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Condominium Boards Can and Should Question Owners’ Requests for
Comfort Animals If there is one word that describes
the reaction of board members asked to allow “comfort” or “emotional support”
animals in communities that otherwise prohibit pets, it is probably, “Grrrr!”
This is not because association boards are unsympathetic to the needs of
residents who have disabilities requiring the assistance comfort animals can
provide; it is because it is often difficult to distinguish between the requests
of owners who legitimately need pets, and those who simply want pets and will do
almost anything – including claiming disabilities they don’t have – in order to
keep them. Owners whose requests are denied often sue boards for failing to
provide the “reasonable accommodations” federal and state fair housing laws
require for residents with physical or mental disabilities. Fear of that
litigation and its attendant costs has led many boards to “just say yes” to most
comfort animal requests, assuming that judges and hearing officers are more
likely to favor owners claiming disabilities than associations denying them the
pets they say they need. While those concerns are justified, there are signs
that the legal winds have begun to shift.
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To Foreclose or Not to Foreclosure
We get it. The sub-prime mortgage crisis of 2008 that resulted in thousands
losing their homes in foreclosure evolved into a stock market crash that morphed
into a recession that has resulted in the highest unemployment rates (over 11
percent in California) seen in more than 50 years. The problem seems to be
growing as news reports indicate more owners defaulting on their home loans with
a significant number of owners owing more for their homes than they are worth.
This crisis is not just affecting lenders and the many homeowners who may have
had questionable creditworthiness to borrow money to purchase their homes in the
first place; it is also negatively impacting their homeowner associations.
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The Community Handbook One of the most
important governance tools for any common interest community is the Community
Handbook. It can provide stability, consistency and continuity to a community’s
operations. The handbook does not supersede but rather supplements the governing
documents by providing user friendly interpretations of the language that
pertains to day to day matters; by expanding on the topics in the documents in
functional ways; and by providing information that is useful to governors,
administrators, owners and residents (information that is omitted entirely from
the declarations and bylaws of most organizations). In one community with which
I am familiar, they are in their 18th year and 3rd printing of the community
handbook. This document has been passed from one community generation to the
next with little fanfare. Each generation has made additions or modifications
within the handbook. Such changes have been published with reference to the
handbook and such changes are ultimately incorporated into reprinted editions so
that the handbook remains an up-to-date and useful document. Below is an
annotated “Table of Contents” from the fictitious “XYZ ASSOCIATION” that helps
to illustrate the components of a community handbook.
Part I
Part II »
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