Another HOA embezzlement case

http://www.summitdaily.com/news/14114410-113/polich-association-money-affidavit

"Robert Dwight Polich, 62, the longtime financial administrator for a Keystone homeowners association, was arrested on Dec. 2 and charged with embezzling about $160,000 from the HOA."
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Here we go again.

Can condo bylaws bans on "noxious or offensive activities" be used to stifle free speech?

http://www.chicagotribune.com/classified/realestate/ct-mre-1207-condo-living-20141201-column.html

Yes, according to attorney Howard Dakoff.  So how do you like that?

"A bylaws provision that prohibits noxious or offensive activities that are an annoyance or nuisance to other unit owners or occupants is a common provision. Such provisions are routinely board-enforced and upheld by courts. Unit owners have the right to free speech, but boards have the right to fine unit owners for exercising such speech if it harasses or becomes a nuisance to other owners."

Golden's trash program decreases waste, upsets homeowners associations

http://www.denverpost.com/golden/ci_27052742/goldens-trash-program-decreases-waste-upsets-homeowners-associations

"Golden's expansion of its pay-as-you-throw trash collection has left some homeowners associations and apartment managers unsure how they will work it into their current contracts.Pay-as-you-throw offers trash customers volume-based pricing so that they can choose to pay less for a small trash can or more for a larger one. A recycling bin is included, so the idea is that customers will recycle in order to avoid going over their chosen volume.That incentive, however, is not the same at apartment complexes where everyone puts their trash in the same container and it is hard to track who throws away more. "Our problem is that it really becomes the landlord educating the tenant," on why they should recycle, said Nancy Burke, vice president of government affairs for the Apartment Association of Metro Denver. A representative of the association spoke against the program expansion at a Nov. 13 public hearing. Residents of homeowners associations are often on the same contract, so splitting them up means added administrative work. Jim Cringler, who manages the Village at Mountain Ridge homeowners association in Golden, said that will lead to an increase in cost."

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Interesting problem for HOAs.  Do they to "educate" their unit owners about the need to reduce common expenses by changing their habits and recycling more, and expect voluntary compliance? Or  will property managers and boards use the usual command-and-control model to do this, and just order people to do it, or pay a fine?

Clueless Las Vegas HOA defense attorney can't figure out how public records became public

http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/las-vegas/hoa-defense-lawyer-probing-how-review-journal-got-now-secret-documents

Ace reporter Jeff German made it clear how he got the not-so-secret-anymore documents in the Las Vegas HOA takeover fraud case.  But now a defense attorney is making noises about getting to the bottom of this non-mystery.

Illinois: What to expect for condo owners in 2015

http://www.chicagotribune.com/classified/realestate/ct-mre-1207-condo-forecast-2015-20141201-story.html#page=1

Pamela McKuen expains changes in law and policy for the state of Illinois.

Israeli high court upholds residential screening that would enable Jewish villages to keep Arabs out

http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/.premium-1.616391

"The law, which was passed in March 2011, allows small communities to set up admissions committees to screen potential new members based on criteria laid down in the community’s bylaws. Such committees have been standard practice in small communities for decades, but until this law was passed, they had no legal basis. Several human rights organizations, including Adalah and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, argued that the law would allow these communities to reject homosexuals, people with disabilities, Arabs or anyone else who differed from the community’s social norm. ..Though the law explicitly prohibits discrimination against members of other social groups, it permits the admissions committees to reject candidates on such vague grounds as “unsuitability to the community’s social life” or its “social-cultural fabric” or to “unique characteristics of the community as defined in its bylaws.” 

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So now they can say, we aren't discriminating against Arabs. We are just rejecting people who are "unsuitable to the community's social life or socio-cultural fabric, or the the unique characteristics of the community as defined in its bylaws."  

In the US HOAs enforced race restrictive covenants for decades. Then when civil rights statutes made that illegal, more sophisticated ways of creating one-race, one-class communities were devised.  These days, the increasing inequality of wealth and income does most of the work.

There's more on this policy here. 

Residents ask court to remove 3 HOA board members

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fl-lawsuit-tamarac-hoa-20141117-story.html
"Residents of a 55-plus neighborhood are so fed up with four members of their homeowners association board that they are asking a judge to help remove them. Nearly 75 residents of the Mainlands 3are asking a Broward circuit court judge to forbid the four from writing checks and to hold a special meeting within 48 hours to allow a removal vote."
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This is an election dispute. Judges tend to be reluctant to reverse HOA elections because they think if they start doing it soon they will be doing little else.

The Unfinished Suburbs of America - The Atlantic

The Unfinished Suburbs of America - The Atlantic: There are hundreds of zombie subdivisions like this one scattered across the country. They're one of the most visible reminders of the housing boom and bust, planned and paved in the heady days where it seemed that everybody wanted a home in the suburbs, and could afford it, too. But when the economy tanked, many of the developers behind these subdivisions went belly-up, and construction stopped. In some cases, a few people have moved into homes in these half-built subdivisions, requiring services to be delivered there. In others, the land is empty, except for roads, sidewalks, and the few street signs that haven't been stolen yet. In some counties in the West, anywhere from 15 to 33 percent of all subdivision lots are vacant, according to the Sonoran Institute.
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It's going to take a long time for these unfinished Privatopias to recover from the crash of the burbs in the latter half of the previous decade.

Local lawmakers work towards HOA legislation - WMBFNews.com, Myrtle Beach/Florence SC, Weather

Local lawmakers work towards HOA legislation - WMBFNews.com, Myrtle Beach/Florence SC, Weather



Good luck, folks. It's the standard line about disclosure--that's all the help you will get from "law makers," and it isn't worth much. What good is disclosure when (a) nearly all new housing is in HOA or other CIDs so you have no choice, and (b) every single word of "what they are signing up for" is incomprehensible, non-negotiable, boilerplate?  

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"HORRY COUNTY, SC (WMBF) - Local law makers are working on a draft bill for HOA legislation. The bill will focus on three trending issues they feel would hold the most significance on the floor while helping the most people.  A top concern for some law makers is to make sure people know what they are signing up for when it comes to their HOAs."

Does HUD's privatization scheme mean the end of public housing?

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/11/public-housing-renovationrentalassistancedemonstration.html

"Launched in 2013, the RAD (Rental Assistance Demonstration) will hand over 60,000 units of public housing to private management by 2015. While that’s only a fraction of the nearly 1.2 million public housing units nationwide, RAD’s reach could soon expand: HUD Secretary Julián Castro and participating developers are lobbying Congress to lift the cap set during the program’s initial phase and allow more conversions to private ownership, and HUD is requesting $10 million toward the expansion of the RAD."
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The ideology of privatization is so entrenched in the neoliberal wing of the Democratic Party that they won't defend anything public anymore. It turns out in practice that these programs end up being disasters in many cases, but  by then the profit-takers are in the Bahamas and the rest of us are left to clean up the mess. We'll see how this RAD program works in practice.

Cigarette rage shuts down public meeting over tobacco ban

http://www.boston.com/news/2014/11/12/unruly-crowd-shuts-down-westminster-tobacco-ban-meeting/SpTOwv1ttrcNmcrB7C5RZK/story.html

So this is what freedom is all about for some people: cigarettes.  The tiny little town of Westminster, Massachusetts, is considering a ban on the sale of tobacco products. That brought out a host of flag-draped, nicotine-addicted oldsters who were so angry and out of control that the  meeting had to be shut down. They were screaming about freedom. Nonsense. It's about public safety.  The city is trying to prevent the tobacco industry from hooking yet another generation of  their children on the addictive drug that they are peddling inside their cancerous little death-tubes. Smoking kills 480,000 Americans every year.  The cost to all of us is enormous. According to the CDC, the cost is:

• More than $289 billion a year, including at least $133 billion in direct medical care for adults and more than $156 billion in lost productivity
• $5.6 billion a year (2006 data) in lost productivity from exposure to secondhand smoke

http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast_facts/

While I'm on the topic, I've often wondered why smokers think it is perfectly acceptable to fling cigarette butts all over creation.  Why do they think this is anything but littering?

Domino’s founder turning FL town into unconstitutional contraception-free ‘Catholic enclave’

Domino’s founder turning FL town into unconstitutional contraception-free ‘Catholic enclave’

I've posted about Ave Maria before. Let's see how this shapes up--do we have another Marsh v. Alabama on our hands?

Ten buildings in San Francisco where the HOA fees are higher than the rent

http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/11/11/mapping_10_buildings_with_hoa_fees_higher_than_your_rent.php


"The highest HOA fees at 1001 surpass the $5,000 mark—which is high above the recent citywide median rent of $3,488. The 10th-place HOA fee on our map is $2,838, which is still more than the median rent for a one-bedroom in Bernal."
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After which the article goes on to rationalize and justify the high fees as "boring homeownery stuff" and "high-dollar extras" like doormen, without mentioning management company charges, senseless litigation, and other costs that  are more controversial than paying for utilities. It is getting harder to tell the difference between real estate reporters and PR flacks for the housing  industry.

Park Ridge residents sued for objecting to condo development

http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/park-ridge-niles/ct-park-ridge-lawsuit-met-20141111-story.html

This is a SLAAP suit (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) against some neighbors who objected to construction of a condo project.  City officials and twenty citizens who attended two public meetings are named as defendants.  Got your local democracy right here.

Six month sentence for public sex in retirement "community"

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2828952/Couple-sentenced-six-months-jail-having-sex-outdoors-Florida-retirement-community-go.html

Six months in jail for having public sex in a retirement "community"? And it's the second time a sentence like this has been imposed for public sex in this place. Are you kidding me?  They should get a medal. This place is called "The Villages,"  but perhaps "Cotton Mather Acres" would be a better name.

Selling fast: public goods, profits, and state legitimacy

http://bostonreview.net/books-ideas/mike-konczal-profits-state-legitimacy-parrillo-goldstein-balko#.VGDbvdxAADs.twitter

Mike Konczal reviews three books dealing with the failures of privatization and in the process writes a brilliant  essay. A taste:

"Through the first half of our country’s history, public officials were paid according to the profit motive, and it was only through the failures of that system that a fragile accountability was put into place during the Progressive Era. One of the key sources of this accountability was the establishment of salaries for public officials who previously had been paid on commission. As this professionalized system is dismantled, once-antique notions are becoming relevant again. Consider merit pay schemes whereby teachers are now meant to compete with each other for bonuses. This mirrors the 1770 Maryland assembly’s argument that public officials “would not perform their duties with as much diligence when paid a fixed salary as when paid for each particular service.” And note that the criminal justice system now profits from forfeiture of property and court fees levied on offenders, recalling Thomas Brackett Reed, the House Republican leader who, in 1887, argued, “In order to bring your criminals against the United States laws to detection” you “need to have the officials stimulated by a similar self-interest to that which excites and supports and sustains the criminal.”

Homeowners association pulls plug on Waterford woman's Volt - WXYZ.com

Homeowners association pulls plug on Waterford woman's Volt - WXYZ.com: (WXYZ) - Natalie Forte is eco-friendly and loves her Chevy Volt.

But, her homeowners association doesn't share her enthusiasm.

The resident owns a condo along Elizabeth Lake Road in Waterford and says the homeowners association doesn't have rules against plug-in cars. But the HOA has cut-off power to Forte's garage.

Forte tells Action News starting in June she would charge up her new car in her detached garage. Electricity to the garages are under shared expenses residents pay as part of their monthly HOA fees.

After a few months, the association told Forte the expense was too much and wanted her to pay for the extra electricity.
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Add electric vehicles to the list of issues that generate bad press for Privatopia. Film at 10 on WXYZ, Detroit.

Election 2014--my interpretation

I look at elections by starting with the structural factors first.  Democrats had a difficult set of structural factors to overcome.  But they took a bad hand and did worse than expected. 

1.  Of the 36 Senate seats up for election, 21 were held by Democrats and 15 by Republicans, so the Democrats had more seats to defend and were more exposed to the risk of losing seats.  

2.  And 7 of those 21 Democratic senators were in states that Romney won just two years ago--what we call red states.  Democrats have a hard time winning in those states in the best of times.

3. Moreover, the whole class of senators was elected last in 2008, when Obama was elected, McCain took a drubbing, and the whole Republican brand was in the tank because they wrecked the economy and stuck us in two wars that we had obviously lost. That's why so many Democrats were elected in red states--they had Obama "hope and change" coattails, running nationally against a party in relative disrepute. 

That's all changed now. Twenty one Democratic candidates (well, 20 plus one independent) had to run in 2014 with no presidential coattails, with one-third of them in red states. In fact, Obama was widely seen as a drag on the ticket even though he wasn't on it.  The public has a short memory and independent voters in particular walk  in space a large part of the time, so they don't remember how Bush and his team wrecked the place. 

So everybody knew Republicans would win the Senate, just based on structural or fundamental factors.  But last night's results were worse than they should have been for Democrats, even given those realities.  Why?  I see two main reasons:

Money: I think when the FEC and other reports are in, it will turn out that Republicans outspend Democrats substantially. The "dark money" factor--independent spending by non-profits funded by right-wing plutocrats--looks at this point like it heavily favored Republicans. Independent voters, who for the most part just don't understand politics but think they do, are more easily swayed by 30 second ads that focus on candidate image. But we shall see.

Base voters: The Democratic party has lost its connection with the social groups that should be its base. Young people; working  and middle class people; black, latino, and asian people; seniors; women.  Instead, again and again Democrats, including most especially Obama, have tried to compete with Republicans for the love of the rich and powerful.  Banks, insurance companies, manufacturers, big pharma, and on and on.  They have benefited consistently.  But where was the relief for middle-class homeowners? How about students drowning in college loan debt? Why are we still wasting billions in pointless wars in the Middle East? 

But here's the quandary Democrats face: How tdo they get the money they need to compete against the Republicans--who gleefully sell out to the highest bidder--while serving the interests of people who are not in the top 1% or even the top 10%?  

The answer, I think, is that they have to take a big leap and transform themselves back into what they were from 1933 until Reagan came along: the party of working people, an economically populist party.  And they have, I think, a very short time to do that, because the 2016 election cycle is already underway.  Right now we have on offer a battle between the Republican Party and the Republican Lite Party. The result of such a race in 2016 will probably be a Republican president and congress.

Homeowner associations seen as mini-governments

http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/local/henrico/homeowner-associations-seen-as-mini-governments/article_2827ee0d-376b-5fca-bff3-97f6b4b8bcac.html

"When homeowners associations make the news, it’s usually for some sort of dispute with a resident: a fight about a mailbox, a garden, a sign or a flag. But the associations are nearly ubiquitous for new residential housing in the Richmond area, embraced by developers as a way to handle long-term care of common amenities and by local officials as “mini-governments” that can help maintain order and property value."
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Nearly ubiquitous, indeed. And not only in the Richmond area.

Vegas HOA takeover case defense attorney moves for dismissal

http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/las-vegas/hoa-case-lawyer-moves-dismiss-charging-prosecutor-misconduct

The claim: that the prosecution committed misconduct by not agreeing to keep secret the records of lead defendant Leon Belzer's failed plea negotiations, in which he said things that have made it obvious to anybody who can read how guilty these folks are.  Jeff German snarfed the docs during the two days when they were public and went to press in  the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Now defendants want to move the trial to the moon to avoid tainted public opinion.