Officers are entrusted to carry out association operations on behalf of the homeowners. This page describes what that requires. Please note: Not everything that gets done in the association must be done by the officers!

Officers

Officers as a committee or team

Carrying on the HOA seems to work best when the three officers are able to consult each other on any issue that comes up and decide what to do together as a sort of leadership team or executive council. This is because for any communications made or actions taken:

  1. By nature of their identified roles, the officers are the ones contacted whenever any kind of issue or topic arises for the HOA, be they internally or externally sourced. By this advice, any such initial contact received by any officer as for the HOA should immediately be shared with the other officers.
  2. Homeowners seem to prefer to have most issues handled by the officers without needing to involve the general membership. This is expressly the case when it's a mundane or expected action of the HOA. Such expected actions would ideally be documented and reviewable, and while they may be implied or sometimes stated in the By-laws, they're not always included there, so a more complete list might be useful. (See below.)
  3. No one should act on behalf of the organization independently, in isolation, or without the review and consideration of at least one, preferably two other members. Because the officers have in all cases been recognized by the whole membership as performing HOA functions, and because they are also legally empowered and obliged to take certain actions for the HOA, the group of officers is the most natural and appropriate group of people to consult and review in support of these actions.

President

The president acts as the primary representative (first point of contact) for the organization, probably for any topic that's not expressly assigned to the other officers' roles. So that means these activities:

  1. Preside in the HOA meetings, covering the agenda and attempting to ensure that all members are heard as regards HOA business.
  2. Offer to all homeowners the willingness to take their questions and concerns at any time as would affect the neighborhood and attempt to find a path to answer or resolve that issue.
  3. Attempt to stay in touch with all homeowners to the extent that they're willing. Doing this keeps the door open to topics that may arise and helps the officers identify possible issues for the organization to address.
  4. Back up the Secretary and Treasurer in their roles when necessary.
  5. Identify and explore initiatives that the homeowners as a whole seem to find an interest in pursuing. This involves balancing the requests and creating agenda items for consideration in a committee or in the general membership.

Secretary

The secretary is in charge of the formal records of the organization, so that involves these specific activities as of 2022:

  1. Notify members of HOA meetings, assembling and providing the agenda.
  2. Maintain the minutes (decisions and progress) of the meetings, particularly the decisions that will authorize actions taken by the organization and the attendance of the members.
  3. Maintain the official list and contact information for all homeowners, protecting and sharing that information as necessary.
  4. Filing reports and updates with the State of New Hampshire for the corporation.