June 19, 2008
Dear Everyone:
Our
Homeowners Association Board of Directors meets
on the third Wednesday of every other month.
Two months ago, we had quite a meeting because one homeowner was
up in arms over the noise caused by his next-door neighbor.
We thought the situation had been resolved; but last night we
found out otherwise.
It’s not often that “Officer Todd” drops in on a
Board meeting. It seems that
the neighbor, who “rents” the place from his parents, has a girlfriend
we’ll call “Tina”. “Tina”
likes to get high and yell obscenities at the top of her (considerable)
voice. Every night.
Plus really loud music.
Officer Todd is very familiar with the situation as are many of
his co-officers in the
San Ramon Police Department.
In fact, Officer Todd is on a first-name basis with the parents.
The homeowner has a little girl.
The reason he bought his place was so he could get his little
girl into a San Ramon school.
(We have very good schools.
I always vote in favor of school-support bonds and/or taxes
because good schools attract good people.
Mostly.) He wants the
Board to do something about the situation.
Several other neighbors want something done and two
of them are also on the Board.
So it didn’t take too long for the Board to decide to start
fining the parents every time their “tenant” misbehaves.
Evidently, they told him to kick “Tina” out and that resulted in
a drunken rampage on his part that included tearing down part of the
fence. The father paid to
fix the fence.
And now “Tina” is back.
Officer Todd advised the homeowner to call the police each and
every time there’s an incident and to keep a log.
This will help when it’s time to go to court, if that becomes
necessary. In the meantime,
the property manager is going to write a letter to the parents informing
them that they will begin to receive fines of escalating amounts until
they do something about their son’s behavior.
All I can think is:
“I’m so lucky that I live at the far other end of the complex.”
Then we had to listen to another homeowner who is
way behind on his homeowner dues to the Association.
It seems his wife handled all the bill-paying and he only
recently discovered that she hadn’t been paying the dues because she
suffers from depression and it somehow “slipped” her mind until he got
the letter from the
Collection Agency.
So we’ll “waive” the late charges which will lower to total the
Collection Agency is trying to recover.
But we really can’t do anything about the Agency’s own fees.
He’ll have to work something out with them.
By this time, the meeting, which usually lasts less
than half-an-hour, had blossomed into more than 90 minutes and everyone
was tired and wanted to adjourn.
But first we had to deal with the swimming pool.
Specifically, kids from the other side of the fence who have been
sneaking in to use the pool.
Someone will get the address of the house they’re coming from and the
property manager will send a letter to the household.
Plus a homeowners newsletter reminding everyone of the Pool
Rules.
By the time I finally got home, it was ten minutes
before my usual bedtime, but there were all the evening chores to do so,
late night. On the Plus
side, tomorrow is Friday and I’ll be able to get a good night’s sleep
before going off to
And the Homeowners Association Board doesn’t meet
again until August.
Love, as always,
Pete
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