Re: Nice Planet © 2009
Re: Nice Planet © 2009
As much as I respect the man for past service, I don't respect his disrespect for the rules. He knew what the rules were, petitioned for an exception and was not granted the exception. He decided he was above the rules and began to violate them.
No one should be above the law, not even a hero who fought for and risked his life to protect those laws.
If you enter a contractual agreement, you don't break it. If he wanted to have a flag pole he should have asked for that to be in his lease to begin with.
DISCLAIMER: What I'm about to say about Homeowners Associations only reflects what I've experienced NOT what is across the board. I'm postive there are Associations that are high quality and don't match what I've stated below.
First off, here in Omaha, the homeowners associations can be very.... ahm... two faced. They care about the rules only when someone next to them breaks them. The board members only care about the rules so they can feel powerful and lord over the other people so they can feel important. The best way to accomplish this is to install an "Aesthetics clause" into the community property clause. This doesn't necessarily mean that everything has to look good on the community property. It means that the board has the right to determine what is aesthetically pleasing and what isn't. Again, power.
Here's an example: My friend in Omaha lives in a neighborhood with a homeowners association that decided to erect a couple of weeping blue spruces (whatever they are) at the entrance to the community to the tune of a couple of grand. For those of you who have never seen them, they look like a sick or dying Blue Spruce. When my friend went to the meeting to ask if there is something they could do to help the sick trees (I'm not kidding. I looked at the trees and they look horrible) they were met with, at the most positive aspect, defensive hostility.
This leads to this vet. According to the Fox story, he DID ask the homeowner's association if he could raise his flagpole. They waffled for a while so he simply erected it anyways. This cause the homeowners association board to react negatively. Again, POWER. The vet didn't bow down enough and kiss enough backside to warrant approval. He didn't wait the required 6 months - 6 years for such a decision to be made with finality. Hence, the conflict.
You can tell I'm right by reading the article where it says that the non-neighboring members of the community supported the vet. It makes no difference to anyone except those who neighbor the "offender" that the flagpole is there. They want power to lord over someone else. They found it by pushing around a 90 year old MoH winner.
They rock.
The vet is at fault because he didn't wait long enough and kiss enough backside. He also didn't research well enough into the neighborhood. He found a condo he liked and he bought it. Homeowning isn't that simple anymore. The property he bought doesn't include the lawn in front of his unit. I think many condos are like that. If you want true control, you should find it. And that is where he's at fault.
There is no way the Homeowner's Association is going to look good coming out of this. They can't cave or their contract looks foolish and they give up Power (which is why the board members ran for office in the first place). They can't uphold the contract because they will be run through the wringer in a PR slaughterhouse.
The best thing they could have done was simply heard the old man out and simply allowed a compromise. Find a spot where he can put up the flagpole and do his duty in peace. Maybe in front of the clubhouse. But, alas, they decided against that apparently.
Where is TBA to express his outrage that this scofflaw is getting away with this? 
