This just in …

Here’s a fun one that came in Friday afternoon.

My neighborhood has a new PM who is struggling to support us. PM does first (contractually obligated) Violation Patrol, cites ~10 properties. One cite is for “improper sign”: the resident has a child in the US Air Force and has placed a small “Go US Air Force!” sign near the front door. Citation has no fine, says “please remove sign”.

Cited neighbor sends letter to PM protesting citation, stating a) why don’t we support our troops?, b) other neighbors display various signs, and c) he’d like us to send him a copy of whatever document restricts signs. Oh, and please send them in accessible format, since neighbor is blind.

Our bylaws and restrictions are online - in the form of crappy non-searchable, non-accessible PDF scans. Late last year we asked our lawyer to update our bylaws etc to searchable format, I don’t believe they’ve even started on the work.

Also, flags and signs have been an ‘issue’ for our neighborhood: for over a year we’ve been attempting to come up with a scheme that allows the neighborhood to vote to decide what kinds of signs and flags they want to allow. When I say “we” I mean “the Board” and not necessarily “me” - I kinda walked in on the middle of it. Enforcement policy on flags and signs has been - I really have no idea. As best I can tell, current rules do indeed forbid this kind of sign.

WWHTD? (What Would HOATalk Do?)

Thanks,

BillD

My personal take is below. I don’t have strong feelings on this except that yeah, we need to make these docs accessible.

a) Tell PM to not cite flags and signs unless they receive complaints from residents. This is temporary policy until new, improved rules are in place.

b) Void citation for the neighbor.

c) Explain that we’re in the process of making our documents accessible and we’ll provide neighbor with copy and announce to the world when they are available.

d) Touch base with lawyer to ensure that the docs they give us are indeed accessible.

Bill

Does your PM get paid for the letters it sends, fines or not?

-- Enforce the covenant as written. No signs means no signs. I do not buy an abandonment (of covenants) argument here, because signs are easily removed, at no real cost to anyone.

-- I would not have tasked the attorney with making the governing documents "more accessible." In my opinion making the documents more accessible is something a good secretary or lower level administrator could do.

-- Specifically: Someone should re-type the documents into MS Word. On each line, make the sentences and paragraphs end exactly as they do in the original governing documents. Even if the Word document ends up looking a bit strange. The page number of any given section in the original must match the page number of any given section in the Word copy. Prominently place a header and footer on each Word page with words like the following (bolded, all caps, large-ish font) Unofficial copy. Please see original to confirm wording. What this document presents is not guaranteed for accuracy. Convert the Word documents to PDF. Send the offending owner both the searchable pdf copy and a copy of the original, near impossible to read copy. Cite the CCR the owner violated.

-- Why is the Word copy not an official copy? Because the courts say so. Too many problems may occur when some non-attentive-to-detail person re-types the original copy into word and misses something, including a mere comma, which of course sometimes is a game changer.

I did a PDF to MSWord conversion of our Covenants and Bylaws. It did a very good, though not perfect, conversion. I cleaned them up some and also added/noted changes we have made to the original docs. We can now easily read and search our docs.

I did put a disclaimer on the new docs saying they were a conversion and if any issues arise, the original docs (PDF) supersede the conversion.

I do not know that you have a legal obligation to make your documents accessible to the resident who is blind. Your attorney will know for sure.

I do know that our attorneys were once asked if we needed to send violation notices in the native language to homeowners who were not English speakers. The answer was no, there was no legal obligation to translate the violation notice to the desired language of the recipient.

One might extend that to blind residents as well. Again, I am not sure but your attorney will know.

Post-o. Should be "could not handle without... "

As Board President, our PM does not send any violation letters until the Board has reviewed the issue, determined the best plan to solve it the problem and if a violation letter is to be sent, the Board will authorize the PM to send a letter and copy the Board.

Anything’s possible - but I appreciate all of the input y’all have provided. We’re supposed to meet with our attorney soon to discuss the status of various tasks, and I’ll be asking some worthwhile questions about the online bylaws/restrictions/etc project. Questions that I hope will lead to a better work-product. For instance: what, if any, kinds of requirements do we have to meet WRT accessibility?

BillD

Thank you. I like this a lot.

BillD

Various thoughts:

As of September 1, 2021, HOAs in Texas that are professionally managed or have more than 60 lots must have a website with all the association's dedicatory instruments. Citation for those who are going to immediately doubt me. https://texashoalaw.com/2021-hoa-legislative-update/

Your association should have adopted a sign policy when the property code was updated in 2011 to require HOAs to allow political campaign signs. But since they apparently did not, they should do so now. You can list categories of signs that are permitted, call out what you specifically do not want (say...commercial advertising signs) and leave the rest to "must be approved by the ARC."

Now for my controversial statement: CCRS should serve the membership, not the other way around. If a majority of the membership does not care about a "go Army" sign, I think it's silly to insist on prohibiting it because "it's the rule." Change the rule to reflect the will of the membership.

Now do you see why HOA restrict signs? Opinions ruin everything. Keep it simple. No one needs to hear they do not "love America" because they do not have a flag or sign stating such. I told everyone that we fly under the same flag. No one is more American than anyone else because they choose to display it.

We have way too many people in my neck of the woods going to jail or prison over the capital invasion. I do not want anyone thinking I support that kind of mentality.Ho U.S.A but do not damage my own land or freedoms doing it.

BarbaraT1 posted: CCRS should serve the membership, not the other way around.To me it's not that this is controversial. It's that the courts disagree with this.

When the covenants give the Board the authority to create reasonable rules about xyz, then I agree these board-created rules should serve the membership. But for most instances* where a CCR that is disliked by many; where the CCR gives the Board no discretion; and the Board does not like a CCR; the proper approach is to seek an amendment to the CCRs.

Else for one thing, future boards may be left in conundrums.

I think there's no perfection in governing. I think it's more about striving toward the perfect.

* Not all. E.g. covenants that are facially discriminatory towards certain FHA protected groups.

I wish I had saved the site that I used, but I faced the same problem (non-searchable PDF files for our documents) and I used an online OCR application that transferred those documents to searchable pdf files perfectly. Page numbers, stamps, etc. all came over. Translating to WORD was not nearly as good. It would probably be best to include a disclaimer at the top explaining this was digitally copied and the actual document is available at wherever your documents are file.

If you search online for "OCR PDF Searchable" you will get several hits.