An Expert Comments on Background Checks

 

 

Readers: On the Goodman/Arendt forum, they have asked 2012 Board candidates to comment on this question:

 

Should background checks be conducted on ANY CANDIDATE that wishes to run for a board position, and if so, what types of information should be verified (past employment records, employment responsibilities and duties, criminal backgrounds, financial records of any bankruptcies, court judgments, etc.)?

 

Candidates Bob Frank and Don Schramski, apparently unaware of the fact that Nevada Revised Statute 116, which regulates the state’s HOAs, would not seem to permit such investigations, posted answers saying they think, in so many words, that background checks are appropriate.

Candidate Forrest Fetherolf, to his credit, qualified his answer by suggesting that he’d endorse background checks only if they were legally permitted.

After searching NRS 116 thoroughly and failing to find any language that would permit or even imply that background checks would be permissible, I decided to put the question to Barbara Holland, an expert who writes the HOA Q&A column that appears in the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Saturdays.

Here is the question I sent her on Monday, February 20:

 

Ms. Holland:

A faction in our HOA is advocating a policy to require that background checks be conducted on any candidate who wishes to run for a board position. The suggested background check, they say, should include information on such things as past employment records, employment responsibilities and duties, criminal backgrounds, financial records of any bankruptcies, court judgments, etc.

I can find nothing permitting this in NRS 116, but do you believe a HOA could institute such a requirement?

Thank you.

David Berman

Sun City Anthem, Henderson

 

 

Here is Barbara Holland’s complete reply, sent to me this evening (Feb. 23):

 

Based upon NRS 116.31034 subsection 5 and subsection 8, I do not believe that your association can implement a background check as suggested in your correspondence to me.

Barbara Holland, CPM

President, H&L Realty and Management Company

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Editor’s Note: One of the troubling aspects of life in Sun City Anthem is that all too often, the same vocal residents who constantly file complaints and assert that our community leaders are not adhering to statute, will happily skirt or ignore the law when advancing their own radical agendas.  

 

 

Comments

[alan]

I have a question. what kind of lawyer is miss holland? where did she graduate from law school? too many times people try to come off as "experts" but really only have an opinion which everyone else already has.

[alan]

I forgot something in the previous post, sorry. about background checks, if someone volutarily allows a background to be done, i would think that the law is not there to prohibit that. but i dont see why they are a bad thing. would you want some crook of ANY kind in any capacitiy on our board??? would you want to even live next to a felon?

[Sandy Ridge]

Per the comment by Alan above ... all the more reason to remove Bob Frank from the 2012 SCA election ballot.

We don't have to do a background check on him to know that he's up to no good - always has been, always will be.

[David Berman]

Alan, here's a little lesson in hypocrisy for you.

Barbara Holland is a realtor and certified property manager who has been writing the HOA column in the R-J for years. And she also has been a lecturer at various HOA-related events, along with testifying on proposed legislation at many committee hearings.

Here is the hypocrisy: In the past, when Ms. Holland has written something Arendt and others agree with, they don't hesitate to cite her opinions without questioning her credentials.

It is common practice among those who are unhappy with informative information to shoot the messenger.

If Arendt, Goodman, Frank and others think SCA or any association could legally institute background checks on Board candidates, they should go out and get an opinion to that effect from an attorney of their choice, who could explain how it could be allowed under NRS 116.

In addition, they could describe to us exactly how it would be done and what it would cost.

When day is done, the big hurdle is that violations of people's privacy would be one more reason why qualified homeowners would not want to step forward and run for office.

And anyone such as Bob Frank, who says he would welcome background checks, should prove he is not a hypocrite by answering personal questions that are asked of him instead of always saying, "It's none of your business." He is the most secretive of all.

The law is specific on the criteria for running for an executive board: You must be a member in good standing, and must complete a dsiclosure statement. Even then, an association has virtually no power to do anythng about a candidate who leaves information off a disclosure statement, with its power limited only to not sending outthe statement if it concludes that it contains defamatory information.

If someone wants to know more about a candidate's background than the candidate has chosen to disclose, or if they want to challenge a candidate's background, then it is their job to ask those questions.