The CBWRA 2024 AGM – once again a desperation to restrict resident involvement

Residents were sent the following email (below) re the AGM by CBWRA ‘co-chairs’ Larisa Villar Hauser and Louis Sebastian Kendall, who changed the constitution in September 2023 resulting in only 9% of leaseholders voting in the Chair elections.

The email states that:

The 2024 AGM will be held on June 12 between 7-8.30pm.
If you would like to submit any motions to the AGM, the deadline for motions is 5pm on May 24th. Please send your motions to info@cbwra.com including the text of the submission alongside the RA member who is putting the motion forward and the RA member who is seconding the motion. As last year, the maximum number of motions that may be submitted by one person is 3.

In fact I submitted 5 motions for the SGM in September last year, 2 of which were passed. There was no limit to the number of motions that any leaseholder could submit as far as I am aware, either at AGM or SGM. There is no mention of any such restriction in the bizarre constitution which CBWRA forced through in September 2023 which residents were given only 10 days to examine before the vote and which they were told contained only ‘minor changes’ (in fact it contained sweeping changes which were not mentioned such as limiting voting in Chair elections’ to paid up members, allowing any member to have their membership terminated because of ”any other conduct not in line with the aims of the Association” (as judged by co chairs/committee) and removed the article from existing constitution which required CBWRA to make available to leaseholders copies of all correspondence with the freeholder, removing yet another important aspect of scrutiny/transparency.

The two of my motions which were passed were these:

• That no resident’s CBW app account can be closed in an arbitrary manner without a written/formal process (as was the case with the closure of my account in May 2022). The arbitrary closure or threat of closure of CBW app accounts has created a ‘chilling effect’ on the CBW app which means that residents are afraid to say what they think or to be critical of the CBWRA committee in any way.

• That there will be quarterly meetings with the new managing agent (Urang) assuming that RTM goes ahead and they are appointed – the meetings will be hybrid (face to face with the option to attend online) and ALL residents will be welcome not just leaseholders.

Here is a full list of the 5 motions which I submitted and the rationale

So it would seem that once again an arbitrary change to reduce the possibility of resident involvement has been made, without any consultation and on top of that our intelligence is once again insulted by CBWRA pretending that no change has been made.

These changes may make little difference because even when motions are passed, the CBW committee simply choose to ignore them if they do not like them

Last year, despite resident requests, the co-chairs refused to publish the AGM or SGM motions on the CBW app, such was their desperation to prevent any discussion of the issues raised in these motions. The level of control freakery by CBWRA and the determination to supress even the most marginal level of resident involvement is amazing. If only they put this much effort into actually engaging with residents.

In my view these games and the lack of valid elections show that the current Chairs and committee are not fit to represent residents of Chelsea Bridge Wharf and they have no mandate to do so (91% of leaseholders did not vote at all in the Chair elections), there are no elections for CBWRA committee members and no directors of the Chelsea Bridge Wharf Right to Manage company have been elected. CBWRA and the CBW RTM company have zero legitimacy in my view. The thought of these people being in charge of the service charge budget, after Right to Manage goes through is a grim prospect.