Retooled Ombudsman Bill Referred to House Appropriations Committee
On March 3rd, the Colorado House Committee on Business Affairs and Labor passed a retooled version of House Bill 1278 and referred the bill to the House Appropriations Committee for consideration. The amended version of HB 1278 does not include an advocacy role for an ombudsman. Instead, the amended bill focuses on information gathering and education with the following provisions:
- Registry for Associations. Under the Auspices of the Division of Real Estate, homeowner associations will be required to register on a yearly basis. The purpose of the registry is for the State of Colorado to get a handle on how many associations actually exist in Colorado and to be able to communicate with those associations. The current anticipated cost of the registration is $20.00 for the first year and is expected to reduce to approximately $15.00 for the second and subsequent years. However, an updated fiscal note is being prepared which will take into account the retooled version of the bill. We will provide you with more information on the anticipated cost for associations as it becomes available.
- Track Inquiries & Complaints. The Division of Real Estate will also be responsible for tracking inquiries and complaints relating to homeowner associations. The purpose of this provision is to determine whether there are any trends of concern relating to the complaints. This data will be utilized to determine whether future changes to the regulation of associations are necessary. Revisions to CCIOA are currently based upon anecdotal complaints received by legislators and do not necessarily reflect trends in associations.
- Information Clearing House. The bill also provides that the Division of Real Estate will act as a clearing house for information concerning the rights and duties of unit owners, declarants, and homeowner associations.
We will continue to keep you updated on HB 1278.
Seems like a more milder, toned-down version of the first draft which doesn't appear to be as anti-HOA as the original.
Where in the fiscal budget is the Division of Real Estate going to get the funds to start up this new government program. We are so far in debt does this legislature not understand that this just is another way to grow government.
It appears that this "clearing house" would now be informational only, without any power. What would happen if an HOA chooses not to "register?" What happens to the complaints? Isn't it sort of a moot point to file a complaint without the expectation that something will be done about it? These are the types of issues that the legislature is ill-equipped to deal with, because it has no in-depth knowledge of our industry and the issues involved with it.
Anyway, do we need a law to allow the Division of Real Estate to gather information? I think not. We have too many useless laws as it is. Can't the Division do this on its own, without having been told to do so by legislative action? Am I missing something here?
The Division of Real Estate is a self-funded agency. The same thing will happen that has happened to real estate licensees and that is renewal fees will jump drastically when they need money to cover their overhead. The real estate complaint/investigation is a joke as this will be. I deal with the Real Estate Division of the Department of Regulatory Agencies on a daily basis.
This appears to be another unfunded (except for the regis. fees, which will increase, under Murphy's Law) addition to the bureaucracy. If the Div. of Real Estate is to be a clearing-house for information of HOAs, then we might as well have a clearing house for information about the many thousands of other statutes on the Colo. statute books. I am sure there is no one in that Div. presently who has any expertise or experience, except anecdotally, about good governance practices and recurring problems in HOAs. If the Div. is now going to aggregate and analyze homeowners' comlaints about their HOAs, it should also collect complaints from HOAs about homeowners who often don't understand, or don't want to understand, that they don't (or no longer) reside in a detached single-family home, with no Rules or Covenants.
If we had had such a law then we wouldn't have had a powerful ombudsman law come out of nowhere, because the legislature would have had the information to show that there was or was no problem to solve. This is the purpose of government as conceived by John Stuart Mill and other great thinkers about freedom and capitalism in the 19th century.