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The association board sent out notice of a special meeting to vote on obtaining a loan. Enclosed was a ballot we were to take to the meeting and use to vote. We had to put our names on the ballots. Proxies were also included. Thirty-one (31) votes were needed. The vote at the meeting was twenty-five (25) in favor of the loan and four (4) opposed. The board said they were going to send out ballots to those who did not attend the meeting or send in a proxy, asking them to vote YES or NO regarding the loan. "Voting will continue until the required votes are received," the minutes state. With no further business to discuss, the meeting was recessed. It has never been reconvened. Is this a proper vote under Robert's Rules?

 

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The association board sent out notice of a special meeting to vote on obtaining a loan. Enclosed was a ballot we were to take to the meeting and use to vote. We had to put our names on the ballots. Proxies were also included. Thirty-one (31) votes were needed. The vote at the meeting was twenty-five (25) in favor of the loan and four (4) opposed. The board said they were going to send out ballots to those who did not attend the meeting or send in a proxy, asking them to vote YES or NO regarding the loan. "Voting will continue until the required votes are received," the minutes state. With no further business to discuss, the meeting was recessed. It has never been reconvened. Is this a proper vote under Robert's Rules?

 

Under the rules in Robert's Rules of Order, no absentee voting of any kind is permitted.

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Under the rules in Robert's Rules of Order, no absentee voting of any kind is permitted.

Guest Sandy, I agree with Mr. Honemann's response above, but wonder why (or how) you calculate that 31 votes are necessary to adopt a motion to make the loan?  Do your bylaws require something more than the standard majority vote for such a motion?

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We have sixty owners. A simple majority of all unit owners was needed. That's the thirty-one. Does that recess instead of adjournment, by any chance, allow for exceptions? For example, would that make ballots solicited after the meeting valid?

 

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Does that recess instead of adjournment, by any chance, allow for exceptions? 

 

A recess is a brief intermission (say, ten or fifteen minutes). Once everyone goes home, the meeting has been adjourned, whether formally or not.

 

The notion that "voting will continue until the required votes are received" has no basis in parliamentary law.

 

But the defeated motion can be made again as if it had never been made before.

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We have sixty owners. A simple majority of all unit owners was needed. That's the thirty-one. . . .

If your bylaws require the vote (or approval) of a majority of all unit owners in order for such a motion to be adopted, they, yes, that would require 31 votes.  Your initial post did not mention that requirement.  Without such a requirement in your bylaws (or some superior state law), a majority of the votes cast would be all that would be required.

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In theory, the assembly could set a time and location for people to vote outside of the meeting, and set an adjourned meeting that would close the polls and where the result was announced.  The people however would have to vote in person. 

 

The method you chose was not even close to that.  Unless authorized in the bylaws, it is null and void.

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