CC&R Corner for May 2008

By Will Bullington, CC&R Compliance Officer

May 2008

Up Coming Vote on Changes to the CC&Rs

Our current Environmental Control Committee (ECC), in cooperation with the current Board, has developed some proposed rule changes to the CC&Rs. In 2000, the membership of the LSPOA adopted our current CC&Rs. It has been eight years and we have seen some need for changes. The ECC met in 2007 with realtors and contractors, and then in May held a town hall meeting on fences. Through these meetings and literally hundreds of comments, complaints and requests for variances from the rules, developed the proposed CC&R changes.

First you must understand that the CC&Rs are developed by a committee, staff input and association attorneys. It took four years and $40,000.00 just to get enough of the membership (50% plus one) to approve the new CC&Rs. Each unit of the subdivision had to approve at this ratio. These new adopted CC&Rs differed from the original rules in which the old rules said you could have no fences, no restrictions on overhangs and roof pitches. Now the total membership not based on each unit, must vote 50% plus one. Now that we have a much higher population of people who actually live here and over 1,000 homes, I believe the vote will be easier to achieve to pass these changes.

Now, the current CC&Rs have Sections that lay down the restrictions and rules, how assessments are collected, how the Board is elected, etc. There are By Laws that also do much of the administrative part of the Association. For instance Article V of the CC&Rs tells you how an improvement is approved, by whom, and what an improvement is: house, deck, pool, etc. Article VI tells you what the minimum construction standards are: roof pitch, overhangs, minimum size of a garage, etc. The ECC must only approve those improvements that meet the minimum construction standards (MCS). The MCS are very important to planned unit developments like Lake Shastina because they help maintain higher property values than other communities.

Even small sub-divisions have CC&Rs when you build a house because an 800 square foot home is not as valuable as a 2,000 square foot home (duh). O.K. so we have a class act going on here. The original developers had enough forethought to put the power lines and all utilities underground, prohibited fences for a more open “rural” looking community, used a designer from Disneyland to put in ponds and waterfalls, and had engineers develop a master plan for drainage, etc. Once you realize this you really take a harder look at other communities when you are out and about: the solid fences jump out at you like a stockade, and the power lines blot out the skyline, or you see a neon bright yellow house.

As you drive back into Lake Shastina, especially if you have been gone for a while, you smile when you turn off of Big Springs Road and onto our streets. You can’t even find a pot hole in our roads (never noticed that till you are in some of our neighbor cities, huh?)

As we are filling in our empty lots with homes, minimum construction standards and CC&R enforcement are going to become more important. What one person got away with for 20 years all changes when they share a back yard with their neighbor. The ECC recognizes the fact that most new homes require new improvements after people have lived in them for awhile: a new fence for the kids and the dog or a storage shed for tools and lawn furniture because they won’t fit in the garage. The ECC has proposed changes to the CC&Rs in three sections at this time: new rules for storage sheds, fences and for overhangs.

The proposal is to have these three sections of the CC&Rs be regulated by architectural rules that may be changed by the Board. Rule changes would be posted to the membership for 30 days advising the members that the Board is considering a rule change. The Board then holds a hearing and decides on whether to change a rule. Currently, the Board may not create a rule that conflicts with the CC&Rs. Past rules that allowed for 2 x 4 inch mesh wire fences conflict with the CC&R that states the maximum size of wire fencing is 2 ½ inches. The proposal of the ECC is that the membership vote on the following changes to the CC&Rs:

1. Article 6.4: Change “No Temporary Structures” to “Temporary Structures and Outbuildings.” Add: “Outbuildings and sheds shall be built in accordance with the architectural rules adopted by the Governing Board.”
2. Article 6.12: Change section to read: “Eaves and Overhangs. All eaves and overhangs to be built in accordance with the architectural rules adopted by the Governing Board.”
3. Article 6.15: In first paragraph delete “under the following conditions:” and insert “in accordance with the architectural rules adopted by the Governing Board.” Also delete 6.15 (b) and (c). 6.15(d) to become (b) by default.

Please look for your ballot about voting on these important CC&R changes. If you would like to view the CC&Rs go to our web site at: lakeshastina.com. You may also contact staff through this web site for any question you may have.