Retaining Wall

Hello,

I'm new to the HOA game. I purchased a home last year in December. I was told when I was purchasing that the association had plans to replace a retaining wall which runs along the backside of all the homes in the HOA including mine. It was just old and aged wood that was half to mostly deteriorated. It wasn't a big concern on my end when I made the purchase, because our townhome wasn't purchased for the view. Anyway, as soon as spring came I noticed they replaced about half of the retaining wall and stopped dead center to my unit in the backyard. It only has my deck then about 2 feet of grass then the retaining wall to a hill. It's about 4 feet high. I gave them all summer for them to finish but nothing has changed. Since it was partially destructed, there is a big gap where the new wall ended and the old wall is still there. All the dirt that was removed when installing the new wall was left laying right in "my backyard" and it killed the entire hill's grass behind my house as well as the grass below. All of this is maintained by the HOA, not including the hill above the wall I assume.

I've messaged the HOA president multiple times over the last couple months with my concerns. She states that one of the members voluntarily opted to install the new wall but made it to my unit and they fell sick with cancer. I tried to be very understanding and give them ample time to figure this out. Now she said we have no one to finish the wall. This raised many concerns because the retaining wall in my mind is a safety issue. So she allowed one of the unit owners to destroy the wall because they didn't like the way it looked. Now they have finished the part behind their own house and have fallen sick and cannot/will not finish the retaining wall. So not only do we have a safety issue of this wall being half completed, the grass and any aesthetic look of my backyard is completely decimated. How is this my fault at all?

The last straw happened today when I woke up (I work nights, I have no idea who did it) and I found that someone went and added rock gravel to the entire bottom part of the retaining wall that is supposed to be grass in front of my window and deck. No one else the entire length of the townhouses has this. Why they would do this? I have no idea other than to spite me. It looks completely ridiculous. How is this acceptable or legal?

After my inquiry to the president about the rocks being placed today, she said and I quote. "Talk to the person that tore it apart. I'm not the complaint department."

So I joined this forum community for some help.

Would anybody be able to answer these questions or maybe have some incite for me on this? I would GREATLY appreciate it! Should I hire a lawyer on something like this? (The home is only worth 140k)

1. How is it legal to have someone that doesn't have a construction license to tear apart a retaining wall behind multiple peoples homes?
2. What are my legal options on something like this?
3. Wouldn't this be a major insurance violation?
4. Am I responsible for this at all?

Respond to the President that since the contractor/volunteer is working on behalf of the Association, the Association is indeed responsible for the contractors actions and quality of work.

Thanks for the help so far, my company has free legal advice I'm going to question their thoughts. Sounds like the advice so far is I have to get extremely firm with the president. This is not going to be fun.

**Update**

I spoke to the guy doing the work and he is an 80+ year old gentleman. After a long conversation he told me the association had a bid put out a couple years ago to fix the retaining wall and it came back at 15k. The association only has around 11k in funds so this was not an option. He told me him and the gentleman that got sick offered to do the wall free of labor. He said they spent 1500 to make it about 3/4 done. He said he cannot work in the high heat so he has to wait until it cools down in the fall. So it seems the other owners have good intentions, but that doesn't change the fact that I don't know if that would meet code and be covered by insurance in case the worst happens. Or, if there is any chance the wall is going to be finished this year or not. Also, is it safe to have a big gap in a retaining wall for months/years at a time.

The now story gets even more strange. The man that fell sick is my next door neighbor I guess. The older gentleman told me he is on a lot of pain meds so he doesn't always think about things before he does them.

I guess my next door neighbor heard from the president (I was told I can't have my grill on my deck for a fire code violation, I asked her if putting it down on the ground was acceptable, I got no reply so I made no plans to do so) that I wanted to put my grill down and he just placed the boards and rocks over the dirt. I don't even know what to say. That's not what I had planned at all, if I was going to do something like that it would have been just a couple nice stones for it to stand on. This just keeps spiraling into weirder and weirder things. SO, my neighbor I guess had good intentions and was trying to "please" me, but that's not what I wanted at all!

NOW, I have three options. One, I just accept the rocks and try and make the best of it. Two, remove the rocks myself and tell the association I want grass replaced. Or Three, go talk or write a letter to my neighbor saying he needs to remove what he did. I feel terrible even thinking about asking a cancer stricken man to remove the "favor" he did for me because I don't like it...

WHY?!?!?! WHAT SHOULD I DO?!?! Obviously I know I have to make the decision, but I've come this far, so I figured I would share the story if anyone was interested.