Strata governance and council duties

Governance is the largest section of this library, which tells you something about where strata life actually gets difficult. The Act gives a strata council real authority and real constraints, and most disputes come from one side of that pair being forgotten.

A council can enforce bylaws, but only after giving the owner written particulars and an opportunity for a hearing. It can set rules for common property, but it cannot invent a rule that contradicts a bylaw. It can hold meetings electronically, restrict a facility for genuine reasons, and fine repeat offenders — each of those with a procedure attached, and each of those routinely done wrong in a way that makes the outcome unenforceable.

The articles below cover the mechanics council members and owners both need: what the seven council roles actually involve, how to change a bylaw so it sticks, how to call an SGM when the council won't, how to remove a council member, what has to appear in the minutes, and where the line sits between a strata matter and a police matter. There is also a run of pieces on the human side — difficult councils, volunteer burnout, thin AGM attendance, and the question of whether anyone should be paid for the work.

If a dispute is already underway, start with the piece on owner rights and the one on hearings. Procedure is usually the thing that decides these.