Professor returns from vacation to find office covered in aluminum foil

News from The Associated PressST. PETER, Minn. (AP) -- A science professor at Gustavus Adolphus College left for a week's vacation this summer and returned to a shiny office. Very shiny. Professor Scott Bur's students had covered his office in aluminum foil. Computer screen, chairs, the ceiling, the floor - all covered in foil. Books and pens were individually wrapped, so was the phone, a ball cap, a bottle and the coffee maker.
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Usually I stick to an aluminum foil hat. Keeps the mind control rays out, you know. Thanks to Fred Pilot for the link.

Amid Washington Heat Wave, Senator Talks 'Global Cooling'

His Al Gore igloo melted, Sen. Jim Inhofe Not Convinced of Warming Trend

Back in February, when Washington D.C. was buried under record-breaking snowfall and the capital was paralyzed, the nation's chief climate change doubter made much of a small igloo down the street from the Capitol building as he took to the Senate floor to refute climate change.

With municipal pay like this, who needs Privatopia?

BELL, Calif. – Residents in this modest blue-collar Los Angeles suburb where one in six lives in poverty were angry: Their city manager was getting paid more than President Barack Obama and the police chief more than the commander of the nearly 13,000-member LAPD.

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Their mayor and three of their four council members, people they see every day at the grocery store or church, approved the contracts, and put an obscure measure on the ballot that allowed council members to pay themselves any amount of money.

And they did: collecting between $90,000 and $100,000 a year as part-time officials.

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What a deal for counties and cities: not only do they shift the cost of providing services onto privately governed HOAs, they get volunteers to run them as well who are paid zip for doing so.

Real estate deflation hits most large California counties

ALAMEDA, Calif. — Assessed property values in California are likely to decline for the second year running, according to a Bond Buyer review of data from the state’s larger counties.

Even though the state’s tax assessment system has the effect of muting the volatility of property assessments, 11 of the state’s 12 largest counties experienced a decline in their property tax roll this year.

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Even the center of the Silicon Valley, Santa Clara County, was unable to avoid a shrinking roll.

“This is far worse than anyone had expected,” County Assessor Larry Stone said in the news release announcing the tax roll. The roll dropped 2.44%, by $7.4 billion.

“This county has not experienced such a devastating drop in property values since the Great Depression,” he said.

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The data show this isn't a typical real estate correction cycle in which prices fall back to earth following a boom. They're actually falling into a deflationary hole in much of California, which along with Nevada has suffered some of the steepest declines in real estate value in the nation.

Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman recently wrote that Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who studied the Depression of the 1930s for his doctoral dissertation, so fears deflation that he reportedly said he'd toss sacks of $100 bills out helicopters to prevent it. Memo to the Chairman: deploy a squadron of black helicopters bearing bags of Benjamins to California, starting in my ZIP Code.

Credit card contracts unreadable for most Americans

Credit card contracts unreadable for 80% of Americans"Credit card contracts and other such documents are written in dense prose for a reason: So that the customer will NOT be able to understand it," notes Roy Peter Clark, a national expert on writing and a senior scholar at the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla. "I may be cynical, but I don't think their writing strategies are accidental, the collateral damage of a bureaucratic mindset. I think those writers know exactly what they are doing."
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Yes. And one might say the same thing about CC&Rs.

Alligator makes a meal of Tempe Town Lake fish | Phoenix News | Arizona News | azfamily.com | Phoenix News

Alligator makes a meal of Tempe Town Lake fish | Phoenix News | Arizona News | azfamily.com | Phoenix NewsTEMPE, Ariz. -- Since the dam at Tempe Town Lake broke and the lake drained earlier this week, one of the big questions has been what will happen to the fish left behind in the drying lake bed.

Well, let's just say an alligator named Tuesday is getting one heck of a meal.
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And he (or she) has a nice smile, no doubt as the result of a full tummy.

Ohio.com - Judge: Ohio man can't form own Indian reservation

Ohio.com - Judge: Ohio man can't form own Indian reservationLIMA, OHIO: An Ohio man who claimed that his American Indian ancestry makes him exempt from city nuisance laws has been ordered to clean up two homes that have fallen into disrepair.

A judge told William Bowersock on Thursday that he has 30 days to take care of the properties in Lima (LY'-muh).

The judge rejected Bowersock's argument that he had seceded from the local government and formed his own Indian reservation, thereby making him exempt from the city's property code.
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Obviously he should have formed a one-man HOA instead.

Man Pulled Gun On Condo Tenant In Shower

A Boynton Beach homeowner's association member was arrested after pulling a gun on someone in the shower Wednesday, police said.

"He had the gun within 12 inches from my face, shaking his hand," tenant James Korienek said.

Korienek said he came face to face with an armed man inside the Boynton Beach condominium where he lives early Wednesday.

Boynton Beach police said Virgil Wilkinson, a homeowner's association board member, broke into the unit.

"I was locked in the bathroom," Korienek said. "I come out, open the door and the gun is pulled on me like this, and he had the Boynton (Beach) police on the phone. He said, 'Just stand back. Stand back.' And I'm like, 'Virgil, it's me, Jim.'"

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Sounds like a scene out of a Hitchcock movie, doesn't it?

Should Condos have access to privately owned units? Is this an invitation for abuse?

Johnson battles homeowner's association in court

A homeowner's association in Kettering is suing Prince George's County Executive Jack B. Johnson (D) and his wife for allegedly failing to pay assessments to the HOA.

In court papers filed in Prince George's County District Court, the Kettering Community Association is asking for about $1,500 in late assessments and legal fees.

"We had this house for 30 years, paid our dues consistently for 30 years," Johnson said in an interview Friday. "They claim we didn't pay. ... It's only $150 (per year). The next thing I know I get a bill for $1,800 or more ... and [got a notice] they are going to foreclose on my house [from] some lawyer. I got pretty mad. I hired a lawyer representing me. ...

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Mr Johnson says: "There's a pattern that's been really frustrating for us," he said. "You have these developers that come in and they build condominium associations and homeowners associations, but the way the bylaws are drafted, the citizens of Prince George's County never take control over their own communities."

Oh, Mr Johnson, I think the problem is much bigger than that!

Two bodies found in S.W. Reno house that burned after reported explosion

Investigators have found two bodies in the burned-out rubble of a home in an exclusive southwest Reno neighborhood. They have been unable to identify the victims who died in the blaze, which began shortly before 11 a.m. Tuesday.

Deputies with the Washoe County Sheriff's Office had attempted to serve an eviction at the home, which was under foreclosure, on Tuesday at about 10:40 a.m. They said they knocked and identified themselves, then heard what sounded like gunfire or an explosion and took cover.
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Thanks to a a friend who alerted me to the story.

No word on whether this was a bank or an HOA foreclosure. Regardless, this is not the first time a homeowner has has self immolated in a burning house they were about to be evicted from. I sometimes think we are a little too cavalier about kicking people out of their own homes in this country.

Petition seeks to have wolves howl across US

Petition seeks to have wolves howl across U.S.

Those wild canines better not howl too close to any exurban HOAs or they may find the HOA will send out the exterminators.

Money missing from St. James HOA leads to embezzlement charge for employee

St. James | Brunswick County Sheriff's Office investigators arrested a Wilmington woman in an embezzlement scheme that siphoned more than $12,000 from the St. James Property Owners' Association.

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Another embezzlement story from Cynthia Stephens.

Carolina Beach woman charged with embezzling $30,000A Carolina Beach woman has been charged with embezzling about $30,000 from homeowners associations

A Carolina Beach woman has been charged with embezzling about $30,000 from homeowners associations whose money she managed.

Michelle Lynn Bowman, 42, of 300 The Cape Boulevard, was arrested June 28 after turning herself in to Carolina Beach police. She is still being held in New Hanover County jail in lieu of $40,100 bond, according to jail officials.

She is accused of using identification numbers from four homeowners associations to get bank cards and withdraw cash, said Lt. Bill Goodson of the Carolina Beach Police Department.

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Thanks to Cynthia Stephens for this story. I wonder how much money is missing from communal coffers in America's hundreds of thousands of residental associations?

California political paradox unveils underlying tension between voters, interest groups

The Los Angeles Times has highlighted a political paradox that's playing out in California and certainly other states and the nation as a whole. While anti-incumbent sentiment remains high (last month, California voters nearly elected an unknown state worker who spent less than $5,000 on his campaign over an incumbent Assemblymember as the GOP nominee for insurance commissioner), it is incumbents whose campaigns are getting funded and not their challengers.

Voters in effect are saying we want new blood and someone not beholden to special interest groups, but we'll elect incumbents over non-incumbents since special interest groups get the incumbents' name out there more than their relatively unknown challengers. The real fight isn't over who gets elected, but between the voters and special interest groups.

The explosion of the Internet, which is already blowing a huge hole in the business models of the mass media, could change the equation. Folks running for office -- particularly in large, populous states like California -- have to raise gobs of money in order to buy political ads from mass media outlets. However, if more voters already sick of junior high school level attack ads decide to ignore them and visit candidates' websites instead, the balance of power is shifted between them and the special interest groups that fund candidates' high priced TV spots.

At Mass this morning, there was a reading from Micah, II,1-3

Sent to me from a friend. Am sharing with permission.
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"Shame on those who lie in bed planning evil and wicked deeds and rise at daybreak to do them, knowing that they have the power!
They covet land and take it by force; if they want a house they seize it; they rob a man of his home and steal every man's inheritance.

Therefore these are the words of the Lord:
Listen, for this whole brood I am planning disaster...

Goodness! I didn't know the CAI-HOA was active then, too!

Texas HOA property owners outraged over lack of transparency, questionable expenditures

The neighbors wanted everyone to know exactly where their dues were going, so they also presented their findings at a recent HOA meeting that got so out of control some people were threatened with arrests.

"People are outraged," exclaimed Peggy Sue Wilson-Schmueckle. She’s the homeowner leading the fight to rid the association of what she calls gross mismanagement of funds by the board. “Once we uncovered it and did an audit, people were very outraged. They want them [the current board] to resign.”

The information we uncovered explain why the homeowners are so bent out of shape. Records detail board meetings at nice restaurants; meetings that were not open to the public. We also found a document showing a $4,200 expense paid to the board president's son-in-law for brush work he did in the neighborhood. Additional records showed the HOA donated thousands of dollars to random charities. The HOA even gave more than $1,300 to a group of HOA lawyers to help them lobby the legislature.

Florida HOA threatens $100 a day fine for unapproved shade of mulch

Lynn of Davie couldn’t believe her eyes, but a letter from her homeowners association confirmed the worst: She faces a potential $100-a-day fine for having the wrong-colored mulch in front of her house.

Lynn tells me that her problems began when the Association made it known it was displeased that home’s mulch had thinned out too much and needed replacing. To appease the board, Lynn and her husband added new match, but apparently the golden shade of mulch the couple chose was not in accordance with what the Association wants. Thus the ultimatum: Put in new mulch or pay $100 a day until you do.

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As the owner of this blog has noted, there seems to be no limit to how frivolous HOAs can be.

Homeowners Associations Get Nasty: Foreclose or Sue to Collect Dues

In 30 states, HOAs have the power to foreclose on homeowners who do not pay up, which has made them even more vilified than the IRS!And now some are resorting to cutting off utilities: A Georgia woman has been living without water for more than a year now, all because she failed to pay her HOA dues.

Texas State Sen. John Carona (R-Dallas), who serves as president of a huge national realty property management firm with $400 million revenue, says the Texas law that permits HOAs to foreclose should not be changed. Tweaked, but not changed. When you sign for your mortgage, he said, you also sign and legally agree to be a part of the homeowners association. That's fair -- you are duly warned and don't have to buy the property if you don't like the association's terms (my words). He advises buyers to read HOA rules carefully before buying. Seek counsel, if necessary. He also says that homeowners who don't pay their share of homeowners association dues force a hardship on other homeowners in the neighborhood, who often have to kick in more for expenses.

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Life is so simple, "if you don't like it, move" or better yet, "Don't live there". If you sign your mortgage docs, you agree to be abused, fined, have your water turned off, get evicted from your own home.

And you thought the IRS was the most hated entity in the country.

Ah yes, more happy homeowners Zogby missed - this time around.

Sailor faces fine for leasing condo

Homeowner's association charges sailor $10 a day CHEASPEAKE, Va. (WAVY) - For three years, the condo on Rivanna River Reach was home for Mike Lukaszonas.
But when the Navy transferred the helicopter pilot to Florida, he started leasing his home to someone else to help pay for the mortgage. He asked his homeowner's association for permission
"They decided unanimously to vote no," said Mike Lukaszonas, "and the reason was never cited in the letter. They just said denied."

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Another genius board at work here.

I wonder if Zogby ever talked to anyone in this haven of happy homeowners?

Power company tells customer she is dead

Power company tells customer she is dead

VIENNA (Reuters) – An Austrian woman has had to convince her electricity supplier that she is alive after the company wrote to her asking for information about her contract following her "passing away."

In a personally addressed letter, the Linz-based company said it had heard of her death through her bank, daily Oesterreich reported on Thursday.

"I am not the dead one," 58-year-old Christine R. wrote back in a fax and email to the company, explaining that it was her neighbor who had died and she was the custodian. She eventually went to the customer center in person to prove her existence.