Rancho Santa Fe condo owners’ voting rights reconsidered

The Rancho Santa Fe Association’s Governing Documents Committee is no longer recommending giving condo owners the right to vote at this time, according to Fred Wasserman, who spoke during his committee liason report at the Jan. 7 RSF Association board meeting.

Wasserman said that the committee determined there is not enough information to make the condo owner change to the bylaws and articles of incorporation right now, but they would like to move forward with the other amendments which include deleting the “cumbersome” registration process and ensuring all property owners receive one Association membership with two votes.

Amendments are also being proposed to bring Association documents in line with the Davis-Stirling Act.

Directors Heather Slosar and Philip Wilkinson expressed disappointment that giving condo owners the right to vote was taken off the table. Slosar said it’s like “taxation without representation” and Wilkinson said it seems unfair when condo owners pay assessments just like everybody else and sometimes pay higher than someone who has owned property for 15 years.

There are currently 19 condominium associations in the Covenant and 79 total units.

Wasserman said that the committee’s recommendation is not to say that it should never be done but as there are so many proposed changes to the bylaws, they don’t want to create a challenge for items such as the simplified voting process and two votes per property owner.

All of the changes will be posted prior to a vote of the membership and Wasserman said that the committee expects to be ready to bring the amendments to a vote within 60 days. He said a successor governing documents committee could still tackle the issue of condo voting rights as well as multiple votes for multiple-property owners.