"Jim Weir" wrote in message
...
I spent five years on the board of, and two years as the president of,
a 721
home development board of directors. We had a few blowhards who, like
many in
here, told us to go to hell and parked cars on blocks and the like.

It wasn't rocket science. We voted a 30 day "take it away or go to
court." We
were impolitely told to go to hell. We didn't go to hell, we went to
court.
Not a big deal. Between the court costs and our lawyer's fees, the
blowhard had
a thousand dollar junk car project to remove.

"take it away or go to court."? This looks a bit like a small minded
battle of the wills between Mr. BH and the Homeowner's Association. But
I could easily be wrong. Did the Homeowner's Association give the car
owners the option of fixing the cars? Did the Homeowner's Association
ask for volenteers to help make the cars safe and reliable? A few guys
who know what they are doing can get alot done in 30 day's spare time.
It would be a neighborly offer to make.


Three or four cases like that in
the first couple of years and things got remarkably quiet, and we all
got along
like neighbors respecting the wishes of each other.




I took perverse satisfaction in stringing copper tape under the eaves
of the
house, strangely just long enough to make a quarter wave dipole for
forty
meters. But it was painted with exactly the same shade that the eaves
were
painted, run with a quarter-gallon with adequate filtering, matched to
the n'th
degree, and worked the world on everything from forty on up. You
could walk
right up to it and not detect that there was an antenna of any sort.

Not to mention the 2-meter groundplane disguised as a chimney strap.
Painted
wrought-iron black and strangely so, 19 inches long. Coax? Run down
a mortar
seam and painted mortar grey. From five feet away, it was
indistinguishable
from the mortar.


I'm curious. How much do antennas reduce property values? Is there a
formula for such things?



I laugh at you blowhards telling us how you will do what you damn well
please
when and where you damn well please to do it. I note that none of you
have
tried it.


No sir. Not me. I'd much rather discuss things politely rather than
start telling people what to do.



Clever works. Big mouths don't. And, if you don't like the rules,
either don't
move in or once you move in then try to change them. If a majority of
your
neighbors agree, it is changed. That's the way I learned that this
country
works.

Jim



Sometimes those meddlesome courts think the country works differently.
They said the CC&Rs which prohibit a seller from selling his property to
Blacks or Jews or Mexicans or any group in particular can't be enforced.
I suppose it had something or other to do with civil rights. The
Homeowner's Association can still regulate the color of the neighbor's
house, if not the color of the neighbors.

Frank Dresser