Sunday, June 30, 2013

The HOA contribution to the decline in civic virtue


by George K. Staropoli

Jeb Bush and Clint Bolick, VP of Litigation at the Goldwater Institute in Phoenix and nationally recognized constitutional law scholar, expressed their concern for the loss of “basic American values.”  Although presenting their solution to the dysfunctional US immigration policy[i], their concern is well suited to the impact that the defective HOA legal scheme has had on civic virtue.
New US ConstitutionA good part of the failure to provide for education in civic awareness lies in the rapidly growing residential housing industry that requires a governmental body over developers’ subdivisions that contain common elements.  Some entity, if not the local municipality, must govern these common elements and that has fallen to the homeowners association (HOA) legal scheme. . . . There is no civic virtue or civil servants in HOAs, because the HOA legal structure for governance is a corporation.  The equivalent of civics or civil virtue is HOA virtue, which amounts to two simple attitudes:  pay your assessments on time and follow the rules. (See High Noon in HOA-Land: members who permit lawless boards to function).  
Read the complete paper here . . .


[i] Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, Jeb Bush and Clint Bolick (Threshold Editions Div. of Simon & Schuster 2013).

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