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PUNITIVE DAMAGES WILL WORK!
By
Jan Bergemann
Published February 9, 2024
Many provisions were added to Florida Statutes 468.431-438 – the
statutes regulating community association management, but
nothing really worked. The DBPR division of CAM Licensing is a
toothless tiger, unwilling to do their job. And they still allow
the CAM defense – also known as the Nuremberg defense: The board
told us to do it! That defense didn’t work in Nuremberg, but it
works in Tallahassee.
No matter what the excuse: There are many ad actors among
community association management companies and managers. Over
the years I have heard the weirdest stories about total
incompetence or willful violations of existing laws.
We see it all over our nation: Only serious punitive damages
work in order to deter bad actors from ignoring and/or violating
the rules and laws.
I
have to applaud Representative Vicki Lopez (HB
1021) and Senator Jennifer Bradley (SB
1178) for finally pushing bills in Tallahassee that will
finally create punitive damages for bad actors.
Management companies should pay a high price when it comes to
non-compliance of giving back ALL association
documents after their contract was terminated. Just being mad
about their contract being terminated doesn’t justify violating
the laws.
I
heard once the story of a management company using the excuse:
All records were destroyed by a hurricane. Guess what? There was
no hurricane in the time-period! But CAM Licensing accepted the
excuse!
Hopefully one of the companion bills (in a not watered-down
version) will end up on the Governor’s desk for his signature!
It is high time that CAMs are finally reined in and have to fear
serious punitive damages for violating the laws.
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Jan Bergemann is president of Cyber Citizens For Justice,
Florida
's largest state-wide property owners' advocacy group.
CCFJ works on legislation to help owners living in
community
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associations. He moved to
Florida
in 1995 - hoping to retire. He moved into a HOA, where the
developer cheated the homeowners and used the association dues
for his own purposes. End of retirement!
CCFJ was born in the year 2000, when some owners met in
Tallahassee
- finding out that power is only in numbers. Bergemann was a
member of Governor Jeb Bush's HOA Task force in 2003/2004.
The organization has two websites to inform interested
Florida
homeowners and condo owners:
News Website: http://www.ccfj.net/.
Educational Website: http://www.ccfjfoundation.net/.
We think that only owners can really represent owners, since all
service providers surely have a different interest! We are
trying to create owner-friendly laws, but the best laws are
useless without enforcement. And enforcement is totally lacking
in
Florida
!
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