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Article Courtesy of The Palm
Beach Post
By Mike Diamond
Published July 10, 2023
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Residents of the Black Diamond development in Wellington have at long last
elected a new board, making moot the outcome of a lawsuit that sought to remove
board members through a recall.
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The community on State
Road 7, roiled in controversy and litigation for more than
two years, voted last month to replace board members that
had been the target of the recall.
The board has refused to accept the recall petitions;
claiming the process was flawed. The decision prompted a
lawsuit that is expected to cost the HOA hundreds of
thousands of dollars in legal fees. The HOA has already been
paying its lawyer, and now the recall leaders say they will
ask the new HOA to pick up their legal fees as well.
Judge James Nutt was days away from deciding the recall case
but opted instead to hold off until the latest election was
held.
“The reign of terror is over,” said Rick Darquea, a
homeowner who challenged the results of the election in May
2021 and then was the leader of the recall movement. “Turned
out the judge was right. It is all moot now, but we would,
nonetheless, have liked to have had a decision.”
Darquea, who did not run for the board, said he and others
were concerned over new election rules that were recently
adopted to suppress the vote to prevent a quorum. That would
have resulted in the existing board staying in office for at
least another year.
“That was their strategy, but people came out in droves,” he
noted, easily surpassing the number needed for a quorum. |
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Pictured is Black Diamond community signage by the
neighborhood tennis courts on Thursday, December 1, 2022, in
Wellington, FL. A year ago, homeowner Rick Darquea accused the
homeowners association board of conducting a fraudulent election."
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The new board is expected to carefully review HOA spending the past few years.
There has already been charges of questionable spending. Darquea said he expects
the board to hold those who refused to accept the recall petitions personally
responsible for HOA legal fees.
It
remains to be seen whether the divided community can return to a sense of
normalcy. Sheriff’s deputies were called on this year to investigate charges of
assault at a board meeting. Some homeowners have claimed there were denied
access to board meetings.
Two years ago, the state Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR)
ruled that “improprieties” had occurred in the 2021 election. Residents claimed
that their names were forged on proxy ballots.
The state agency ordered that a new election be held but the DBPR does not have
the power to enforce its orders, and the board ignored it. That’s when the
litigation began. Disgruntled homeowners filed a lawsuit to force a new
election, but the litigation was settled after the HOA agreed to pay legal fees
of the homeowners that brought the lawsuit.
Then the recall petitions were filed.
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