Committee Authority: What a Committee May Actually Do in a Condominium, HOA or Cooperative

Jason Hamilton Mikes, JD, MBA
Founder & Managing Shareholder

• Published September 25, 2026
• Reviewed by Jason Hamilton Mikes, JD, MBA, September 26, 2026
• Florida Statutes as of July 1, 2026
• Applies to: Condominiums · HOAs · Cooperatives

A committee has the authority the board hands it, and nothing else. The Florida statutes say very little about what a committee may decide and a great deal about when its meetings must be noticed and open to owners. Chapter 718 and Chapter 719 draw that line one way. Chapter 720 draws it in a different and narrower place. The corporate statute sets outer limits that apply to all three. Classify the committee correctly at the moment you create it and most committee problems never arise.

What a committee is under Florida law

Chapter 718 defines the word. Under § 718.103(8), a committee is a group of board members, unit owners, or board members and unit owners, appointed by the board or by a member of the board, either to make recommendations to the board regarding the proposed annual budget or to take action on behalf of the board. Two things follow from that sentence, and boards routinely miss both.

First, the statutory definition contemplates two jobs and only two: budget recommendations, and action on behalf of the board. A social committee or a landscaping advisory group is a creature of your bylaws, not of the Condominium Act, which means the statute is not the place to look for its powers.

Second, the definition describes who may compose a committee. It is not a separate eligibility rule layered on top of the governing documents. A committee is made up of board members, unit owners, or both, so a director satisfies the first branch whether or not that director owns a unit. Whether a non-owner may serve as a director is a different question, and § 718.103(8) does not answer it. The declaration and the bylaws do. Where the documents permit a non-owner director, that director may serve on a committee and vote there. What the definition does not contemplate is a voting member who is neither a director nor a unit owner, which is the position an outside consultant occupies. Nothing stops a committee from inviting an engineer, an insurance broker or the manager to attend and speak. The distinction is between attending and voting.

Chapter 720 contains no definition of committee at all. Section 720.301 defines governing documents, member and voting interest and leaves committee alone. For an HOA, therefore, the first question is never what the statute says a committee is. It is what your declaration and bylaws say, and what the board resolution creating the committee says. Our separate treatment of HOA committee authority under Chapter 720 works through the documents side of that analysis.

The line that matters: recommend or take final action

Every other question about committees resolves to this one. A committee that recommends produces advice, and the board's vote on that advice at a noticed board meeting is the association's act. A committee that takes final action decides, and the association is bound without a further board vote.

The source of a committee's power to take final action is the corporate statute. Under § 617.0825, the board, by resolution adopted by a majority of the full board, may create one or more committees and may give each of them any of the board's own authority, to the extent the resolution says so. Whatever the resolution does not say, the committee does not have, which is why a vague motion is a poor way to create a committee.

Section 617.0825 also fixes three things a committee may never do, however the resolution is worded. A committee may not approve or recommend to the members any action or proposal that the corporate statute requires the members to approve. A committee may not fill vacancies on the board of directors or on any committee. A committee may not adopt, amend or repeal the bylaws. Add to those the limits in your own declaration and bylaws, which frequently reserve specific decisions to the board or to the membership.

Which committee meetings must be noticed and open

This is where the chapters split, and the split is real. The condominium and cooperative rules are broad and catch most committees. The HOA rule is narrow and catches few.

The condominium text is worth reading twice. Section 718.112(2)(c)4. says that meetings of a committee to take final action on behalf of the board, or to make recommendations to the board regarding the association budget, are subject to paragraph (2)(c). Meetings of a committee that does neither are subject to the section unless those meetings are exempted from the section by the bylaws. The default is coverage, and an exemption has to be written into the bylaws rather than assumed because the committee feels informal. Chapter 719 carries the same structure for cooperatives.

Chapter 720 works the opposite way. Section 720.303(2) applies the open-meeting provisions to a committee only when a final decision will be made regarding the expenditure of association funds, and to any body vested with the power to approve or disapprove architectural decisions for a specific parcel of residential property. An HOA finance committee that merely drafts a budget for the board falls outside that language. Many HOA bylaws impose an open-meeting requirement anyway, which is good practice, but it comes from the documents rather than the statute.

When a committee meeting is covered, it is a real meeting: posted notice identifying the agenda items, owners entitled to attend and to speak on designated items, and minutes. The mechanics are the same ones the board uses for its own meeting notices and agendas.

Budget committees

A budget or finance committee is the one committee the Condominium Act names. Because § 718.112(2)(c)4. reaches a committee that makes recommendations to the board regarding the association budget, a condominium finance committee that drafts numbers for the board is subject to the notice and open-meeting rules even though it decides nothing. This catches boards off guard every autumn, because the work feels like homework rather than governance.

In an HOA the same committee is usually outside the statute, which makes the charter more important rather than less: it is the only document setting out what the committee may see, what it may say publicly, and what it must bring back to the board. The budget and finance committee has its own guide.

Architectural and modification committees

In an HOA, the architectural committee is the committee most likely to generate litigation, and the statute treats it specially. Section 720.303(2) makes its meetings open when it is vested with the power to approve or disapprove architectural decisions for a specific parcel. Section 720.3035(1) then limits its authority: the association or its committee may exercise architectural control only to the extent the authority is specifically stated or reasonably inferred from the declaration or published guidelines and standards. A committee that invents a standard on the spot is acting outside the section.

Effective July 1, 2026, § 720.3035(1)(c) adds a specific prohibition. An association or its architectural or construction improvement committee may not require that a building permit have been issued by a governmental authority as a prerequisite to the association's review of a proposed improvement. Committees that had been telling owners to come back with a permit in hand need to change that instruction. Our discussion of architectural review procedures covers the review timeline and the denial letter.

Condominiums have no statutory architectural committee. Changes to the common elements are material alteration questions under § 718.113(2). A condominium committee may study an alteration and recommend it. It cannot approve one, and neither can the board where the declaration reserves that vote to the owners.

Can a committee bind the association?

Sometimes, and the answer depends entirely on what the board wrote down. If the board delegated final action within the limits of § 617.0825 and the governing documents permit the delegation, the committee's decision is the association's decision. If the board delegated only the power to recommend, the committee's decision is a suggestion, and a vendor who relies on it is relying on nothing.

Two cautions matter in practice. The first is contracting. Competitive bidding obligations run to the association, not to the committee: a condominium must obtain competitive bids for a contract requiring payment exceeding 5 percent of the total annual budget including reserves, § 718.3026, and an HOA above 10 percent, § 720.3055. Both sections except certain professional services, emergencies and sole sources. A committee that solicits its own quotes and picks a vendor can put the association in breach of a statute the committee never read.

The second is apparent authority. Vendors do not know your bylaws. If a committee chair has given direction on a job site for two months, the association may find it hard to argue later that the chair had no authority. The cure is boring and effective: the board signs, the committee does not, and the charter says so. Our guide to reviewing vendor contracts sets out the signature and scope controls.

Committee minutes and records

In a condominium this is settled. Section 718.111(12)(a)6. lists among the official records the minutes of all meetings of the association, the board of administration, any committee, and the unit owners. Committee minutes are official records, owners may inspect them, and they are subject to the same retention period as the rest of the records.

Chapter 720 does not list committee minutes by name. Section 720.303(4) lists the minutes of all meetings of the board of directors and of the members, and then, in its catch-all, all other written records of the association not specifically included which are related to the operation of the association. Committee agendas, minutes, scoring sheets, bid tabulations and correspondence land in the catch-all. The practical answer for an HOA is the same as for a condominium: assume an owner can ask for it.

The exemptions are narrow and are not a general confidentiality rule. Records protected by attorney-client or work product privilege, personnel records, medical records and certain personal identifying information are withheld from inspection under § 718.111(12)(c) and § 720.303(5). A committee's opinion that its work is sensitive is not on the list. Handle committee records the way the board handles its own. Minutes should record who attended, what was considered, what was recommended or decided, and the vote; for a committee that takes final action, they are the only evidence that the association acted at all.

Who may serve, and who may not

For condominiums the analysis has two steps, and collapsing them into one is the mistake we see most often. First read § 718.103(8): a committee is a group of board members, unit owners, or both. A director satisfies that definition without owning anything. Then read the declaration and the bylaws on who may be a director. Chapter 718 imposes no unit-ownership requirement for directors, so where the documents permit a non-owner to serve on the board, that director is eligible to serve on a committee and to vote there. The constraint boards attribute to § 718.103(8), that every committee member must own a unit, actually comes from whatever the documents say about director eligibility. We are not aware of a Division or arbitration decision treating the definition as an independent restriction on committee membership. What the definition does settle is that a person who is neither a director nor a unit owner is not a committee member, however useful that person may be in the room. A spouse whose name is not on the deed, a tenant, a manager and an outside professional can all attend, present and answer questions. Giving one of them a vote is a risk with no benefit.

The fining committee is the sharpest example, because the statute adds disqualifications on top of the definition. Under § 718.303(3), § 719.303(3) and § 720.305(2), the committee must have at least three members appointed by the board, and no member may be an officer, director or employee of the association, or the spouse, parent, child, brother or sister of an officer, director or employee. Those rules are covered in our guide to the fining committee.

For HOAs, membership is whatever the documents allow, which in some communities includes non-owner residents. Whatever the source, the appointment should be by board action at a board meeting, recorded in the minutes, with a stated term. Committees that have run for years on self-selected membership are the ones whose decisions get challenged.

Setting a committee up so it stays inside its lane

A workable sequence for any new committee:

1. Decide first whether the committee recommends or takes final action. That sentence determines the notice rules, the minutes and the liability.
2. Adopt the committee by board resolution at a noticed board meeting, with a majority of the full board voting for it, and name the members and the term.
3. State the subject matter narrowly. A committee evaluating roofing proposals is easier to govern than a committee on building maintenance.
4. Say what the committee may not do: sign contracts, direct vendors, speak for the association, or spend money.
5. Decide whether the meetings will be noticed and open, then comply. For a condominium budget committee the answer is set by statute.
6. Require a written report to the board, and require that the board vote on it in an open meeting.

All of that lives in the charter, and one thought through properly will govern a committee for years. Our guide to writing a committee charter works through each provision, including confidentiality, conflicts and sunset dates.

Contact Hamilton Mikes

Hamilton Mikes helps boards in Lee, Collier and Charlotte Counties create committees that work and stay inside the statute, including charters, delegation resolutions and the meeting-notice analysis for each chapter. Call 239-594-7227 or visit our Corporate Governance page.