Friday, October 31, 2008

The Contractual Community: Why Community Associations are not Governments

Articles in this and other publications devoted to the science of community association operations and management often discuss the concept of "community association" as if it were just another subdivision of local government. It is a common perception because so much discussion about this unique housing type is devoted to questions of governance. We have boards of directors that, in some respects, appear to be like city councils. There are property managers who carry out many of the same functions as city staff. The property so governed has many of the same physical accoutrements as a town or city-streets, utilities, parking and recreation facilities.

There are controls that are seemingly analogous to municipal government, where ordinances such as zoning place restrictions on individual property rights in order to give effect to the paramount needs of the city or county, as determined by the elected policy-makers. But while these two governance systems may appear similar, their respective legal bases are really quite different. Understanding this difference may help to understand why the occasional characterization of community associations as "mini-governments" or "quasi-government agencies" is particularly inapt and can lead to false assumptions about community associations...

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