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New Board Member Certification Requirements Will Bring Mandatory Courses

Laura Manning-Hudson
August 12, 2024

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For those who live in communities with associations, serving as a director provides one of the most impactful opportunities they will ever have in their entire lifetime to volunteer to serve for the betterment of the place they call home. Association board/committee service is much like a civic duty, as these volunteers provide for the oversight of entire communities that rely on dedicated and scrupulous owners for their financial and administrative well-being.

Previous Board Member Education Requirements

Since 2013, new board members elected or appointed to serve as directors of Florida community associations have been required to become certified within 90 days of their election or appointment. Certification was to be completed by attending a course administered by a qualified condominium or HOA education provider and approved by the state’s Department of Business and Professional Regulation. However, newly minted directors were also allowed to become certified by signing an affidavit stating they had read all of their community’s governing documents, would work to uphold such documents and policies to the best of their ability, and would faithfully discharge their fiduciary responsibilities to the association’s members.

New Board Member Certification Requirements

Solely signing the affidavit is no longer an option, as legislative changes enacted this year that became effective July 1 provide new board certification education requirements for all directors in condominium and homeowners associations. All new board members are now required to complete seminars/courses covering all the basics, and those courses will need to meet a new set of criteria to qualify to provide official board member certification.

Historically, our firm and many other providers throughout the state have offered courses that had been approved by the DBPR to fulfill the certification requirements. Those course that had been previously approved are no longer valid for any provider in the state of Florida due to these changes in the educational requirements. The state agency has indicated it will release instructions on how providers can get new course approvals in the fall.

In the meantime, the DBPR will be offering its own board member certification courses starting on August 15th, and new board members who need to satisfy the requirement should visit its website at www.myfloridalicense.com for more information or to access the new course. For the time being, this will be the only approved course until other providers become approved later this year, and current board members will be required to take and complete the new certification course by June 30, 2025.

Our firm looks forward to obtaining the new state approval and continuing to provide board members with complimentary courses and seminars/webinars that qualify for certification. For condominium association directors, that will now include four hours of training covering milestone inspections, Structural Integrity Reserve Studies (SIRS), elections, recordkeeping, financial literacy and transparency, levying fines, and meeting requirements. Condo board members will also be required to complete at least one hour of continuing education annually on recent changes to condominium laws and rules.

Homeowner association directors for communities with fewer than 2,500 parcels must complete at least four hours of continuing education annually, and those with more than 2,500 parcels must complete at least eight hours of continuing education per year.

All new directors will also be required to certify in writing that they have read the governing documents, will implement the rules and policies, and will faithfully honor their fiduciary responsibilities. Any board member who fails to become certified within 90 days of being elected or appointed is suspended from their board service.

We encourage anyone with questions to contact us for further information.