Tag Archives: HOA

Everybody Loves A Party!

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Some fascinating posters are going around the Internet right now. Remember CAI? The Community Associations Institute? These are the good folks who run America’s managed neighborhoods, handing out excessive fines for minor violations, and hiring lawyers to file liens and lawsuits to take away your homes. They’re the ones who have predatory tow trucks cruising your streets and towing away cars that don’t belong there, like those of friends and relatives. These are the folks who are now doing mandatory DNA cheek swabs on the neighborhood pets, so fines can be handed for each unscooped poop. They are faux governments that have more power than traditional governments. And they don’t recognize such niceties as the Constitution’s Bill of Rights.

Oh, and they’re also the ones who madly lobby the Legislatures to make sure Homeowners can never reclaim the Consitutional rights they’ve lost to the modern HOA Movement. And these folks make an amazing amount of money….ALL OF IT from you!

When you have that kind of money, what do you do with it?

Just scroll down and see how appropriate the upcoming Arizona party season seems.

CAI-1Casino Night PosterRemember just a few months back when the TSA got hammered for spending taxpayers’ money in this same way?

Ah, but Congress has government oversight over the TSA. Congress has no such oversight over Homeowners Associations.

Go figure.

 

Hey, You Brats! Inside! This Is An HOA!

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by Guest Blogger Nila Ridings
 
Nearly everyday I see something about “Let’s move!” America’s move to raise a healthier generation of kids. Well, that program seems to apply only to kids outside of Boca Quay, Florida.
 
With the new “no wheels” policy, kids in the Boca Quay Homeowners Association are probably supposed to sit inside on their computers honing their cyber-bullying skills!
 
This battle-ax of a board member hides behind a door when the TV cameras show up and yells, “No comment!” She had plenty to say in a letter warning homeowners to keep their kids inside, but “No comment” for the news media? 
 
Where does this anti-kid attitude come from? It probably stems from the flood of lawsuits against HOAs where someone gets hurt. Tort lawyers have sure messed up the neighborhood, haven’t they?
 
When I was growing up, all the neighborhood kids played on the street. We rode our bicycles. Sure, there was the time when I went airborne over the handlebars of my pink Schwinn and messed up my face on the asphalt. But I didn’t sue the neighborhood. None of my friends ever sued the neighborhood after their own mishaps.
 
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a proponent of kids playing on the Interstate. But childhood is all about being with your friends, and playing outside.
 
When you click on the link below, pay special attention to the little girl who says, “These people don’t know what freedom is!”
 
Honey, we all know what freedom WAS. But that was back before the nightmare known as Homeowners Associations.
 

 

Dang Those Chickens!

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Who doesn’t love omelettes for breakfast and chicken sandwiches at other times of the week? But just keep those chickens out of my backyard!

Backyard chicken coops are one of the privileges of rural living. Two or three laying hens can feed a family forever. But the astonishing growth of Homeowners Associations has led to a pathological contempt for any neighbor who dares keep a pet chicken.

We’re not talking about roosters crowing at the crack of dawn, here. Just chickens.

But for many of the growing number of condo commandos and lawn nazis a backyard chicken is about as attractive as ticks on a picnic blanket.

Oh, the omelette’s OK. Just as long as it has no connection to my neighborhood.

http://www.wvec.com/news/Backyard-chicken-law-not–202352431.html

 

Life Gets Really Poopy In Las Vegas

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Amanda Rhett must have thought she was living on a different planet last week. She had to face the board of the West Trop Homeowners Association to defend herself against a photograph showing two pieces of dog poop in the private back patio area of her home.

The offending feces were left by Amanda’s little miniature Yorkie. It’s not like this terrier was terrorizing the neighborhood by depositing ‘S’ bombs in all the common areas. It was two dog poops the size of a child’s little finger on this lady’s private patio.

It was either pay the $100 fine or find a new place to live.

Actually, this whole story is a really rather creepy. The photographer, obviously a member of the HOA staff, had to trespass onto this woman’s property, lean way over her private balcony rail to snap his photo of the offending poops.

This guy’s got a problem.

Talk about a feces fetish.

http://www.ktnv.com/multimedia/videos/?bctid=2287872811001

Don’t Like The Blogger? Sue His Butt!

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They’re often called SLAPP lawsuits, a frivolous suit filed just to shut up an annoying critic.  The acronym stands for “strategic lawsuit against public participation.” SLAPPS were sometimes used by major companies to hush up environmentalists. Sometimes it was used the other way around. The bottom line was that lawyers were hired to cause the other side great expense and great anxiety, nothing more, nothing less.

SLAPP lawsuits have made their way into the world of Homeowners Associations, too. If you don’t like the neighborhood critic, just hammer him with a SLAPP lawsuit. But there’s a troubling little annoyance called ‘The First Amendment’, and a troubling little Supreme Court decision called ‘New York Times vs. Sullivan’ that essentially says if you’re a public figure you’ll get nailed if you try to jam up the Free Speech rights of the neighborhood critic. A public figure has to be able to prove ‘actual malice’ in a lawsuit against someone who’s just expressing an honest opinion about what’s right and what’s wrong. It’s more complex, of course, but I go into the subject in detail in my new book, “Neighbors At War!”

But the commentary linked below shows that it can be very expensive for an HOA board member to use neighborhood monies to fund a lawsuit against the local loudmouth. Nobody wins in these idiotic SLAPP lawsuits. Everybody loses, that is, with the exception of the lawyers who file and defend  such lawsuits. They always make money. That’s why there are so many lawyer jokes in the public discourse.

The wisest words in the story linked below: Get over it. Move on.

http://www.opposingviews.com/i/technology/florida-homeowners-association-sues-resident-critical-blog-comments-seeks-identity