2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE TWENTY-ONE - Municipalities (§§ 1-4 — 6756) › Subtitle 6 - Autonomous Municipalities (§§ 4001 — 4990-4990j) › Chapter 231 - Citizen Participation (§§ 4751 — 4764) › § 4755 - Associations—Creation

Owners and tenants in a specific residential or commercial area or section may voluntarily form citizens associations or commercial district association, as the case may be, under the provisions of this chapter. Such associations shall be organized as nonprofit corporations in accordance with Act Jan. 9, 1956, No. 3, and shall also comply with the provisions of this chapter and with applicable municipal ordinances. The existence of the citizens associations and commercial district associations shall be specified in their articles of incorporation, and they may be indefinite or for a fixed period coinciding with the duration of the project or projects their members agree to carry out. Once an association is incorporated, it shall comply with all requirements of the tax laws in order to enjoy the benefits those laws provide for nonprofit entities.
Said associations shall have as their chief purpose, the search for alternatives and solutions to the problems that affect the specific residential or commercial area or section in which they are constituted, as well as establishing procedures, mechanisms, and, where deemed appropriate, setting quotas to carry out the public works, programs and services that have been agreed upon in the area or section involved.
The association’s regulations shall provide for voting rights of the owners and tenants who are members, regulations and rules for internal procedures, regulations for handling and managing its activities and affairs, the duties of the association’s officers, and all other essential norms to ensure the participation of its members and the smooth operation of its affairs.
Each citizens and commercial district association formed under the provisions of this chapter shall present to the mayor, their respective certificates of incorporation together with an improvement proposal duly-approved by the members of the association in question.
Within five (5) days of the date the mayor receives these documents, he shall submit them to the Legislature which, by means of an ordinance to such effects, will extend official recognition to the association involved and approve the improvement proposal submitted.
For purposes of this chapter, the phrase “improvement proposal” shall mean the public works, programs and services agreed upon by a citizens’ association or commercial district association for a given sector through which the owners and tenants of a residential or commercial area constituted into an association agree and propose to undertake or defray, partially or totally, the works, programs or services described in the document in benefit of a specific area.
When the proposal for improvements includes capital works and improvements projects to be executed with the funds proceeding from the Citizen Participation Program for Municipal Development, the proposal shall state the total cost of the works or project and the financial contribution to which the association shall be committed through an agreement with the municipality, which may amount to up to fifty percent (50%) of the works or project. The proposal for the use of these funds must comply with the criteria established in § 4752(n) of this title.
Each municipality shall establish, through ordinance, the minimum percentage of said contribution, which shall be in proportion to the total cost of the proposed capital works and improvements.
Residents and commercial district associations to which funds are delegated from the Citizen Participation Program for Municipal Development, shall render to the municipalities the fiscal reports required by the municipality and shall administer said funds pursuant to the rules provided in § 4763 of this title and by those others established by the municipality. Furthermore, the provisions of § 4763(h) of this title notwithstanding, they shall provide the municipality, within sixty (60) days after the date in which the capital works and improvements or that phase of the latter for which funds have been delegated are concluded, with the checks, invoices, purchase orders, service payment vouchers, payrolls, records, minutes and any other documents related to the funds of the Citizen Participation Program for Municipal Development, for their conservation and custody.
History —Aug. 30, 1991, No. 81, § 16.006; Oct. 29, 1992, No. 84, § 96.