The hall is currently owned by the community. The following is an explanation in layman’s terms how that is legally the case.
How did the ownership of the hall get transferred to the hall association?
The Certificate of Title, issued by the NSW Land Registry Services, is now registered in the name of: Stokers Siding Dunbible Memorial Hall Incorporated, which is the formal name of the Stokers Siding Dunbible Memorial Hall association and because it is an incorporated association it is a legal entity and is able to own property.
The title was updated on March 9th 2021 as a result of the hall association applying to the Registrar General to transfer the title to the hall association. This transfer might have attracted payment of stamp duty but a ruling sought from Revenue NSW revealed that no duty was payable as the property had been in the hands of the hall association from the time it was incorporated in 1994. At that time the assets of the unincorporated association were transferred automatically to the incorporated association. The old names on the title were there because they were the members of the management committee so the certificate of title now reflects more clearly that the association is the property owner.
What about the previously named owners?
Prior to the change in March 2021 the Certificate of Title named five local men to whom the ownership had been transferred in February 1923. The land the hall was built on was donated to the community by a local landowner, Arthur Byrnes, specifically so that a hall could be built. He also gifted land for a school and a church. The hall was built in 1912 but it took some time to transfer the property title due, we suppose, to the intervention of the First World War and a flu epidemic.
According to historical newspaper reports from around that time the men to whom the title was transferred were members of the management committee. Of course, all those individuals are now deceased. They were joint tenants of the property so that as each transferee passed away the ownership reverted to the survivors.
We can only wonder why no plan was in place to regularly amend the certificate of title by replacing the names of past committee members with the names of the current, living committee members.
What about the “trustees” prior to 1994?
The minutes of committee meetings in the 1970’s indicate that, after making some inquiries as to the whereabouts or existence of a trust deed, in the absence of any other alternative the committee members appointed themselves as trustees. This appointment was reconfirmed at every subsequent AGM until the 1990’s. This was a convenient arrangement but as there had been no change to the certificate of title the “trustees” were not legally entitled to sign any official documents that required Owner’s Consent.
The ongoing maintenance of the hall will require from time to time the necessity of applying to Council for consent to undertake building and maintenance work. Development applications are legislated under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act and require Owner’s Consent. Also, at times, the committee may be successful in receiving grants of funds to carry out maintenance or improvements to the hall. It is a requirement of these processes that there is legal Owner’s Consent to use the grant funds for these purposes.
It goes without saying that the association was compelled to get the ownership updated on the Certificate of Title as the committee would have been unable to continue to do its job.
When the association became an incorporated association it was stated in its application for incorporation that the purpose of the association was to manage and maintain the hall for the benefit of the community. Under the Incorporated Associations Act the members of an association are prohibited from benefiting financially from belonging to the association. Any assets of the association will always remain the property of the association and cannot be disposed of. If the association were to be disbanded the assets of the association can only be transferred to another association that has a similar purpose – that is, it would have to exist to maintain and manage the hall. Thus the hall will be owned by the Stokers Siding-Dunbible community as long as there is an incorporated association.
All members of the Stokers Siding-Dunbible community are entitled to apply for membership of the association.
