Nevada HOA Boards: the 100-Day Meeting Rule and the 21-Day Records Deadline

Board meeting frequency is written two ways because associations gamed one of them. NRS 116.31083(1) requires a meeting of the executive board at least once every quarter and not less than once every 100 days, so a board cannot stack a January and a December meeting inside adjacent quarters and claim compliance. The same subsection requires that at least twice annually the meeting be held at a time other than during standard business hours, which is what makes an evening or weekend meeting available to owners who work.

Notice runs 10 days out. Under NRS 116.31083(2) the secretary or other officer named in the bylaws must give owners notice not less than 10 days before a board meeting, unless the bylaws require a longer period, an emergency applies, or the meeting is limited to executive-session items. The notice may be given in the manner set out in NRS 116.31068, which starts from the owner's designated electronic mail address, or published in a newsletter or similar publication circulated to each owner. It must state the time and place, include the agenda or say where copies may conveniently be obtained, and expressly notify owners of two rights: to receive a copy of the audio recording, the minutes or a summary of the minutes on request, and to speak to the association or board except in executive session. A period for owner comments and discussion of them must be scheduled at both the beginning and the end of every board meeting, and at the beginning those comments are limited to items listed on the agenda.

Every quarter, and not less than once every 100 days, the board must review six specific items at one of its meetings under NRS 116.31083(7): a current year-to-date financial statement, a current year-to-date schedule of revenues and expenses for the operating account and the reserve account compared to budget, a current reconciliation of the operating account, a current reconciliation of the reserve account, the latest account statements prepared by the financial institutions holding the association's accounts, and the current status of any civil action or claim in arbitration or mediation to which the association is a party.

Board meetings are recorded, and owners may record them too. NRS 116.31083(8) requires the secretary to have every board meeting audio recorded, except an executive session, which must not be recorded, and to make the recording, the minutes and a summary of the minutes available to owners not more than 30 days after the meeting, free in electronic format or at 25 cents per page for the first 10 pages and 10 cents per page thereafter. Minutes must show the date, time and place, which members were present and absent, the substance of all matters proposed, discussed or decided, a record of each member's vote on anything decided by vote, and the substance of an owner's remarks if the owner asks that they be reflected, or a copy of prepared written remarks if submitted. Board minutes must be maintained until the common-interest community is terminated. Under subsection 12 an owner may audio record a board meeting, other than an executive session, after giving notice of that intent to the board members and to the other owners present.

Executive session is narrowly bounded. NRS 116.31085(3) allows it only to consult the association's attorney where the discussion would be privileged under NRS 49.035 to 49.115, to discuss the character, alleged misconduct, professional competence or physical or mental health of a community manager or association employee, to discuss a violation of the governing documents including failure to pay an assessment, or to discuss an alleged failure to adhere to a schedule under NRS 116.310305. Subsection 2 flatly bars executive session for opening or considering bids for an association project as defined in NRS 116.31086, and for entering into, renewing, modifying or terminating a contract. Owners have no right to attend or speak in an executive session, with one exception: a person facing sanction may attend all portions of the hearing on that alleged violation.

Owners' meetings and board elections sit in NRS 116.3108. A meeting of the units' owners must be held at least once each year at a time and place stated in or fixed under the bylaws; if the governing documents set no annual date, the meeting must be held one year after the last one, and if no meeting has been held for a year, on the following March 1. Ballots for the election of board members are opened and counted at that annual meeting. A special meeting must be held if the president, a majority of the board, or owners holding at least 10 percent of the total votes, or a lower percentage in the bylaws, request it; the request is a written petition, signed by the required percentage, mailed return receipt requested or served by a process server on the board or the community manager, and the board must set the special meeting not less than 15 and not more than 60 days after the petition is received. The association may not adopt any rule that prevents or unreasonably interferes with collecting the signatures. Notice of any owners' meeting goes out not less than 15 and not more than 60 days in advance with a copy of the agenda.

Records access is where the numbers bite. NRS 116.31175(1) requires the board, on an owner's written request, to make the association's books, records and other papers available for review at its business office or a designated business location not more than 60 miles from the physical location of the community, during the association's regular working hours. The list expressly includes the financial statement, the budgets required by NRS 116.31151, the reserve study required by NRS 116.31152, and all contracts to which the association is a party plus all records filed with a court in a civil or criminal action to which it is a party. Copies of the financial statement, budgets and reserve study must be provided to an owner or the Ombudsman within 21 days of a written request, in electronic format at no charge, or in paper at no more than 25 cents per page for the first 10 pages and 10 cents per page thereafter. Reviewing records may not cost more than $25 per hour. Records must be kept at least 10 years, other than owners' meeting minutes governed by NRS 116.3108 and board minutes governed by NRS 116.31083.

Three categories are carved out of the review right, and one is carved back in. Subsection 4 excludes employee personnel records, except records of hours worked and of salaries and benefits; records relating to another owner, including any architectural plan or specification another owner submitted during an approval process; and any document, including draft minutes, a reserve study or a budget, that is still being developed for final consideration and has not been placed on an agenda for final approval. Carved back in by subsection 5 is the association's general record of violations: the board must keep a general record of each violation of the governing documents, other than failure to pay an assessment, for which it imposed a fine, a construction penalty or any other sanction, describing the nature of the violation and the type of sanction and stating the amount of any fine or construction penalty, stripped of the name, address or any other information identifying the person or the unit, and kept in an organized and convenient filing or data system that lets an owner search and review it.

The records deadline carries its own money penalty. Under NRS 116.31175(3), if the board fails to provide a copy of the financial statement, budgets or reserve study within 21 days of the written request, the executive board must pay a penalty of $25 for each day it fails to produce them. That runs against the board, not merely the association, and it accrues without any further step by the owner.

If the board refuses to allow a review at all, NRS 116.31175(6) puts the Ombudsman for Owners in Common-Interest Communities and Condominium Hotels between the owner and the board. On written request the Ombudsman may review the books, records or other papers on the owner's behalf during the association's regular working hours, and if the Ombudsman is denied access, may request the Commission for Common-Interest Communities and Condominium Hotels, or a member acting for it, to issue a subpoena for their production. The Ombudsman's wider duties come from NRS 116.625, which also directs the office to investigate disputes involving chapter 116 or the governing documents and to help process mediation claims.

Beyond that, an aggrieved person may file a written affidavit with the Real Estate Division under NRS 116.760 within one year after discovering the violation, after first sending the association certified mail, return receipt requested, that specifies the alleged violation in reasonable detail, any actual damages, and the corrective action proposed, and giving it a reasonable opportunity to correct the problem. The affidavit must be on the Division's form and accompanied by evidence that reasonable efforts to resolve the matter failed. Knowingly filing a false or fraudulent affidavit exposes the filer to an administrative fine of up to $10,000, disqualification from serving on an executive board for up to 10 years, or both, and repeat findings support designation as a vexatious affiant.

Going to court is a later step and only after the statutory gate. NRS 38.310 bars a civil action based on a claim about the interpretation, application or enforcement of the CC&Rs or of association bylaws, rules or regulations until all administrative procedures in those documents are exhausted and the claim has been submitted to mediation, or by agreement referred to a program, under NRS 38.300 to 38.360, and it directs the court to dismiss an action commenced in violation of that requirement. NRS 38.320 sets the process: a written claim filed with the Division stating the parties, the nature of the claim and whether the claimant wants a referral to a program, accompanied by a $50 filing fee.