|
ANOTHER YEAR – AND NOTHING ACHIEVED AGAIN!
|
|
ANOTHER YEAR – AND NOTHING ACHIEVED AGAIN!
|
|
An
Opinion By Jan Bergemann Published January 1, 2012 (Published in the Orlando Sentinel HOA & CONDO BLOG)
From
the point of view of property owners in community associations the review
for the year 2011 was the same as the reviews for the years 2009 and 2010:
The Florida legislature totally failed to address the financial crisis
that is dooming more and more associations – a crisis caused by unpaid
dues and/or foreclosures. Actually, in the last three years our
legislators fell over each other trying to protect the folks that really
caused the whole financial misery in many of our community associations:
Banks and mortgage lenders! The
latest highlight to top off the achievements worth mentioning for the year
2011: The so-called Safe-Harbor Amendments to H319
[See: AMENDMENTS
TO H319 GET BANKS OFF THE HOOK, AGAIN]. It’s just amazing
how far our elected officials will go to protect the major donors to their
campaigns. And
the actions surrounding these amendments to H319 again proved my point:
The so-called lobbying groups run by law firms and specialized attorneys
claiming to lobby FOR
associations (CAI,
CALL
and CAN) are in reality
nothing but organizations trying to protect the financial welfare of the
service providers. Claiming to lobby FOR associations is in my opinion
just a way to mislead ill-advised board members to finance the lawyers’
lobbying efforts and to use the number of folks they claim to represent to
impress Over
the years we saw some more PR gimmicks scored by our legislators, trying
to bamboozle the owners into making them believe that bills were created
to help them deal with the financial problems. The biggest joke: “We
increased the liability for unpaid dues for banks from 6 months to 12
months. Hallelujah!” The legislators and the lobbying groups (CAN and
CALL), praising these changes, forgot to mention that the amount the banks
have to pay was still limited to 1% of the original mortgage – an amount
that in most cases equaled about 3-4 months of unpaid dues – meaning
banks were not required to pay one dime more than they had to pay before
this “great legislative achievement.” Our
esteemed Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi has obviously given up trying
to prosecute the criminal acts of banks, mortgage lenders and their
attorneys. No matter what she claims, she fired the two top prosecutors
who tried to go after the guilty parties that actually caused the national mortgage meltdown and added
falsifying documents and robo-signing to their daily repertoire. Bondi explains that she prefers money settlements to
criminal prosecution. I guess so do the bankers, because they just use the
bail-out money paid by us taxpayers to pay for these “settlements” –
and will ask for more bail-out money if the “settlement amounts” are
too big. Does anybody
still wonder why this state is known as FRAUD FRIENDLY FLORIDA? We
saw some more great legislative achievements in the last few years –
such as, enticement for bulk-buyers that backfired on the private owners,
and punishing renters for the failure of their landlords to pay the
monthly dues. It all ended in more billing hours for attorneys, meaning
more lawsuits. How
about the brilliant idea of enabling boards to ban deadbeats from using
the community pool, while they still enjoyed the TV-service paid for by
their neighbors? You
may be wondering why this review actually covers the past three years, not
just 2011? The explanation is simple: The legislative achievements of the
last three years are actually all the same. Three words for three years: NOTHING – ZERO – ZIP! However,
if they feel so inclined, our legislators have the first three months of
2012 to make up for their failure to even attempt to enact some helpful
provisions that would create some financial relief for Florida’s
community associations under financial distress. CAMP 2012 created a BILL
DRAFT with six provisions that would really help associations deal
with the serious problems that endanger the existence of many If
our legislators are again not inclined to help their constituents, it’s
up to the more than 3 million eligible voters living in community
associations in I
have always tried to find an explanation for the fact that The
only explanation I was able to come up with: I
wish for all owners in community associations that 2012 will be a better
year – and that our legislators will finally stop treating these owners
as stepchildren of our society. Owners
surely deserve better! The still-paying owners didn’t cause the real
estate market to collapse or the mortgage meltdown. But so far they are
the ones paying the price for the mistakes and greed of others! As
the saying goes: If you reached the bottom, you can’t go down any
further – things can only get better. Let’s just hope this saying is
right. With that thought in mind I wish you all a HAPPY
and PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR 2012! |
