HOA question

[IronBrand]

I am president of an HOA in Indiana and am trying to determine if I can enforce my parking restrictions with towing (the covenants do not say yea or nay.

The enforcement section talks about being able to take actions and then available relief from those actions may include injunctive and declaratory relief.

Are the actions open to a vote by the board, or would it just have to be letters?

 

[LdiJ]

I am president of an HOA in Indiana and am trying to determine if I can enforce my parking restrictions with towing (the covenants do not say yea or nay.

The enforcement section talks about being able to take actions and then available relief from those actions may include injunctive and declaratory relief.

Are the actions open to a vote by the board, or would it just have to be letters?

So you are attempting to make parking restrictions on your own, that are not part of the covenants of the HOA? If I understood you correctly the restrictions themselves would have to be put to a vote, mostly likely by the entire community, not just the board, if they are not currently part of the covenants.

 

[bdancer]

So you are attempting to make parking restrictions on your own, that are not part of the covenants of the HOA? If I understood you correctly the restrictions themselves would have to be put to a vote, mostly likely by the entire community, not just the board, if they are not currently part of the covenants.

Maybe I missed something, but I read the OP as asking about ENFORCING restrictions, not creating new restrictions.

 

[FarmerJ]

You wrote >(the covenants do not say yea or nay.< to me it sounds like you have your answer >

The enforcement section talks about being able to take actions and then available relief from those actions may include injunctive and declaratory relief.< I suggest you explore this further because if your by laws were not clearly written to include towing and It was my vehicle you had towed Id have no problem using the bylaws lack of definition in suing for full refund of the towing cost & filing fees and if I won my claim then every member household in the HOA would have to pay for your poor choice.

Are the actions open to a vote by the board, or would it just have to be letters? < If your going to propose rule changes follow your bylaws to the T and make sure you seek guidance from a atty if you have any doubts as to the way changes are written and in the time being use registered return rcpt letters ( You didnt say if this was about people parking on the roads in this community or if it was people parking things like work trucks in their driveways but on a serious note with out well defined bylaws already on the books you might start a legal battle that you may regret cost wise. )

 

[IronBrand]

So you are attempting to make parking restrictions on your own, that are not part of the covenants of the HOA? If I understood you correctly the restrictions themselves would have to be put to a vote, mostly likely by the entire community, not just the board, if they are not currently part of the covenants.

No the restrictions are already in place, it is the enforcement of the restrictions that I am looking for answers on. The language provided in the covenants is a little too legal for me. I have my interpretation, but I do not want to do the wrong thing. For 99% of our issues we do a letter with ten days to correct, then another letter with another 10 days if it had not been corrected. After the second 10 days has passed if they are still non-compliant they are turned over to an attorney. This works well enough but does take time. Personally I do not believe that this is the best option for enforcing the street parking restrictions. But, again the covenants are a little vague on what actions can be taken. The board has already voted on a course of action to work with a towing company, but we want to make sure we are right to proceed with this course of action.

 

[IronBrand]

You wrote >(the covenants do not say yea or nay.< to me it sounds like you have your answer >

The enforcement section talks about being able to take actions and then available relief from those actions may include injunctive and declaratory relief.< I suggest you explore this further because if your by laws were not clearly written to include towing and It was my vehicle you had towed Id have no problem using the bylaws lack of definition in suing for full refund of the towing cost & filing fees and if I won my claim then every member household in the HOA would have to pay for your poor choice.

Are the actions open to a vote by the board, or would it just have to be letters? < If your going to propose rule changes follow your bylaws to the T and make sure you seek guidance from a atty if you have any doubts as to the way changes are written and in the time being use registered return rcpt letters ( You didnt say if this was about people parking on the roads in this community or if it was people parking things like work trucks in their driveways but on a serious note with out well defined bylaws already on the books you might start a legal battle that you may regret cost wise. )

This is about street parking. We use letters for everything else. But the letters take too much time to be effective in cleaning up our streets.

 

[FarmerJ]

Are your streets already posted no parking ? tow away zone? Since you are not a city I cant help but wonder if your streets must not only be posted no parking but be posted tow away zone and maybe listing the tow company, Apartment and many other types of parking other areas like so called private parking lots often have additional rules BUT if the county or city you live in requires extra things of tow operators to tow from non city owned streets/ parking lots then it would be up to you to find out ( and also would likely help keep your legal cost down)
HUGE ? does your city already ban all parking on any residential streets/areas with in its boundrys ? you know like fire lanes etc ?

 

[LdiJ]

Are your streets already posted no parking ? tow away zone? Since you are not a city I cant help but wonder if your streets must not only be posted no parking but be posted tow away zone and maybe listing the tow company, Apartment and many other types of parking other areas like so called private parking lots often have additional rules BUT if the county or city you live in requires extra things of tow operators to tow from non city owned streets/ parking lots then it would be up to you to find out ( and also would likely help keep your legal cost down)
HUGE ? does your city already ban all parking on any residential streets/areas with in its boundrys ? you know like fire lanes etc ?

I will also add that if you are setting up the type of arrangement where the towing company gets to decide who does or doesn't get towed, then that can be a bit dangerous. Towing companies can be very predatory and the last thing that you want is a neighborhood where everybody wants to leave or vote the board out because of predatory towing. That can do more damage than good. If you are going to tow, you really need signs making it clear that violators will be towed, and then someone should be in charge of contacting the towing company to do a tow.

I must say, in my personal opinion, unless your streets are very narrow, I do not get at all why HOA rules would forbid parking on the streets. It seems overly anal to me.

 

[IronBrand]

Are your streets already posted no parking ? tow away zone? Since you are not a city I cant help but wonder if your streets must not only be posted no parking but be posted tow away zone and maybe listing the tow company, Apartment and many other types of parking other areas like so called private parking lots often have additional rules BUT if the county or city you live in requires extra things of tow operators to tow from non city owned streets/ parking lots then it would be up to you to find out ( and also would likely help keep your legal cost down)
HUGE ? does your city already ban all parking on any residential streets/areas with in its boundrys ? you know like fire lanes etc ?

The city does not ban street parking however, they have told us that we can enforce our more stringent covenants. We have posted signs for no parking/tow away zones. We are just not sure if we can really enforce it with towing.

 

[IronBrand]

I will also add that if you are setting up the type of arrangement where the towing company gets to decide who does or doesn't get towed, then that can be a bit dangerous. Towing companies can be very predatory and the last thing that you want is a neighborhood where everybody wants to leave or vote the board out because of predatory towing. That can do more damage than good. If you are going to tow, you really need signs making it clear that violators will be towed, and then someone should be in charge of contacting the towing company to do a tow.

I must say, in my personal opinion, unless your streets are very narrow, I do not get at all why HOA rules would forbid parking on the streets. It seems overly anal to me.

The covenants state only temporary and non recurring parking is allowed. And most of the time we do not have issues for guests and parties. But we do have people who park on the streets daily and yes our streets are narrow. The tow company would not be given the right to decide who to tow, only the board would have that power through documentation proving re-curing towing. The offender would then be tagged with a 24 hour notice to move. If they were to return shortly after moving the board would make a decision on if they need to be towed since they had been warned.

 

[LdiJ]

The covenants state only temporary and non recurring parking is allowed. And most of the time we do not have issues for guests and parties. But we do have people who park on the streets daily and yes our streets are narrow. The tow company would not be given the right to decide who to tow, only the board would have that power through documentation proving re-curing towing. The offender would then be tagged with a 24 hour notice to move. If they were to return shortly after moving the board would make a decision on if they need to be towed since they had been warned.

Ok, then you shouldn't have a problem.