Then what's the point in trying to seek legislative reforms?  If you
don't want privatized local government, then work to eliminate it.

I agree. Now, let the Loner in the Wilderness attempt to explain  his position.

I am well aware that this bill only touches on 2 items that need addressing and not on the dozens of others that need to be addressed. Too little, too late and no meaningful change.  The horror stories will continue. Civil liberties are still being denied. However, as I said, this is a step forward. Again, except for a few attempts to provide for enforcement, nothing has changed. The BODs and their cohorts in crime, the HOA attorneys, still can go and do as they please.

I view this legislation as a sub-goal, serving to help explore the issues. Can we even accomplish the passing of this bill? Well, look who sponsored it. Representatives with relatively few HOAs in their districts. (About 50% of the population of Arizona is in the Metro Phoenix area and Tucson has less than half that). I applaud their efforts on our behalf, but don't get excited.

We can look forward to maybe bits and pieces from the legislature over time.  The real relief can only come from a de-privatization of the HOA, while not eliminating planned communities, but by bringing them back into  the American Zone.  That's what I feel will be the end result of all these attempts to attain reform legislation.  It is the realization that the only real solution to the issues being raised is to subject the HOAs to  the laws of the land, for better or for worse,  without special preferences for these undemocratic corporations.

And this will require the involvement of the Courts. Of course, the legislature can pass laws until, when and if the Supreme Court is brought in to decide the issue under the separation of powers doctrine, as the legislature is now doing in favor of HOAs.

Any arguments by advocates, in effect,  to retain special laws to allow the HOAs to hold the maintenance of  property values above the rights of American citizens are arguments against the American system of government. So, while everyone argues for the right to fly the flag, the flag is only symbolic of the our way of life and HOAs are not. It's that simple.

And many advocates are not ready to accept that. They believe that HOAs can function, as they are,  in peaceful coexistence with true democracy.  You must choose: either the rights of citizens are paramount or some other objective, whatever it may be, is paramount. And the changes required to make the restoration of civil liberties happen requires de-privatization of HOAs. Either homeowner rights come first or bricks and mortar.  This is what all these reform efforts will amount to in the final analysis. "Reform" legislation is just a series of step toward de-privatization.

(The fact that many homeowners may still prefer to live in HOAs presents a real practical problem as I tried to  explore in my Exit Plan. But the practicality of a solution should not lessen the fact that HOAs are outside the American system and have gotten that way through deceit and the failure of the government to protect its citizens -- the full disclosure /  private contract issue).

This process of reform legislation will internalize the realization that the HOA model of government is defective and must be replaced. As I have said in my Exit Plan, echoed somewhat in Texas, homeowners must vote on the status of the HOA periodically and those on the losing side have a decision to  make. That's about the only fair way  to handle the problem, because our government has allowed the problems to become unmanageable.

So, here in Arizona and Texas and elsewhere, are we going to  get meaningful enforcement which will bring HOAs back into America? This is a necessity. It will make all other problems easily fall into place.  Arguing for these reforms without a restorarion of the Bill of Rights, de-privatization, is putting the cart before the horse.

___________________________
HOA Network
Citizens Against Private Government HOAs
"We must make the injustice visible"    ... Gandhi
George K. Staropoli
pvtgov@cs.com
http://pvtgov.org