View from the cop: Crime & punishment
View from the Cop is moving to a new site on Wordpress. Blogger Steve Rose of the Sandy Springs Police Department gives his take on crime, offers safety tips and give his weekly picks from the police blotter. Follow Steve Rose to the new blog site.
AJC.com > Metro > View from the cop > Archives > 2006 > April > 26
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Homeowners associations protect us against ourselves
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Homeowners associations are set up to keep your neighborhood up so that your property value goes up.
It’s a nice concept. It keeps people from doing things like putting hunting tree stands in the front yard during the off-season or parking that old school bus, long since retired, that was scheduled for a conversion into an RV but was bumped back on the “things to do” list after the owner realized it required a lot of work. Like buying tires and an engine.
There are all sorts of homeowners groups. There are small groups composed of a couple of dozen families with a common goal of organizing, improvements and cleanups. The first order of business is usually trying to get a pool. The second is a toss-up between a tennis court or a margarita machine for the clubhouse. (You can always play tennis somewhere else.)
Then there are the really large organizations, with a agenda to secure a seat at the U.N. or purchase a small Third World country.
When you form something that exercises authority, there are positive and negative reactions. Most everyone wants a sense of order and appearance. Although most people are nice folks, they don’t all see beauty in the same sense. The Partridge Family was just a normal family, but I doubt anyone liked the bus parked on the street.
Still, it’s not easy to satisfy everyone in the neighborhood. I think the rules are mostly fair. Our subdivision is very nice. Those who run the association do a good job, but are quick to jump on you.
The Dreaded Letter
We have a tradition of receiving letters when you are out of compliance with whatever compliance you were supposed to be within. Our landscaping guidelines book is so big I had to get the Cliff Notes from Barnes & Noble. I was shocked to find out that I had to remove the tractor tire planter from around the fake palm trees I bought in Mexico back in 1973, which, come to think of it, crosses over into the subject of tequila and why I don’t drink it anymore. Why? Well, for some reason, late one night, I thought it would be a good idea to invade Tijuana with an orange 1961 Ford Falcon, jacked up in the rear with chrome reverse wheels and no brakes. The cops finally caught up to me at a ceramic Buddha shop. The Navy secured my release after I agreed to give the police chief the car. (They let me keep the palm tree and a Buddha.)
Anyway, I have had to change my whole lifestyle to accommodate this landscaping book (“War and Peace”) that restricts you from doing things in your yard like:
— Vietnamese pot belly pig breeding
— Shin-kicking tournaments (single elimination)
— Wet T-shirt contests (This was a close vote)
— Camel wrestling
— Civil War reenactments
— Lynyrd Skynyrd concerts
— Hairy chest festival
— Various other celebratory festivals, including the Exploding Outhouse Festival and the annual Running of the Small Farm Animals.
What a rip-off.
