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Article
Courtesy of the The Orlando Sentinel
By Jeff Kunerth
Published August 28, 2004
After
Will Hudgins moved into his house in June, his next-door neighbor Connie
Stratton came over to compliment him on what he had done with the place. She
was friendly, he was cordial.
By the end of July, they were no longer speaking.
What has pitted neighbor against neighbor, and divided a neighborhood, are the
political signs Hudgins planted in his yard on Eli Street just west of Winter
Park. It started with a sign that said "Mr. Bush, Shove It," which
he then replaced with a sign that says, "Vote the Son-of-Bush Out!"
"It's all about my freedom of speech," said Hudgins, 59, a retired
air-conditioning company employee. "I didn't do it to agitate anybody. I
did it to express my opinion."
Stratton finds Hudgins' opinion disrespectful. And she told him so.
"He's entitled to his opinion, but he should show more respect for the
man who represents our country," said Stratton, a senior citizen who has
lived in the neighborhood for 35 years.
Another elderly neighbor, Flo Kozy, considers the signs vulgar. The
Son-of-Bush sign, she says, hints at another word, a four-letter word with
five letters.
"To me, it's really offensive," said Kozy, who has never met Hudgins
and now hopes she never will.
Other neighbors, Hudgins said, have voiced their approval of his signs.
They've knocked on his door to tell him so or given him the thumbs-up sign
when they walk by.
Even those who don't like his signs concede that Hudgins has a right to plant
his opinions in his own yard. That is not true in communities where residents
are bound by the covenants of their homeowners associations that ban political
signs -- pro or con -- in their yards.
While the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that city and county governments
cannot prohibit political yard signs on a person's private property, the
rulings do not apply to condo and homeowners associations.
"Cities and counties are creations of government. HOAs are really a
creation of contract," said Robert Taylor, a partner with Taylor &
Carls, an Orlando firm that represents homeowner associations. "If you
sign a contract that says you won't have any signs, you cannot put up any
sign."
Taylor said homeowners associations are well within their powers to prohibit
any and all signs, including political yard signs, and that right has never
been challenged in Florida.
"Our position is that signage is well within the rights of an association
to regulate, whether it is a political or real estate sign. We don't think
under Florida law that there is a First Amendment right to have any kind of
sign. That is a right you could waive by becoming an owner," Taylor
said.
But the enforcement of a prohibition against political signs can be
problematic and arbitrary.
In the Country Creek subdivision in Altamonte Springs, The Trails and
Southridge neighborhoods have the same covenants that ban all signs except for
real estate signs. The Trails has reminded its residents that, as the campaign
season kicks into high gear, those signs are prohibited.
But the Southridge homeowners association, headed by Altamonte Springs City
Commissioner Pat Freeman, has decided not to enforce the ban.
"Even if you want to say it is a violation of the covenants, you can't
walk in their yard and pull it out. By the time you went through the system,
the election is over," Freeman said. "We set a policy a long time
ago that we have to allow people their God-given right in this country to
express their opinion."
If challenged in court, Freeman thinks the ban on political signs would
lose: "If someone put up a sign for a candidate and took it to court, I
think the person with the sign would win. Judges would say you are denying
them their freedom of speech. I don't want to test it."
In this politically divisive and increasingly mean-spirited presidential
election, those yard-sign prohibitions may be put to a test. Two states --
Arizona and Maryland -- have already passed laws that prevent homeowners
associations from banning political yard signs. California is considering a
similar law.
Campaign lawn signs have the potential to unite neighbors along political
lines, or divide neighborhoods over whether they should be allowed or not.
"It's all about building community and promoting harmony. It's hard to
promote harmony when you have people at each other's throats," said Frank
Rathbun, spokesman for the Community Associations Institute in Virginia.
"We should be able to disagree agreeably. Unfortunately, in a politically
polarized society, that isn't always the case."
In Will Hudgins' neighborhood, which doesn't have a homeowners association,
the signs continue to divide neighbors, although Hudgins has removed his
"Shove It" sign.
"It's in my closet," he said. "I got new signs so I thought I'd
replace it."
The whole fuss makes Connie Stratton, who had a crush on Ronald Reagan as a
girl, long for the good, old "don't ask, don't tell" days when
people didn't know their neighbors' political persuasions.
"There was a time when people didn't tell you if they were a Republican
or Democrat," she said. "It was their secret."
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