Hello All,

It is difficult to believe that, after some fifteen (15) years since the McKay Ruling (1992), unit Owners are continuing to encounter difficulties in obtaining access to Records of their Corporations. CAFCOR receives many complaints from unit Owners in Corporations whose Boards of Directors have refused to permit them access. In every instance, CAFCOR has been succesful in convincing these Boards to comply with the requirements of section 55 of the Condominium Act, 1998 without unit Owners having to resort to the Small Claims Court. As a matter of fact, CAFCOR has had to assist unit Owners in succesfully ousting their BODs over this very issue. In every instance, the Records sought have not been Records subject to the exemption of subsection 55(4) of the Act. Most are with respect to Minutes of Board or Owners meetings.

What Boards and property managers need to realize is that such refusals, either through malice or ignorance, are illegal and not an excercise in reasonable prudence. Such serious breaches of fiduciary duty and statutory obligation are both irresponsible and damaging to a condominium community and may invite unneeded financial and social consequences.

If you are a unit Owner or minority Director who cannot access Records of your Corporation, please feel free to contact CAFCOR and we will be more than happy to assist you in obtaing same. There should be no question in the minds of Board members and property managers as to whether unit Owners will succeed in obtaining access to Records but rather at what cost to the Corporation whose interests they were elected to serve and protect.

mailto:complaints@cafcor.org

(416) 747-8889 ext. 3 or 4.

Yvon, any chance of CAFCOR making this an advertisement with others (such as the Toronto Star's Condo Section) as people need to know that CAFCOR will help them?

Hello Wotan,

I suppose CAFCOR will consider this option however, at the moment, we are working on condominium "town-hall" style meetings to be held in downtown Toronto, Scarborough and Mississauga, the particulars of which we will certainly publish on this website. Great suggestion though Wotan and this issue will be raised at our September executive meeting.

It took 5 months but I finally got copies of the minutes from the board after threatening to take them to small claims court. To my surprise, I learned that they had not kept minutes for the first 9 months of the year! What recourse, if any, is there? Can they simply say "we don't have minutes?"

Hello Rick,

No, the Board cannot simply say that they have not kept minutes. Subsection 55(1) of the Condominium Act, 1998 imposes an obligation on the Corporation (Board)to keep adequate Records including minutes of Board and unit Owner meetings. The Board has conducted business during those first nine (9) months of the year which must be recorded. I would simply write a "Request to Examine and Copy Records", in particular, minutes of each and every Board meeting held between January 1, 2007 and September 4, 2007 inclusive, and wait for their (written) response. There must be ways in which you can establish that business of the Corporation was carried out which would have required the approval of a "quorum" of the Board.

If, in your opinion Rick, the Board is snubbing you and if its "written" response is that it has held no meetings yet you can establish that the Board has, take them to Small Claims Court. Name the Corporation as a Defendant as well as each and every individual Director.

Should you require any assistance in this matter, please feel free to contact us in confidence mailto:complaints@cafcor.org . Although CAFCOR does have access to its own legal counsel, we are not a law firm and we are not lawyers and we will not represent anyone in court. We will however, assist you in resolving this issue in the interest of all unit Owners in your Corporation.