GHPOA Amendment to Restrictions Moving Forward
Oct 2nd, 2007 by Tom Britt
Approximately 100 GHOA residents attended a special meeting on September 17th to discuss an amendment to the 20-year-old restrictions that would allow GHPOA to recover legal fees when they successfully pursue covenant violators. Currently, GHPOA can sue residents for covenant violations; however, win or lose they can not recover their legal costs.
Several residents voiced concerns over the amendment, disagreeing not with the association recovering legal fees but with the clause that allows one homeowner to sue another homeowner and recover fees if victorious in court.
According to Tom Murray, attorney with Eads, Murray & Pugh that represents GHPOA, this clause is prevalent in most Indiana homeowners’ association covenants. Giving both the homeowner and homeowners association the ability to recover legal fees if they win in court is a common practice. Homeowner to homeowner suits are very rare. Murray stated that of the hundreds of homeowners associations that Eads, Murray & Pugh represents, he hears of maybe one such suit per year. Most serious violations are pursued by the homeowner’s association, not by the individuals themselves.
GHPOA board members have decided to continue collecting signatures on the proxy form that was mailed out to all residents in hopes of attaining at least 1,191 signatures (50% plus one). Currently, the amendment has 1,060 approvals and 195 that do not approve.
If you have not voted, please visit http://ghpoa.com and click on the “proxy form” link on the left or contact your neighborhood representative.
I was under the impression, based on your earlier postings, that the deadline for proxy votes was September 17th. Granted, your attempt to push through a change to the covenants has not garnered enough votes to pass however, that does not justify changing deadlines. This would appear to be a backhanded attempt to disregard the majority of the residence who were against the modification as it was written. Maybe it is time for the board to actually listen to the residents they are supposed to be representing and not just to the lawyers who are after the almighty dollar.
The majority of residents are actually in favor of this. Looking at those who have responded, an overwhelming majority of them have voted “yes”. As you know, it is difficult to get 50% + 1 from 2,200 residents. We were just short of enough so we as a board decided to keep the meeting open until we get enough to pass this change. FYI, lawyers are not driving this, actually no lawyer is being paid or is on retainer for this now. Eads, Murray and Pugh drafted the resolution and consulted the board earlier this year but they are receiving no compensation now.
Based on your comments, you can leave an action open forever in hopes of people either changing their minds, forgetting about it, or hoping that new residents vote without benefit of discussion. All actions submitted for vote should have a voting deadline. That is the fundamentals of democracy. You are not allowed to hold open a general election until the party of your choice eventually has enough votes. If the votes aren’t there at the prescribed time, then the measure is defeated.
You’re right, this is a democracy of sorts and we have voted to keep it open.
A ‘democracy’ of the sort you refer to is more often called a dictatorship.
Not when 12 people vote on it and the majority wanted to keep it open. The people that are so worried about this passing are the very people that are blatantly violating covenants, for the most part.