recording minutes from agenda

[kacey]

Hello,

Forgive me if I am not posting my question correctly as I am new here. My question is this, our council had a meeting last week following an agenda. Now I am writing up the minutes of the meeting for approval. We discussed an item that was listed on the agenda. I believe this item should have been put under correspondence received. Can I record it in the minutes as a correspondence received item? Or must I record it as an agenda item since that is the order the discussion took place?
 

Thank you

[Guest Puzzling]

Welcome !

Minutes are a record what was done, it seems that it was done as an agenda item so the record should mirror that.

(See the section in RONR on minutes) 

RONR does not prescribe that discussions are recorded (Other than sometimes saying that they happened) 

It can be that other (state) laws say differently but this is what RONR says.

[Atul Kapur]

The minutes should record what happened, even if that isn't what should have happened.

[Josh Martin]

11 hours ago, kacey said:

Forgive me if I am not posting my question correctly as I am new here. My question is this, our council had a meeting last week following an agenda. Now I am writing up the minutes of the meeting for approval. We discussed an item that was listed on the agenda. I believe this item should have been put under correspondence received. Can I record it in the minutes as a correspondence received item? Or must I record it as an agenda item since that is the order the discussion took place?

Was any motion actually made regarding this matter or was there simply a discussion? It's not clear to me that this item should be included in the minutes at all. The minutes are a record of what was done, not what was said.

To the extent that this item should be recorded at all, I don't know that I fully understand the question about recording it "as a correspondence received item" as opposed to "recording it as an agenda item," but it is certainly the case that the minutes are to be a record of what actually happened, not what should have happened, and that the minutes are generally recorded in chronological order.

Edited February 7, 2021 at 06:06 PM by Josh Martin

[Richard Brown]

Whether right or wrong, it is the custom in many organizations that when a letter is read to the assembly, the minutes reflect the fact that the letter was read, but not the contents of the letter unless the assembly orders that it be done. When that happens, it has been my experience that it is is usually at the request of the president or some other officer and it is usually agreed to by unanimous consent.  I have not seen that happen often, but I do frequently see the fact that a certain letter was read entered in the minutes. 

[kacey]

Thank you for your replies. I realize my question is a bit confusing and difficult to explain so let me try again. The meeting I am referring to is a regular by-monthly strata council meeting. Prior to our meetings our property manager provides us with an agenda with the usual, financial, business arising, new business, correspondence, etc., correspondence is letters from owners, which is the case here. We received a letter from an owner regarding an item they want the strata to fix. The property manager mistakenly put this item under new business rather than under correspondence. We discussed it under new business as it came up on the agenda since that is where is was placed. The outcome of the discussion was that we asked the property manager to obtain a quote for repairs. After that all other items were discussed and meeting adjourned.

We are now two weeks later and I am preparing the minutes of this meeting to be circulated to the owners.

Here is my question:

1. Can I move it from where it is was discussed under new business to correspondence? In other words there will be no item X under new business.

2. I would like to move it to where it should have originally been under correspondence to read: From an owner submitting a proposal for X repair. The strata council reviewed the proposal and agreed to obtain a second quote.

The reason I want to do this is so owners don't think this is something the strata council is prepared to do at this time. There are many other owners with the same issue and it's not in our budget if they all come forward and demand the same repair. BTW this repair is in no way structural or a safety issue.

 

[Atul Kapur]

2 hours ago, kacey said:

1. Can I move it from where it is was discussed under new business to correspondence? In other words there will be no item X under new business.

No. It occurred under New Business and action was taken ("we asked the property manager to obtain a quote for repairs"), again, under New Business.

2 hours ago, kacey said:

2. I would like to move it to where it should have originally been under correspondence to read: From an owner submitting a proposal for X repair. The strata council reviewed the proposal and agreed to obtain a second quote.

As stated above (by several of us), the minutes record what happened, not what someone (the secretary or someone else) believes should have happened.

2 hours ago, kacey said:

The reason I want to do this is so owners don't think this is something the strata council is prepared to do at this time.

It doesn't sound like strata council has made a decision to do or not do at this time. You have said that they directed the manager to obtain a quote. Owners are going to draw the inferences they want and I don't think that the location of the item in the minutes will affect that. In any case, this is not an appropriate rationale to change the minutes from reflecting what actually happened.

BTW, are you in B.C.? I don't know of any other jurisdiction that uses the term "strata".
[Strata is the term used in British Columbia for condominiums]

Edited February 8, 2021 at 02:06 AM by Atul Kapur
Added last line

[kacey]

Yes, I am in BC. Thank you very much for your answers.