From its origins in the American colonies in 17th century New England when taxpaying folks would gather in town halls to listen and talk to their politicians who would then bring up their views in parliament, the terms “town hall meeting” or “town halls” have expanded to describe any present day gathering of people in a hall or similar large community space to discuss issues with their elected leaders.
Of late the practice of holding informal meetings by groups of (usually disgruntled) residents of strata buildings under the guise of “town halls” is gaining some popularity and traction. Partly because as an after-work or weekend free-for-all event, residents can boldly and in the open pressure the invited committee members into answering their ad lib questions without the formalities, restrictions and decorum required by an EGM.
Not surprisingly, the committee of Joint Management Body (JMB) and Management Corporation (MC) are rather cautious about encouraging or attending these town hall meetings. They now ask whether such meetings should be allowed to be held using the facilities of the common property to discuss building matters without the approval of the committee beforehand.
DUTIES AND POWERS OF COMMITTEE
While we may applaud the effort and concern of residents in organising these democratic forums, they appear at odds with the duties and powers given to the committee under the law and seem to side step the procedures for meetings and dialogues spelt out in the Strata Management Act (“SMA”).
According to sections 21 and 22 of the SMA, the Committee acting on behalf of JMB or MC and vested with the duties and powers of overall management and control of the building and common property and of enforcing its by- laws (house rules), have the legal right to approve or impose condition on the use of the common property by residents including for town hall meetings.
The Committee, under the standard by-laws (section 4 of the Third Schedule) is charged with the duties and powers to “control, manage and administer” the common property for the “benefit of all the proprietors” except that it may in writing grant exclusive use to any proprietor on suitable terms.
RESIDENTS RIGHT OF DIALOGUE WITH COMMITTEE
Committee members are merely proprietors who are nominated by other proprietors to act on behalf of the JMB or MC, with honesty and without any pay or salary. In carrying out their duties, the Committee members are by no means acting as “representatives” of the proprietors in the senatorial sense so as to be answerable to them as constituents. They are not obliged to provide answers every time they get any question from the residents nor must they under the law turn up for the so-called town hall meetings to explain things each time they are invited to attend.
In fact, the Committee is by law obliged to only hold one general meeting a year with proprietors. This event is called an AGM. The rest of the time the law says that they must hold their own committee meetings which they must do at least once every two months. Residents can attend these committee meetings as observers but they must ask for permission first from the Chairman.
If more than one general meeting is needed, proprietors must call for it by following the strict procedures laid down under the law. These ad hoc additional meetings are called Extraordinary General Meetings (EGM).
Therefore, as the SMA has already made provisions for general meetings of residents with the Committee, the holding of “town-hall meetings” has really no basis under strata management law. In fact, set against the spirit of promoting harmonious community living as envisaged and espoused by Malaysia’s strata management laws, Town Hall meetings may end up serving just the opposite purpose.
Kerk Boon Leng
kerkco.com 