Tag: first amendment

Media fails 1st Amendment free HOA speech

The media has failed its First Amendment prerogative of protected free speech. The Founding Fathers well understood the need for an informed citizenry for a healthy democracy and made free speech the 1st Amendment. However, America has become divided and the courts, including the Supreme Court, have adopted a policy that biased, personal agenda speech is OK because America has many channels for opposing speech. For example, FOX  News and MSNBC.

But the media has silenced the opposing views of HOA members themselves.

The Supreme Court (New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964),  with respect to newspaper articles, held:

“In the case of the newspaper that published inaccurate information, that form of speech would not be protected by the First Amendment if the newspaper published falsehoods knowingly and purposefully. . . . The Supreme Court ruled that the newspaper was constitutionally protected in this instance, despite the false allegations, since the newspaper did not knowingly and recklessly publish the inaccuracies.”

In response to a call for a media contact committee by HRLNG (FB) I wrote today:

“This has been a long-neglected point of power for advocates, realizing that the media is part of what I’ve designated as, “the unspoken alliance of NO HOA negative stories.” Ask yourself, recalling all the TV anchors telling you that they ask hard questions, they get to the facts, etc. yet nothing bad about HOAs that amount to substantial issues. Yes, they talk about this incident and that incident, but substantive issues go ignored. This must be the substance of your approach! Example: NAR and all state chapters claim they are here for you the home buyer and you can trust your Realtor (This term is the NAR members only). BUT HOA??? What’s that??

“The Homes Association Handbook, the 1964 “bible” for HOA-Land was supported by that version of NAR. AARP had some articles but no lobbying for its age 50+, members. Why not? This committee must not be afraid to ask these hard questions. What do you have to lose? They did very little for HOA reforms. CHALLENGE THEM and ask hard questions in pursuit of the truth!”

HOAGOV EDUCATION SERIES: understanding the real lives of HOA members

My purpose for the Education Series, taken from a collection of my Commentaries (WordPress blog), is to present the other side of the HOA legal concept that has been intentional kept hidden from the public, the media, and the legislators.  Homeowners associations (HOAs) — generic for POAs, CIDs, planned communities, and condominiums — have become an institution and are unquestionably accepted as “that’s the way it is.”

Over the years, the general public has heard only the benefits of HOA regimes, but has heard nothing about the means to achieve these benefits. The rationale, I suppose, is that the end justifies the means. This quiet acceptance of the HOA private government regime came to be as a result of aggressive lobbying by the HOA special interests, also known as HOA stakeholders (homeowners not included). The media, that was granted 1st Amendment freedom of speech rights in order to ensure a properly informed electorate, failed its obligations by remaining silent.  Nothing bad, seriously bad, about HOAs is publicized by the media. As you can read in my post on George Orwell’s 1984, the Ministry of Truth (a 1984 agency) parallels Goebbels’ Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda:

The Ministry of Truth uses control over the education system and the communications media to keep the masses in a state of ignorance and incapable of perceiving the facts of their manipulation. By controlling all sources of information, and playing one ignorant group off against the other, they ensure that effective opposition does not arise. While the masses attempt to make sense of the false reality fed to them in the schools and on the telescreens, the elite manipulators that write the scripts laugh at their confusion.  (Freedom is Slavery, The Modern History Project, April 24, 2015).

The Commentaries listed below present a broad picture of the current conditions, culture and environment relating to living in an HOA controlled home.  Violations of the Constitution’s equal protection of the laws and inadequate due process protections, pro-HOA state laws, legislative support for HOAs, the national business lobbying organization misleading the public that it is an unbiased educational organization, and the HOA attorneys and managers are all presented and discussed in these posts.

For readers who are interested in the history of how HOAs came to be can read my 121 page analysis, with references and legal authorities: The Foundations of Homeowners Associations and the New America.

Become informed.   Please read on.

 READING MATERIALS (click on links to access posts)

 A.    Constitutional issues

  1. HOA Member Declaration of US and State Citizenship
  2. HOA Common Sense: rejecting private government (complete series as PDF)
  3. CC&Rs are a devise for de facto HOA governments to escape constitutional government
  4. HOAs violate local home rule doctrine and are outlaw governments
  5. The unconstitutional delegation of implied rulemaking powers to HOAs
  6. Unconstitutional delegation of power to HOAs
  7. HOA reforms needed to guarantee U.S. Constitutional protections
  8. model HOA regulatory agency bill

  B.   HOA oppression

  1. Why do people harm others in HOAs?
  2. George Orwell’s 1984 is alive and well in HOA-Land

  C.   Community Associations Institute (CAI)

  1. Misrepresentation:  CAI comes with unclean hands
  2. Will the real CAI standup: its contradictory beliefs, pronouncements and goals
  3. CAI: the HOA form of government is independent of the US Constitution
  4. HOA constitutionality will cause the collapse of CAI