Green practices conflict with homeowner association rules

[jpak]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/environment/2010-05-12-green-conflict_N.htm

Early last year, Larry Lohrman, a homeowner in Salem, Ore., decided to try to cut his energy consumption by installing solar panels on his roof. He researched the panels, hired an installer and put a down payment on a 3,000-watt solar installation.
Lohrman's plans were interrupted abruptly by a letter from his homeowner's association at Creekside Estates denying permission for the installation because it would violate the private community's covenants.

It's a scene that's being played out across the country. As homeowners increasingly seek to turn to green practices such as using clotheslines instead of dryers or moving to wind or solar power, they are finding those plans in conflict with the rules of homeowners associations that encourage conformity in order to maintain property values.

"Homeowners associations are charged with protecting the aesthetic look and feel of the community," said Robert DeNichilo, an Orange County, Calif., attorney who specializes in homeowner association law. "As energy costs rise and solar is becoming more of a viable option, you're seeing more and more associations having to deal with it."

"Homeowners associations are charged with protecting the aesthetic look and feel of the community," said Robert DeNichilo, an Orange County, Calif., attorney who specializes in homeowner association law. "As energy costs rise and solar is becoming more of a viable option, you're seeing more and more associations having to deal with it."

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[baldguy]

1. HOA boards are made up of mini Mussolinis.

[marybourg]

2. Our federal gov't should have dealt with this at the same time

as they legislated against h.o. associations forbidding satellite t.v. dishes on roofs, which they did several years ago But what is more important than t.v.? :sarcasm:

[ProgressiveProfessor]

6. CA already has

[marybourg]

9. AZ has also, but only very recently. Should have been done years ago.

My house has had solar hot H2O for 31 years, but newer sections of my development forbade the panels.

[ladjf]

3. This silly HOA crap must stop. nt

[Teka]

4. BOYCOTT OREGON

Those unprogressive cretins.

Even ARIZONA doesn't allow HOA's to ban solar panels

[ProgressiveProfessor]

5. In California HOAs can not stop solar panels

California Solar Rights Act solves that for us here. Helped a number of people with it.

Funniest incident was when a neighbor, not knowing the HOA had acquiesced under legal pressure, threatened to have us arrested while we were installing a system on a nearby house. He called 911 and was positively shocked when they did not come.

[NNadir]

7. The solar industry is full of excuses for its failure to provide significant energy. This may come

as a surprise to our http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tortilla_Curtain">Tortilla Curtain set here, most of whom as far as I can tell have never done a shred of useful work in their pathetic and stupid lives, but even if every American who lived behind gates was required to install toxic PV solar cells to live in their lah-lah lands, solar energy would still be what it is today: A trivial and useless form of energy.

All the rah rah cheering and regulations over the last very stupid 50 years has not made solar energy a significant form of energy:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/alternate/page/renew_energy_consump/table1.html

Let me know when your concerned about how the guy running your lawnmower is going to pay for the big giant solar PV system.

The idea that living behind gates can be "green" is as stupid as the idea of "green" cars. It's posturing by and for stupid people with too much money on their hands and very few brains in their heads.

Have a nice bourgeois brat behind the gates evening.

[jpak]

10. more US reactors were canceled than actually built

fail

[NNadir]

12. On the other hand, nuclear reactors produce more energy than all of the solar, wind, and geothermal

plants in the United States combined.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/alternate/page/renew_energy_consump/table1.html

Have a nice wood soot in the lungs kind of evening.

[jpak]

13. not that stupid strawman again, those canceled nukes cost ratepayers $122 billion in stranded costs

:thumbsdown:

[ProgressiveProfessor]

11. My experience is the opposite of yours

I have a grid tie system. It had batteries, but the prior owner had not maintained them properly. It generates about 120% of my needs on an annual basis. New law in CA means that I will now get paid for the extra.

[IDemo]

8. Xeriscapers are also targets of HOA's

By doing something that likely yields greater benefits than solar panels - taking out the thirsty lawn and replacing it with native plants and rock.

It's time the laws were changed to eliminate enforcement of HOA bans on solar and xeriscaping, much the same way the FCC disallowed bans on antennas and satellite dishes.

[depakid]

14. Yep- needs to be done at the federal level and be fairly broad and inclusive

of energy and water conservation practices.