This week, hundreds of CAI members gather in Orlando to reconnect with friends and colleagues from around the world at CAI’s Annual Conference and Exposition: Community NOW. One of CAI’s core objectives is to advocate for public policy that creates the most ideal legislative and regulatory environments for community associations. There are more than 36 state legislative action committees, 600 volunteers, and 30 lobbyists advocating at the local, state, and federal levels to maintain the integrity of the community association housing model. CAI volunteers in Orlando share strategy, experiences, perspective, and leadership to continue to take advocacy efforts to the next level. Here is a summary of these efforts.
RECOGNIZING VOLUNTEERS
Each year, CAI recognizes volunteers who contributed substantially to CAI’s mission of building better communities. In the area of government and public affairs, the following individuals were recognized:
Matt Kuisle, PE, PRA, RS (Regional Executive Director of Reserve Advisors, Florida) was recognized with the Excellence in Government & Public Affairs Award for his tremendous contributions to legislative advocacy in Florida. Kuisle is a regular supporter of advocacy initiatives in Florida and was engaged and involved in many meetings with legislators at all levels of government.
The Missouri Legislative Action Committee worked diligently to combat legislation negatively impacting the 948,000 Missourians residents living in community associations and heavily fundraising funds to support their efforts. Legislation that is detrimental to community associations in Missouri passed in 2023 in an unconstitutional manner, and the MO LAC engaged counsel to sue the government in 2024. This lawsuit remains pending, and the LAC continues to spearhead advocacy and fundraising for this initiative. Its tremendous work earned the CAI Legislative Action Committee of the Year Award.
Edmund A. Allcock, Esq., CCAL, (Allcock & Marcus, LLC, Braintree, MA) and Brendan P. Bunn, Esq., CCAL (Chadwick, Washington, Moriarty, Elmore, & Bunn, P.C., Fairfax, Virginia), both past Presidents of the College of Community Association Lawyers Board of Governors, and members of their state legislative action committees, are being honored with the Outstanding Volunteer Service Award for their leadership and dedication to CAI’s federal Corporate Transparency Act lawsuit and initiative over the last two years on behalf of the community association industry and CAI members.
Ronald L. Perl, Esq., CCAL (Becker Lawyers, West Palm Beach, Florida), past chair of CAI’s Federal Legislative Action Committee and past member of the New Jersey Legislative Action Committee, is being honored with the Distinguished Service Award.
ADVOCACY UPDATE AND PRIORITIES
Government & Public Affairs Meeting. More than 150 people from more than 35 states attended the Government & Public Affairs meeting to discuss what is happening at the federal level and exchange information about what is happening throughout the states.
Future and past blogs include full legislative updates here. Here are highlights from the Government & Public Affairs Committee meeting and the legislative and regulatory update session held at the conference presented by Dawn Bauman, CAE, and Peter Kristian, CMCA, LSM, PCAM, chair of the Government & Public Affairs Committee:
Federal Update. Work continues these priorities, including access to mortgages for condominiums and housing cooperatives (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac requirements), delays and exemptions to the Corporate Transparency Act, maintaining FCC bulk billing options for community associations, urging condominium safety low interest government backed loan programs, pursuing movement of the Disaster Assistance Fairness Act, supporting the Freedom to Invest in Tomorrow’s Workforce, and preserving community association covenants from preemption by special interest groups. More information may be found here..
State Update. CAI is tracking more than 1,800 bills so far in 2025. Condominium safety continues to be discussed in many states, with a focus on reserve study and funding mandates. Other issues include foreclosures and fining ability, board member education regulations, construction defect regulations, electric vehicle charging stations, access to solar devices, proposals restricting HOAs from prohibiting chicken and beekeeping, and ombudsman and HOA complaint offices.
LACs experienced a lot of success negotiating bill language, defeating legislation, and passing legislation that helps CAI members. Find more details on what’s happening in your state, here. For a summary of 2025 state legislation to date, visit here.
Public Policy Development. CAI government affairs volunteers are in the process of updating assessment limitation increases public policy to ensure they are relevant for today’s environment. A brand-new public policy addressing affordable housing in community associations is also in development for 2025. Updates to the current reserve studies and funding public policy were also approved by CAI’s Board of Trustees on May 7, 2025 to better align the policy with the updated Reserve Study Standards recommendations. If you’re interested in getting involved in the review process, please contact CAI’s Government and Public Affairs team at government@caionline.org.
Advocacy Resources. CAI has an expansive toolkit of advocacy, public policy, and legislative resources that are available to CAI members and advocates. These resources include state and federal legislative tracking reports, grassroots outreach email and petition campaigns, state advocacy day plans of action, tools to invite legislators to your community events, etc. A presentation by CAI advocates, moderated by Phoebe Neseth, Esq., was presented to Conference attendees spotlighting these member resources, and the CAI Government and Public Affairs Committee also presented these resources to CAI members and advocates during their annual in-person meeting.
SAVE THE DATE
Mark your calendar for next year’s conference! The 2026 CAI Annual Conference & Exposition: Community NOW, will be held June 3-6 in Fort Lauderdale.
