Thursday, July 08, 2010

Strings put on beach-front buyouts

GALVESTON — Some West End homeowners, worried about the city’s plans for beach-front properties acquired through a federal buyout program, want the city to restrict what it does with the newly public land in their neighborhoods.As part of its agreement to buy 64 hurricane-damaged houses under the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, the city asked those property owners to obtain releases from the homeowners associations so the city wouldn’t have to pay association fees or follow deed restrictions. Homeowners associations typically have some legal authority through deed covenants over how property is used.However, some homeowners associations are refusing to release the properties until the city agrees to leave the land as open space, City Attorney Susie Green said.

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It just keeps getting more and more interesting.

Thanks to Fred Fischer for this story.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

..and the city could still do all of those things on property immediately adjacent to the HOA-burdened homes.

Perhaps the city would exercise eminent domain and get this over with. This sounds like it still might be a developer controlled subdivision.

Anonymous said...

This story has been posted here before, on January 15, 2010 and March 8, 2010.