Ex-legislator hired to lobby for homeowners associations

Article Courtesy of the Sun Sentinel

Published 12 - 03  - 2004

By Joe Kollin

 

Citing the continuing need for laws to rein in the power of abusive condominium and homeowner associations, a statewide organization of volunteer owners has hired a professional lobbyist to prowl the halls of Tallahassee next year.

Jerry Melvin of Fort Walton Beach will lobby the Legislature at the annual 60-day session that begins March 8, St. Augustine-based Cyber Citizens for Justice announced Thursday. Melvin spent 18 years in the state House of Representatives.

 

"It will be the first time that homeowners and condo owners have their own organization and their own voice in Tallahassee," said Jan Bergemann, founder and president of the organization.

In the past, grassroots organizations, such as the now-defunct Secure Condominium Owners' Rights Now, or SCORN, never had a professional lobbyist to sway legislators. CCFJ is the only current association known to represent owners.

About half the condo units in the state are in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties.

Melvin's presence will help counter the influence of law firms and management companies whose lobbyists represent the position of association boards, Bergemann said.

CCFJ, using volunteers, this spring got the Legislature to make major changes to condo and homeowner association laws. But Bergemann said members, at their annual meeting in Ocala last month, overwhelmingly voted to hire a professional.

"We've got to do it if we want to get anything done; it's how our system works," said Karen Gottlieb of Dania Beach, a member of CCFJ and Gov. Jeb Bush's appointee to the newly created state Advisory Council on Condominiums.

Working with state Rep. Julio Robaina, R-Miami, CCFJ this year got the state to create an ombudsman to help educate owners and resolve disputes between condo boards and owners. Bush is expected to appoint the ombudsman within a few days.

Neither Bergemann nor Melvin would say how much money he will receive. The money, however, won't come from the $20 annual dues that the 200 members, who are condo owners and homeowners, pay. Bergemann said that "big donations from members and friends and allies" will finance the lobbyist.

 

Bergemann said he answers hundreds of calls each month from owners with problems, 60 percent coming from Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties. In the past 12 months, the organization's Web site cover page has recorded 52,391 hits, about 145 a day.


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