 Good afternoon, and welcome to Condo Insider. My name is Jane Sugimura, and I'm your host for today's show. And my guest today is Raylene Tennell, who is the Programs Director for Hawaii Council of Association of Apartment Owners, DBA HCCA. Hi, Raylene. Hi. Thank you for having me here. Thank you for being with us again. Anyway, what we're here to do today is we're going to be talking about legislation that affects condominiums. And what we're going to talk about is how condo owners or anybody who's interested can participate, because it's really, really easy. And there are some bills that we really need your support. And you can do this online with any type of device. You could probably even do it on your phone if your eyesight is good enough. I mean, because everything is very small. But anyway, we have some slides that we're going to show you, but the website address is capital, C-A-P-I-T-A-L dot hawaii dot gov, or Raylene, you say you go to E-E-E. I go to E-E-Hawaii dot gov. Okay, but either way, it gets you to this page, the one you see on your screen right now, it gets you to this page. And the important thing is, is the first box on the top, it says bill status, measure status. And what you do is whatever bill you're interested in, this is where you type it in. If it's a house bill, it's H-B-1234, or if it's a Senate bill, it's S-B as in, S is in Sam, B is in Boy, 5678. But it's a four-digit number after H-B or S-B. And what this does, once you put it in and you click the Go button, it will take you to the bill. But if you want to testify, you hit the first icon. And the first icon says submit testimony. And then it takes you to this page, the login page. Okay, and now you're on the login page. And what you have to do is you put in your email address. So the first box, you put in your email address and then you make up a password and put in the password. And so this is, and every time you wanna do testimony, you have to do this. You have to put in your email address and your password. And then you click login and then it will take you to the next page. Okay, and this page tells you what you're supposed to do. And then so you see the icon, the first one is this submit testimony. The first icon on your left on the front row, that's the one you hit. And then it will take you to the page where you can put your testimony. And what you wanna do is you look at the box. It says enter bill or measure. And so this is where you enter whatever bill you wanna testify on. HB1234 or SB4567. You put in the bill number. And then once you put it in, the page will transform and it will ask you certain questions. It will ask you to type in your email address and it will ask you if you, because then it, since you've registered it will, it will transfer your name to the legislators. And then it asks you whether you agree or you disagree with the bill. Do you support or do you oppose the bill or do you just wanna comment? So you just check one of the boxes. And then the next box will ask you, are you going to attend in person or not? So you don't even have to attend. But this way your testimony gets into the legislature. And so if you're not gonna attend, you can just send, I will not attend. And then it will ask you, is this testimony for yourself testifying as an individual or are you testifying for a group? So if you're testifying for your association, so if your association is the Marco Polo, you would say AOAO Marco Polo is who you're testifying for. And then there'll be a box at the bottom and you can type in your testimony. I support this bill because this bill sucks because it does this and that. Or I would support this bill if it did this and that. So you can put your comments in there. And then in the bottom, it will say submit. Once you hit the submit button, your testimony goes and when the legislators are in a hearing, they all have laptops. And so your testimony is gonna show up on their screen when the hearing appears. And you know that the legislature has your testimony because on the left-hand side, you will see something that says it has, there's a box that says measure and the hearing. And so if you did testimony for House Bill 1234 and the middle will have the date of the hearing and the room number. And if you wanna see what test to see if your testimony was transmitted the way you typed it, you hit view and you will be able to view your own testimony that you just submitted. So this means that you can participate in a legislative hearing for whatever bills that are pending before the legislature. You don't have to go to the hearing and you can do it over the internet. And while we were talking, you could have done your testimony and submitted it and you don't even have to go to the hearing. And you can do this for any bill that is pending before the legislature. And so this is a very good thing to know about and especially since the Hawaii council is gonna be seeking your assistance in some of these measures. And next I'm gonna be talking about the measures that are pending this year. And so the first one on our list is a bill called, and you have to know what the bill numbers are because that's the way they identify them in the legislature. So this is House Bill 2161 because all the bills, most of the bills related to condos, their titles are in ray condominium. So that's why you have to know the bill numbers. Okay, so House Bill 2161, it does a bunch of things. But the two issues that seem to be contentious, there's a provision in 514B in the condo statute that talks about who can serve on the board. And about three years ago, there was a change in the statute that said, that made it real clear that tenants of somebody who's an owner cannot serve on the board. And so, but this year, they're seeking clarification of who is a tenant. And so that language, and there was a hearing yesterday, so we don't know what the legislature is going to do, but we need to do clarification of the language in the statute. And one thing happened, what happened, I guess, that is kind of pushing the changes. This last year, after the law was changed, there was a condominium where I think the wife, the husband and wife, the wife is the owner of an LLC, and the husband decided he wanted to run for the board. And the board of directors took him to court and they filed a TRO to say, you can't run. And what happened before the law TRO was filed, I think is the wife made the husband a member of the LLC. And those of you who know what an LLC is, a member is an owner. And the judge in that case didn't make a ruling, but he did say that he was inclined to grant the TRO because you have only two members, I mean, two members, husband and wife, and they rented the unit from the LLC who was the owner. And so he kind of, he says, you know, I'm inclined to grant the TRO because the husband should be allowed to serve on the board. And because there was no ruling on that issue, some people think, you know, thought it was better to amend the statute. So that's what that change is all about. And the second issue in House Bill 2161 deals with these, if letters that have to be submitted to the association, if you wanna run for the board of directors. And the statute says, if you wanna run, you have to submit these 100-word statements to the board. And in some condominiums, some associations where things are disputed all the time and there are fights and all of us know of buildings that have contentious dealings between owners and their boards and with board members and their other board members. But in some instances, we've heard stories that these 100-word statements contain really defamatory statements, things like, you know, I wanna run for president because the current president is a deadbeat dad and he steals money. And so when the managing agents like Hawaiianna, Touchstone, Asosia get these 100-word statements, they have to send it out to the owners. I mean, that's what the statute says. And so when that happens, you know, there have been threats of lawsuits for defamation because the association, the managing director or the board members published this defamatory statement. And so the statute right now has language that says that the board is not gonna be liable if they do this. And there have been a lot of concerns that, you know, that's the wrong approach. I mean, you shouldn't be trying to relieve people of liability for, you know, something like that. And so the suggestion has been made to change the statute to say that you do these 100-word statements, provided that, and the new language would be that you don't mention a third party by name or by reference. And then, you know, you have this legislator who says, oh, why should we amend the statute? That makes common sense. Why doesn't the board, this is something that makes the board upset or the managing agents upset, then why don't they just pass a motion or pass a resolution and say, you can't do this? Raylene, you have any comments on that? I mean, why would a board want to do, I mean, why, what reason would a board have for wanting to do this? Because it sets the ground rules and it sets the ground rules by statute. So it's even across the board for everybody. I mean, you don't want a derogatory statement about a person being sent out and blasted all over the place. I mean, that opens up the board, it opens up the managing agent for a major lawsuit. So putting it in statute creates that language that sets the procedure on what can and cannot be included in some of those statements. But what about the question about, what if the board, I mean, the board can pass resolutions, they should make a rule. You can't do this. You can't put, save derogatory things in the 100 word statement. What's wrong with doing something like that? I don't think there's any, for me, I don't think there's anything wrong. I mean, if we solicited proxies, if the notice was sent out properly and they put the rules in place, like when we get our packets, there's always the rules. Even the annual, when the day of the annual meeting, there's actually, in that packet, there's a rules to follow during that annual meeting, on what you can and cannot do, essentially being polite, like don't interrupt with someone when they're talking, things of that nature. So it could be like in the packet of the annual meeting, be part of the rules. Like if you're gonna use the 100 word statement, there's no defamatory remarks. To imply a defamatory character, it needs to be done properly. The concern with most boards is if they do that, and we all know, owners, owners are very sophisticated. The first thing you're gonna get is you're gonna get somebody, some owner, saying, hey, you can't do that. I got a First Amendment right. I can write whatever I want to in my 100 word statement. And you, the board cannot censor me. And I'm gonna take you to court because you're censoring me. So the boards are kind of in a catch 22 situation. They're damned if they do, they're damned if they don't. They don't. That's true. Sometimes some things that come to mind is like, well, would you want your, if you're a delinquent, would you want that exposed to everybody? And that everybody know that you're delinquent? It's a lot of times, that's a reason for delinquencies to be held only in executive session. It's kind of a, to me, it's kind of the same principle. Right. But something like this, I mean, and so I guess that's why the suggestion was, we gotta go in and change the law rather than let the boards deal with it by themselves because it's clear that they haven't dealt with it by themselves and there have been claims brought against boards and managing agents for defamation. But right now, we're gonna take a one minute break and we're gonna come back and talk about some of the other legislation that we're gonna be dealing with this session. My name is Mitch Ewan. I'm from the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute and I'm the host of Hawaii, the State of Clean Energy. We're on every Wednesday at four o'clock and we hope that we have interesting guests who talk to us about various energy things that are happening in Hawaii all the way from PV to windmills to hydrogen, close to my heart, electric buses and electric vehicles. So please dial in every Wednesday at four o'clock on Hawaii, the State of Clean Energy, aloha. Okay, welcome back to another, to the second part of Kondo Insider and we're here talking about Kondo legislation and how you can participate. And we, you know, you really can and should participate. It's really easy. You can do it like on any device. You would go to capital with an A-C-A-P-A-T-A-L.Hawaii.gov and it will take you to a page where all you have to do is put in your bill number and you can and click an icon that says testify and you can testify on any bill that you want without ever appearing at the legislature without preparing written testimony and it's a way for you to participate in the enactment of laws that affect your living in condominiums. Okay, we're gonna go down to House Bill 2562 and this deals with a whole bunch of stuff but one thing that it does deal with, it clarifies how a board member can resign and you may think that this is not significant but there are, we have heard stories about people who volunteered to be on the board of directors and when they decide, you know, they don't wanna participate anymore, they resign and then they're told, oh no, you can't resign unless we approve and so this clarifies the fact that if you wanna resign, you don't need anybody to approve it, you write the board a letter or in a board meeting you say, I resign, you want it on the minutes and everybody's in the room and that's the end of it. Okay, so that's House Bill 2562. And now we're gonna get, yeah? Also with that clarification, because you resigned, you can't change your mind later. Right. Oh no, I was upset at the time, I didn't resign. Right. So that was part of the intention. Yeah, that's part of, you know, to make it clear that, you know, there's a way to resign and there aren't, you don't need anybody's permission to resign, but you have, when you do resign, you do it by letter and you do it, or you do it in a board meeting with everybody present and that's it and you can't take it back. Once you resign, you have resigned. And so now we're going to Senate Bill 2200 and this is about emotional support animals and many condos have no pet provisions and these are provisions that were usually there because 67% of the ownership at some time decided they didn't want pets in the building and there's a reason for this and the reason why this is important is when people buy into a condominium, whether or not they allow pets, you know, affects their decision, what if you're allergic to animals or what if you're afraid of dogs? And some people just don't want to live in a building where cats and dogs live, you know, because they don't like the dander or, you know, they just don't want to put up with animals and so if they look at, and one of the things you do when you buy into a condo, you look at their declarations and their house rules and if it's a no pets building, it says so in their declarations, in their bylaws, in their house rules and then they buy into it and then under the Americans for Disabilities Act, and that's a federal law, it says that we're for service animals and these are animals that are specially trained to help people with disabilities and in a condominium, the association has to relax its no pet rules, in other words, you have to allow a service animal and I don't think, you know, and this bill does not affect service animals, if it affects those other animals that are called emotional support animals and right now the procedure is if you want to live in a building that doesn't allow for pets and you have to go to a licensed professional, a doctor or a social worker or psychologist or psychiatrist and get a letter from that licensed professional that says that you have a disability recognized by the Americans for Disabilities Act and that you need an emotional support animal to live in your unit because that animal helps to relieve some of the symptoms of a disability that you have and that letter goes to the board of directors and the board has no choice but to allow the pet or the animal to move into the building and what this bill addresses is what we think is an abuse and we've heard it from lots of buildings where people go and they come with letters where the doctor has never seen the recipient and we know that these, I mean, it's just very clear to the people who live in the buildings that there is no disability and they think this is a sham and you end up with all of these animals living in a no-pets building and you have owners who say, you know, owners who say that, you know, I bought into this building because it's a no-pets building and I'm allergic to dogs and now I have three dogs living next door to me and, you know, so this isn't fair and so what this bill does is it says that a Hawaii licensed professional has to actually see the person and has to determine that that person has a disability recognized by the ADA and that the person has to have an emotional support animal to relieve some of the symptoms of the disability and they sign the letter. So that means that the recipient of the letter has to actually go and see the doctor, actually be examined, the doctor has to make findings and before he signs the letter and what our group is gonna do when we go to the legislature is to ask for sanctions to the licensed professional who disregards what this bill says and just signs this letter because the person is this next door neighbor or the person is the daughter of the best friend or for some reason it has nothing to do with whether or not that person is disabled and Raylene, what are you hearing from the community about this bill? Well, I know in January Department of Transportation issued out, it came out in the news and I just recently saw the article where they're putting a halt on these pet issues, therapy pets, comfort animals, riding in the passenger cabins. So they're setting up- In airplanes. Yeah, in airplanes. So they're setting up guidelines from the Federal Department of Transportation on what really can be in the cabin and the requirements. But other than that, your therapy peacock has to be in the baggage compartment and all that. So it's gonna come down and I have a feeling all the other agencies will follow they'll use that as a guide, more likely we'll have that as a guide to follow. Right, and under this bill, yeah, under this bill, the Civil Rights Commission which is a big advocate of emotional support animals and they're the ones who are beating up on the condominiums. So we expect the Civil Rights Commission to oppose this bill. So this is why we need your help if you're listening out there or you see this video that you need to contact your legislator and say that you want Senate Bill 2200 passed out. And we need everybody to participate and the more people we get to participate online the chances of our getting this pass is gonna be good. Right, and now there's another bill that I've been getting a lot of emails on and this is about Greece. This is Senate Bill, what is this Senate Bill? 2817. 2817. And I don't know why this, what the reason for this is but this is the one where they're gonna make high rise condominiums put in receptacles so that people don't put Greece down the drain in their sinks. And when we talked about it at our last meeting there were a lot of comments on this one. Yep, we did. Everybody had, I mean, because number one you put Greece down your sink it will, it'll cool off and then it also affects the plumbing for the unit on the opposite side because usually kitchens are back to back, bathrooms are back to back on construction and it'll affect the other unit over time. It also affects your dishwasher if you have a dishwasher affects your p-trap because if you pour hot grease some of those p-traps are now kind of evolving into more of a plastic and it could just melt it. So you're really doing a lot of damage that you don't realize that you're doing. For me, I just save the cardboard egg cartons and then when I have a lot of grease I'm usually just pouring the grease in there and then the paper gets all the oil gets absorbed into the paper and then I throw it out in the trash. You know, somebody at the meeting the other day was saying that there are products that will solidify this oil, right? And they were available at BIA and in fact, you said we're gonna have a seminar next week Thursday and we're gonna get some information and probably circulate that to the people who are at our seminar about telling their buildings that these products are available because this bill is just terrible. You take the risk of someone carrying oil down into wherever this receptacle is gonna be placed they could drop it accidentally and have them put it down instead of stairs. Yeah, it's a huge, huge, huge issue. And somebody was saying did anybody bother to check with the fire department to see if this is gonna apply, right? Yeah, yeah. And it'll bring bugs, it'll bring pests, you know? Yeah, wherever this receptacle is, it will draw all the cockroaches and whatever and that's the last thing we need in a high rise. Yep, great, great. And so anyway, the bad thing is is the bill has passed two committees. So it's gonna cross over, this is a Senate bill. I mean, so it's crossed, I mean, it passed out of two committees. So it's gonna cross over to the house and then so we're gonna have to deal with it when it comes up for hearing. So this is another one to tell your neighbors about if you don't wanna pay for a receptacle you're building to collect grease, then this is a bill, it's Senate bill, what is it, 2817? 2817 and when I see this, I find the information about the other portable things to put it in and throw it out. I'll have it posted on HawaiiCouncil.org on our website. Okay, thank you, Raylene, for being my guest today and thank you for joining us for another episode of Kondo Insider and please go to capital.Hawaii.gov or eHawaii.gov and check it out and participate in the legislative process. Thank you very much.