The community where I currently live, Ingleside at King Farm in Rockville, MD, has one resident as a member of the Board of Directors. This is a requirement of Maryland state law. The Resident Council (which was once freely elected by the residents but now is essentially self-perpetuating with residents having no voice in choosing new members) is to choose 3 candidates for the Board which are forwarded to the Board for it to choose among, using the same criteria they use for other Board members. The last time this process was run there was little interest among residents in serving on the Board and they only had one nominee, who was accepted as the resident Board member and has been on other boards, including a university board. The resident Board member is treated the same as other Board members and does not legally represent the residents. She does report regularly to the Resident Council. Prior Board members reported to the community as a whole through the resident newsletter, but the current one does not do that. There is no reporting requirement.
MaCCRA, our state NaCCRA affiliate, has presented a bill to the Maryland legislature which, among other provisions which are more controversial, would require 2 resident Board members to be chosen directly by the residents or Resident Council. Because the industry strongly opposes provisions of the legislation regarding return of deposits, it seems unlikely the legislation will be approved.
We have sister communities in DC and Virginia. They are governed by the laws in each jurisdiction, so one has one resident member and the other has two. The various communities all go with the minimum required resident representation generally, but sometimes a resident is on the Board who is selected by the normal processes (in at least one case, the resident was already on the Board when he moved in) rather than as a resident representative.