Academy/Committees & Volunteers
Advisory vs decision-making committees
Most committees can only recommend. A few can actually decide.
Most HOA committees are advisory: they research a topic and bring the board a recommendation, but the board still has to vote before anything happens. A decision-making committee is different: the board has formally delegated its own authority to it, such as an executive committee or an empowered architectural review committee, so its decision stands without a further board vote.
The default: advisory committees recommend, the board decides
Under Robert's Rules of Order, a committee has no authority of its own. It holds only whatever the body that created it chose to give it, and if it wants to do more than that, its only path is to bring the idea back to the board.
A committee vote does not become association policy by itself, either. Robert's Rules treats a committee's report as something the parent body still has to formally take up and act on before it means anything. Until the board votes on it, a recommendation is just a recommendation, no matter how the committee voted internally.
That is why most committees, landscape, social, finance, are advisory by default: they study a question and hand the board an answer, and the board decides what to do with it.
"Committees research and recommend. The board reviews and decides."
Source: How to Build Effective HOA Committees That Strengthen Your Community, Kuester Management Group
What turns a committee into a decision-maker
A committee does not earn decision-making power by being experienced, trusted, or long-standing. It gets that power only when the board formally delegates its own authority to it. Two common examples are an executive committee made up entirely of directors, and an architectural review committee that has been given the authority to approve or deny requests on its own.
"committees with decision-making authority... such as an executive 'committee of the board' made up entirely of directors to which the board has delegated certain powers, or an architectural review committee"
Source: Creating Committees, HOA Law Blog, SwedelsonGottlieb
Whether your association's bylaws or declaration actually grant this kind of authority to a specific committee varies by association. Read your governing documents, or ask your manager or attorney, to find out whether a given committee has been delegated final authority or is only advisory.
Why the difference matters for meetings and minutes
Under Robert's Rules, a committee's internal proceedings are not part of the board's official minutes by default. The secretary keeps only a memorandum of the committee's own business, not a formal record.
That default can flip once a committee is exercising the board's own decision-making power, and the exact rule depends on your state. In California, whether a committee's meetings and minutes must follow the same open-meeting rules as the board itself turns on whether the committee has a quorum of the board or has been delegated the board's decision-making authority, not on what the committee is called. Florida separately requires open meetings for any committee that will spend association funds or that can approve or deny architectural decisions. Check your own state's community association statute before assuming either rule applies to you.
Check yourself
Answer before you read the explanation, recalling it is what makes it stick.
A landscape committee researches vendors and votes 4 to 1 to recommend one to the board. What happens to that vote?
An architectural review committee's approval and denial power came from the bylaws. An owner asks why the board never voted on their denial. What is the accurate answer?
A finance committee's charter says nothing about final authority over contracts. The committee assumes it can sign a $5,000 landscaping contract on its own. Is that correct?
- Robert's Rules of Order Revised, Article IX, "Committees and Boards"
- Creating Committees, HOA Law Blog, SwedelsonGottlieb
- Committees (Generally), FindHOALaw, Tinnelly Law Group, PC
- How to Build Effective HOA Committees That Strengthen Your Community, Kuester Management Group
- California Civil Code section 4090, State of California
- Florida Statutes section 720.303, State of Florida
Committees & Volunteers
Not sure which kind of committee yours is? See where committee authority actually comes from.
Whether a specific committee counts as a decision-making committee, and whether its meetings and minutes must be open to members, depends on your state's statute and on your association's own bylaws and declaration.