Quorum Case Files
The HOA governance podcast. Each episode is a dramatized case study of a real community association event — the meeting minutes, the money, the decision that looked reasonable at the time, and what it teaches every board that comes after.
Episodes are free to stream with a CICSC account.
Real decisions. Real consequences.
Episode 01 · Honolulu · 2017
The $4.5 Million Question
The Marco Polo Fire
A board studied a fire-sprinkler retrofit, priced it at roughly $4.5 million, and shelved it. Four years later four people died — and the same sprinklers cost more than $6 million to install after the fire. The anatomy of the most normal decision a board can make going as wrong as a decision can go.
“Deferral is not savings — it is a transfer of cost onto a future no one pictures.”
Episode 02 · Berkeley · 2015
The Mushrooms on the Balcony
The Berkeley Balcony Collapse
A fifth-floor balcony sheared off a modern building during a birthday party, killing six. The rot was hidden behind the waterproofing — but the warnings weren't: residents had reported mushrooms growing out of the deck. How California answered with SB 721 and SB 326, the law that fused balcony inspection to the HOA reserve study.
“You can only reserve for what you are willing to inspect.”
Episode 03 · San Francisco · 2016
Broken on Day One
The Millennium Tower
A $350 million luxury high-rise at 301 Mission Street had spent its entire lifetime budget of settlement before the first resident got the keys — then kept sinking and began to tilt. The Millennium Tower Association didn't design the foundation or build it; it inherited the defect, and with it the hardest question a board ever faces: what do you do about a disaster you didn't cause and couldn't have prevented? Measure it, disclose it, and fight for recovery — while owners carry years of assessments before any settlement arrives.
“You can only manage what you are willing to measure and admit.”
Built on the same evidence as the standards
Case Files episodes draw on the same research base as the CIC-BOS Board Operating Standard and the FOAM series — Fundamentals of Association Management. For state-specific guidance, start with the Florida and Texas governance hubs.
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