L.D. from outside of Connecticut writes:
Dear Mister Condo,
Can Board members utilize the association’s official unit-owner mailing list for personal communications? And if so, must they give individual unit-owners likewise access to the mailing list on-demand?
Mister Condo replies:
L.D., the short answer is that the association’s official list of unit owners should NEVER be used for anything other than association business. It is not a commercial list or a list for marketing. It is a legal record of unit owners who require notification of association business. It is to be used for serving notices, issuing newsletters, rule changes, notice of meetings, and any other official use by association governance and management folks. The list should never be offered out for sale, rental, or use to anyone outside of the association for any non-association related use. Hope that helps, L.D.. Best wishes!
Personal Use of Condo Unit Owner Mailing List: https://t.co/m8LQcbWEwg
he Connecticut CIOA says a unit owner is entitled to a list of the names of all unit owners and the addresses at which the association communicates with them. It also says that list may not be used for commercial purposes.
There are good ways and not so good ways to manage such lists and keep them from easily being used intentionally or non-intentionally in the wrong ways. Let me suggest:
Keep the lists as Google or Yahoo groups, or even better use MailChimp which is free. All of these send email as single addressee emails without blind copying (which tends to be dropped by spam checkers); They hide all email addresses all but authorized administrators. And can be setup so that only authorized users can send or reply to emails. Unit owners can manage their own accounts so that they can change their email address themselves etc.
Is there any way to get a hold of this list?