA one unit has husband and wife owners, they both took Proxies, both voted and jointly controlled the meeting
Was the meeting informal
Your reply would be appreciated
Regards, Mark
Hi Mark
Carrie McInerney, Horner Management has responded to your question in the above article.
We gave our strata manager our proxie votes, as we had to go to work. We shouldn’t have to give a paid work up to attend any meeting. (yes it was no to all the motions the building manager/caretakers and Secretary wanted in).
When we received the minutes 2 weeks later, he said he couldn’t use our votes as he had other owners votes. Yet our two votes would off not allowed the motion to be approved. He also said we should off nominated another owner to hold our proxies, yet he and the secretary asked owners to inform them whom was attending so they can give owners votes to hold. But they didn’t pass our proxies on to any other owner.
We were horrified to find out our votes were declined. We are financial.
We feel it was rigged as our 2 votes would have stopped the motions.
Hi Rose
We have received this reply from Ace Body Corporate Management:
Thanks for your comment. It appears from what you have written that you sent your proxy into the manager with your votes to be tabled at the meeting and they weren’t. Is this correct?
Well, if this is the case and you were financial at this meeting, then you should be addressing this with your Strata Management Company, as the manager has not performed their task which is to table your votes in accordance with your proxy. There is not much more we can suggest you do, however, we hope you are able to resolve this matter.
We sent the strata manager an email asking why our votes were rejected, he said we had not given him other owners names to hold our proxies.
It was the owners Corporations strata manager company whom the owners Corp employ and runs the meetings along with the secretary, we followed their directions and gave our votes to the strata manager of our complex.
the secretary sent an email of the agenda and motions and for owners whom cannot attend to send their proxies to the secretary or to the strata manager (not the building manager/caretaker) and they said if you are an financial owner to send your proxies to the strata manager or the Secretary and they will let owners know whom can hold their proxies, we did as they asked. But when we recieved the minutes the secretary wrote in the minutes that our 2 votes weren’t able to be used as the strata manager had held too many proxies ie for other owners. And we didn’t write another owners name down, we don’t know the other owners or whether they are financial or not. Those other proxies that our strat manager held weren’t against the motion but ours was.
They pick and choose whose votes to use. This is grossly unfair. Our 2 votes would have stopped what they wanted changed.
They have ignored us paying owners.