J.S. from New York writes:
Dear Mister Condo,
Hi, I met you and your wife at the Long Island Chapter of CAI meeting last month. We have a homeowner who has lived in our association from the start about 14 years. He can be very confrontational. There have been numerous incidents involving him and the board and he and his neighbor. He has developed several health conditions. He still shops on his own and he drives on his own. He has veiled threats against the community to call the Americans for Disability and force us to put in a chair lift in the swimming pool for him. He does enter and exit the pool on his own now and there will be issues in about a month when he wears his same outdoor dirty sneakers into the pool and occasionally has unhealed sores. My question is: can he force us after all these years to construct a chair lift for him which could run up to one hundred thousand dollars?
Mister Condo replies:
J.S., I hope you enjoyed the presentation in Long Island. It was a pleasure to meet so many Chapter members and share time and stories with you. You certainly have an interesting situation on your hands. As you know, I am not an attorney nor am I an expert is New York Community Association law. However, I will offer you some friendly advice. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is designed to protect people with disabilities and allow access on public properties. Most condominium associations are private properties and are not subject to the same requirements that public businesses are. Although, there are exceptions. If your pool or club house are rented out and used “for profit”, the association may be subject to all the provisions of the ADA. So, you have a bit of a sticky wicket here. It is most certainly time to speak with your association attorney who can give you a legal opinion. Of course, a unit owner who threatens to sue is quite different than a unit owner who actually does sue. If the unit owner makes a formal request for the pool chair, contact the association attorney to determine your legal options. If you are not bound by the ADA rules, you can likely do one of two things. You could simply deny the request, citing the expense as being an unreasonable request or you could allow the installation at the unit owner’s expense, keeping in mind that the unit owner would also be responsible for the maintenance of the chair as well. You can also have pool use rules added that prohibit bathers from wearing shoes (or any footwear) in the pool and prohibit use of the pool by anyone with open soars. Check with your local Health Department for suggested rules on pool use restrictions as well. I hope that helps and I look forward to seeing you again in the future.