Bobbie Dylan, you ought to be singing about our movement! Little by little, here and there, laws are slowly being enacted to reign in some of the fascism in rogue Homeowners Associations. Nevada, which was hit by the worst HOA scandal in the country, has just passed a law signed today by the Governor.
Beginning October 1st homeowners who are hit with Nazi tactics by overreaching board members at least have a chance to file for dispute mediation. For 250 bucks apiece two warring parties can have three hours to present arguments in the dispute and an official decision is handed down in just sixty days. Each side has to pay their own legal bills, which should cut down on frivolous fines and crushing liens and foreclosures.
Seniors, seniors, seniors! You’re supposed to have learned a few lessons in life. How the hell did you decide to turn all your assets over to the Sun City Shadow Hills Community Association?
Shadow Hills is a few miles southeast of Palm Springs, California. It’s only for older residents, a 55 and older community. But now that this Del Webb development is all built and sold out, the Shadow Hills board of directors has sold out to the infamous Texas state senator, John Carona. All of a sudden, the residents say, the HOA managers have gotten heavy handed.
Nevada has some slimy creatures. But this one has finally been nailed by the U.S. Attorney. Las Vegas huckster Leon Benzer has at long last been indicted for leading the organized crime ring that bled untold tens of millions of dollars out of that state’s Homeowners Associations.
Benzer has claimed innocence all along. In fact, he’s now saying that he got personal approval for running his racket by the Nevada Attorney General. While that’s totally believable, the HOA scam was totally unbelievable. More than two dozen participants have already pleaded guilty to rigging HOA board elections so they could put phony straw men on the boards and divert millions of dollars to Benzer, a bunch of lawyers, a few police officials and a politician here and there.
In days of old, when a neighbor was having a problem and couldn’t maintain his property because of disease, disability, aging, family emergency, bankruptcy, all the other neighbors would pitch in and help out. Well, don’t expect that in HOA Amerika.
No, these days it’s all about humiliating, fining, suing and foreclosing on the properties of the less fortunate. And the new leader of the anti-homeowner rights movement may be Gary Walsh, president of the Meadow Walk Homeowners Association in Sarasota County, Florida. His story is linked below.
Yep, the headline was for shock value. But that’s exactly how many Homeowners Association treat anyone in a minority group. Don’t believe it? Look at the deed to your own home. The chances are amazing your deed will reflect a history of bigotry against Negros, Jews, Orientals, and other minority groups. In fact, bigotry against minorities was absolutely the foundation of the modern Homeowners Association movement. It’s no coincidence the modern HOA movement was born just a few months after the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
