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Post by Admin on Oct 7, 2015 18:47:41 GMT -5
One has to wonder what the attorney for this HOA is thinking. The attorney has easy access to the outcome of two recent cases settled in February and STILL ignored demands by the owner's attorney to remove the cloud placed on the parcel's title by the Preservation. The owner's attorney TWICE attempted to get the HOA to remove the owner's parcel from the preservation. (Sound familiar?) The attorney refused to respond to the owner's attorney demands. Today, the lawsuit was filed and is very similar to my lawsuit.
What a waste of time and homeowner's money! The complainant (owner) will probably get all the attorney fees returned if the outcome is like the two cases recently settled by this attorney.
There is one difference but I have not read the complaint. A letter from the HOA stating that the Owner was no longer a member of the association was attached as an exhibit to the lawsuit. This is, of course, nonsense. EVERYONE who owns a parcel is a member of the HOA and permitted to attend meetings, request records etc.
Those with expired lots do not lose their rights under corporate law FS617; they are only exempt from use restrictions stated in the Covenants and Rules.
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Post by Lra on Oct 8, 2015 7:15:51 GMT -5
One has to wonder what the attorney for this HOA is thinking. The attorney has easy access to the outcome of two recent cases settled in February and STILL ignored demands by the owner's attorney to remove the cloud placed on the parcel's title by the Preservation. The owner's attorney TWICE attempted to get the HOA to remove the owner's parcel from the preservation. (Sound familiar?) The attorney refused to respond to the owner's attorney demands. Today, the lawsuit was filed and is very similar to my lawsuit. What a waste of time and homeowner's money! The complainant (owner) will probably get all the attorney fees returned if the outcome is like the two cases recently settled by this attorney. There is one difference but I have not read the complaint. A letter from the HOA stating that the Owner was no longer a member of the association was attached as an exhibit to the lawsuit. This is, of course, nonsense. EVERYONE who owns a parcel is a member of the HOA and permitted to attend meetings, request records etc. Those with expired lots do not lose their rights under corporate law FS617; they are only exempt from use restrictions stated in the Covenants and Rules. I feel compelled to speak out on this issue. After winning through Mediation our situation and lawsuit, Gngr and I were dumbfounded by the language in the Release Agreement that essentially reads: "We release, acquit and forever discharge the Released Parties (SLohA, Stmbug Ixx and employees and their attorneys) for BAD FAITH, EXTRA - CONTRACTUAL DAMAGES arising from the incidents giving rise to our counter-suit as SLohA sued us. Perhaps the attorneys for SLohA feel they can act capriciously and with malice and be redeemed from "bad faith and extra - contractual damages" in future lawsuits too. Someone needs to stop the bleeding of SLohA funds for legal fees. That is not my job anymore. The more owners know about situations like the one noted above the better off we will all be. For those interested, we signed the Release Form with this clause because we residents need to leave this behind us. (Only our attorney fees were paid by Tower Hill. We received no additional monies.) Unfortunately, we owners (us included) paid a hefty $68,000+ from our own funds and another $60,000+ from our insurance company Tower Hill. |
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Post by Admin on Oct 8, 2015 11:47:53 GMT -5
First, further to Lra's comments. The Release Form was envisioned to be a Release of any further claims against the insurance company's client (SLohA) under the two cases. The Releases should have been pretty cut 'n dried. Instead, this insurance company seems to have anticipated and perhaps attempted to limit future claims made by these owners against SLohA due to the ongoing nature of issues in the corporation perpetuated by Board actions. The insurance company is not stupid. They were well aware that these lawsuits were totally unnecessary and unwinnable. Thus, the Release was an extended one which attempted to close the door on further claims with the SAME COMPLAINTS as originally filed against SLohA. That is the way Tower Hill chose to limit liability against actions of owners. The only way to limit liability against BOD recklessness and vindictiveness is to either drop D & O insurance or tell SLohA to take a hike and find another insurance carrier.
The learning is that one should scrutinize every element of any mediated settlement. If the owners had been aware that they agreed to give the insurance company a blank check against further claims of the same nature, they would not have settled their lawsuits. The language of the settlement agreement contained boiler plate clause about "signing the Defendant's Release" and after 10 1/2 hours of mediation, this was not questioned. We just wanted it over. We now know better. If there is any further mediated agreement between any previous complainants and SLohA, the release form itself will be negotiated as part of the mediated settlement.
Now to the subject of this thread. I have read the Complaint and it gets better. Not only did the Association refuse to answer the Owner's attorney's correspondence, the HOA attorney wrote to the HOA President and ADMITTED that the Owner's lot was expired and should not have been included in the Preservation. Amazingly, nothing was done by the HOA to amend the Preservation. I wonder if the HOA thought the Owner would go away after having retained an attorney, secured a title search and had their attorney exchange several demand letters to the HOA?
So here's the next part! The HOA stated the Owner was no longer a member of the Association and could not have ingress and egress to the property or use of the common areas. The response to that is found in the Plat, where the Developer dedicated ALL the lands in the plat and an ingress/easement to the property to ALL owners of the subdivision property. The HOA has no authority to take away the ingress/egress easement originally given to owners when the property was platted. The lawsuit asks the court to make a declaratory judgement on this issue.
Obviously, I have inside access to this lawsuit so I will keep everyone current with the Bradenton shenanigans.
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Post by BagLady on Dec 8, 2015 11:37:44 GMT -5
lra wrote Oct 8, 2015: Admin wrote Oct 8, 2015: Apparently SLohA was told to "take a hike". The SLohA insurance policy was requested on an Official Records Request and 4/5 policies were provided as a result of the Treasurer's announcement of the new "deductible" for lawsuits. The 5th policy (vehicle policy) has been re quested on a followup, along with some important questions. More on that later.
The first policy period is 9/30/15 to 9/30/16 and the Insurer is Ironshore. At this point, members should be aware that, due to the actions of the Board in the past two years, SLohA is nearly uninsurable by insurers for wrongful acts under "Errors and Omissions" AKA "Directors and Officers" Indemnity Insurance. As our Treasurer informed the membership at the last Board Meeting, insurance for SLohA was very difficult to find and our past insurance carrier refused to issue a policy. The current D & O specifies a "Retention" amount of $75,000 for each suit which we understand to be a "deductible", i.e. SLohA must pay the first $75K in legal fees/expenses before the insurer will consider absorbing any costs. The policy covers Directors & Officers and Employment Practices Claims. The base amount, excluding taxes and fees, is $10,190.00. The limit of liability is $1,000,000 for a single claim made during the policy period. It carries a Retention (Deductible) of $75,000 for each claim. *There is a lookback exclusion for claims against SLohA for the past 4 years, (whether closed or pending) but it is unknown with specificity what the excluded claims are. **Additionally, there is a Regulatory Exclusion.
*Attachment Deleted
** Attachment Deleted
The Business Owners Policy is with Rockhill and includes fees and taxes. It is $62,301.26 and has a 1 million dollar limit, per occurrence. This covers bodily injury, damage and replacement of all the SLR buildings and the recreational facilities/equipment. It also pays for legal costs and damages related to lawsuits which involve covered property. It is the "main" policy. Questions have been raised with regard to Declaration of Scheduled Tools & Equipment and Non-Covered Property.
The 3rd is a Property Policy is issued by Essex, including taxes and fees, of $2,569.19 with a $5,000 deductible for each occurrence. This covers the Admin Office building and business equipment, excluding anything related to computers and data.
The 4th policy is an umbrella policy issued by Liberty Mutual and costs $12,185.00 for the period 9/30/15-9/30/16. The limit of insurance is $5,000,000 per occurrence. SLohA elected optional coverage for Acts of Terrorism. Like all such policies, it is an Excess Liability coverage of the underlying policies' limits and most of these policies have limits of $1,000,000 per occurrence. Like most umbrellas, unless there are special Riders, it only covers what is covered under the underlying policy (sorta like Medicare and Supplements ie the supplement only covers a portion of the excess claim if Medicare covers it.)
Relating back to the original post cited above, it is becoming clearer that SLohA has an enormous new burden to bear and insurance costs will continue to climb, especially if there are more lawsuits and non-renewals/rewrites. We are aware that the Board/ met with attorneys on Nov 25 regarding "pending or proposed lawsuits" but it is unknown whether the Board is suing someone or someone is suing SLohA.
The Board inappropriately "laughed uproariously" at the proposition spoken at the last Board meeting that our current and future insurance problems are a "self-inflicted" condition caused by the Board which all owners will be paying for in the years to come. After the crazed laughter subsided, the speaker who was ridiculed stated that he didn't think this was a laughing matter and when I look at the costs of these new policies and the exclusions, I agree!
In my opinion, this board is delusional about potential legal fees costs in the future and needs some serious risk management assessment not only for SLohA legal exposures, but ALL general liability of SLohA premises and its undocumented and secret partnership with KCNet.
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Post by Admin on Feb 23, 2016 14:24:28 GMT -5
Admin posted:
The Homeowner WON their lawsuit and got ALL their expenses and costs returned to them! I have read the Final Agreed Order. Frd O'N eel (Attny), Esq. successfully litigated against this HOA which was ordered to give full and unobstructed access over the private roads to the homeowner and their guests (ingress/egress to parcel is a right given by plat and does not "belong" to the HOA). Additionally, in what I think is a precedent in Florida--if not the US--the HOA voluntarily released the homeowner from the obligations of membership in the Association!
The homeowners are now forever released from all privileges and obligations of association membership. They never have to pay another assessment fee--not one more cent! Not any future special assessment! The homeowner must now pay for their own satellite TV, will get no lawn-mowing service and can no longer use the pool. The homeowners never used the pool the entire time they lived there and the individual satellite TV costs less than than paying the Association an assessment fee. They never had landscaping service because their property is completely rock-mulched. Their successors in title can either remain a "sovereign" parcel or voluntarily join the mandatory association. Needless to say, the prevailing homeowners are ecstatic.
Their neighbors might not be excited about what their HOA agreed to. It is they who have to pick up the prorata share of assessment burden that these homeowners have been released from. Recall it was the HOA who picked the fight by slandering the homeowner's title by recording an invalid Preservation and "ordering" the homeowner from using the roads. This HOA is a special kind of stupid. It will be interesting to see if the other HOA owners choose to S u e their HOA or just pay the extra assessment...
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Post by Dick Tracy on Feb 23, 2016 17:36:06 GMT -5
SLohA is not so unique, Florida has many other dysfunctional HOA's Board Members. The Good Guy won in the end, after a very long ordeal with their HOA's Board Members and Counsel. Now the other residents will have to pay for their dysfunctional Board and Counsel's Action......
"What a Sorry Bunch"..... Really Sad !
16RC
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Post by Admin on Feb 25, 2016 11:23:07 GMT -5
Litigant posted on hoatalk.com forum:
my attorney stated the following when asked if he knew of any other homeowner that was released from their HOA:
This is reposted with permission of the author.
It answers a couple questions. Fact is that in this case, the board clearly acted without Covenant (contract) authority by releasing Member parcel from the HOA. This HOA panicked when confronted with its unlawful act of filing the invalid Preservation, panicked again when they were called out on it by the homeowner and hid their heads underground, panicked again when a legal demand was made and legal fees started to climb, and in panic mode, called on their D & O insurance to be relieved of the first attorney whose legal fees were overburdening the budget. The lawyers for the D & O carrier may have been only following their marching orders to settle now and either did not know they were setting the Association up for another class action lawsuit or they knew it and protected themselves by so advising the board. It is my guess that this HOA will lose their D & O insurance very soon now, similar to what happened to SLohA.
It does appear that this Florida HOA is not the only one dealing with its malgovernance problems by "releasing" certain of it Members from the Association. Subject HOA was just too stupid to get a non-disclosure "gag order" and the news will spread like wildfire. But, even with a gag order on the other two HOA's, it will eventually become evident that not all parcels are paying their pro rata share. No gag order in the world will mean a hoot when the secret arrangements of the board become visible to the homeowners!
I will hazard a guess that the prevailing attorney, Frd O'N eel (Attny), will be getting plenty of additional clients asking him to "get me out of my HOA!"
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Post by BagLady on Mar 1, 2016 8:51:31 GMT -5
From the sounds of this lawyer's blog, Florida might be sued for violating citizens' constitutional right to taxation WITH representation. Looks like the lawyer is soliciting sponsors... it's always about the money!
This lawyer is also making noises about suing Florida for discriminating against HOA's by not providing any enforcement of laws, as it now does to condos and timeshares. This is the third year the legislature has just flat out refused to approve a bill the would afford the SAME protection to HOA's as it has given condos/timeshares for decades!
This same lawyer just won an astounding lawsuit against an HOA association that has put a stop to the endless rollover of boards each election year where are there are no or too few candidates to fill vacant board positions.
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Post by BagLady on Apr 6, 2016 8:29:21 GMT -5
Here is a portion of the entry of the Final Order in the Bradenton case whereby the HOA is ordered to permit ingress/egress to and from owner property and over subdivision roads and open spaces and agrees that the Owner is no longer a member of the HOA and has no further monetary obligation to the HOA's debts or expenses. Note that the future owner of this parcel either can elect to join the HOA or reside as a non-member.
This Order followed two other entirely separate FL case dispositions whereby the HOA voluntarily dismissed the Owners from membership in the HOA. It will be interesting to know what lies in the future for all these HOA's which did not have the authority to release a parcel from assessment obligations but just did it anyway behind the members' collective back. By transferring extra costs to the remaining parcels, the HOA has increased monetary burden onto the remaining members, without authority. The remaining owners have civil remedy and/or they may have a precedent case to also seek removal from the HOA. I am told there are still parcels that have not "signed on" to the Covenants and there are parcels that were coerced and intimidated into "voluntarily" signing on...
This was a case that was slightly different from S-bag's but had many similarities. Most of these lots lots were NOT expired and thus, the HOA was correct in filing a Notice of Preservation of the COVENANTS. Most of S-bag's lots were expired when the Notice of Preservation was filed in April 2013 that attempted to revitalize later adopted AMENDMENTS to the Covenants (to bypass the expiration issue). Unfortunately, (like S-bag) it and its attorney did not understand what it was doing and slandered the 15 parcels whose Covenants had already expired. S-bag slandered 100's of expired lot titles and STILL must remove the cloud on these titles if the Covenants do not get revitalized (revitalization will make the invalid Preservation Notices moot.) The HOA attorney went back and manually got many of those 15 homeowners to voluntarily "revitalize" the covenants on their parcels whereas S-bag sought revitalization under FS720. This task was done "one by one" and many owners, receiving letter/contract from the attorney, were intimidated by threats of having services/amenities withdrawn and social ostracism in the Sm all community. Owners were understandably confused and did not know what to do--so they signed. In S-bag, Owners were also threatened by false statements by the board and green ribbons to identify loyalties and consented without true information. A few Bradenton owners have still not signed perhaps awaiting the outcome of this case. In S-bag's case, almost 200 non-consenting parcels are waiting to see if S-bag indexes their parcel under the revitalized covenants. One of the Bradenton parcels is reportedly contacting the lawyer to explore their rights. In S-bag's case, one known and an additional unknown # of parcels--homesteaded or not--will seek redress from the courts if S-bag places its revitalized restrictions on non-consenting parcels.
On a related note, there is an HOA in Orlando which has just been revitalized and the HOA has indexed an owner's title which was never subject to the revitalized Covenants (one of the requirements). The owner represents an entire community that shares an earlier set of non-mandatory Covenants that expired in 2009. The Owner is now in the process of cH allenging the DEO which, so far, has not exhibited a willingness to further scrutinize the documents or the affected parcels but has only given a stamp of procedural approval on the package it did receive from the HOA.
As of yesterday, the S-bag revite package was still "in the queue" and had not yet begun the review process.
In my opinion, this Orlando HOA (like S-bag) is eventually going to have to be subject to a court order to compel the HOA to obey the common laws of the land outside of its gates. They have been dancing around this issue for years without any resolution--just continued harassment of the owners. More wasted time and money for the benefit of the lawyers and the HOA egos...
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Post by WishICouldRetire on Apr 6, 2016 20:04:00 GMT -5
I have read this board for a while now and feel that you folks need to enjoy your retirement and use your intellect to help improve the lives of others less fortunate. I have wished that I could stop working and enjoy SLR but can't at this time. I hope I am not going to be too old to enjoy what I have earned.
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Post by observant on Apr 6, 2016 23:03:03 GMT -5
I have read this board for a while now and feel that you folks need to enjoy your retirement and use your intellect to help improve the lives of others less fortunate. I have wished that I could stop working and enjoy SLR but can't at this time. I hope I am not going to be too old to enjoy what I have earned. Let's just say that you may enjoy your retirement; however, favoritism, cronyism, and illegal activities on the part of the Board and the management company MUST be a thing of the past. |
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Post by Admin on Apr 7, 2016 9:39:42 GMT -5
Wish I could retire posted:
I do believe that was the original idea for most folks here. My retirement dream was to continue working at tasks I enjoy for the mutual benefit of myself/others without having an accumulation of bills driving a punishing workload schedule. I had NO CLUE that I would one day use my intellect, financial resources and talent to defend my property rights against my neighbors' invalid claims and administer a website to alert and inform others about private malgovernance, misdeeds and erosion of property and civil rights! I do not think that anyone had any idea that their golden years would be consumed with the unpleasant necessity to defend themselves from brutal attacks on character and false accusations and persecution by the SLohA abuser gang. But, as they say, "Life is like a box of chocolates etc..."
No one can know or guess what the future will hold for you when you want to stop working and enjoy what you have earned. I hope that your choices are more informed and realistic that mine were. My best advice would start with "Never buy property in an HOA" and end with "Stay Informed".
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