[Madelaine Amee]

Originally Posted by Advogado

Trump is irrelevant here.

My ramblings on a tragic situation for us all:

1. The plaintiffs ought to be run out of town on a rail and then burn in hell for what they have done to their neighbors--the residents of The Villages. Remember, the plaintiffs not only sued the LLLC and the Developer, but by including the clubs as defendants, they sued all of us. And without the courtesy of talking to us first!

By resorting to litigation, the plaintiffs have ruined one of the great aspects of living here. Had the plaintiffs publicly explained their difficulties and concerns, before starting a lawsuit, their problems probably would have been handled without the court battle and its resulting consequences-- which now appear irreversible. (As a retired attorney, I would stress that litigation should be the last, not the first, way to resolve problems.) If Villagers had known about the plaintiffs' situation, I am sure that (through volunteer signers or contributions to buy appropriate equipment) something could have been worked out so that the plaintiffs could have been accommodated and the LLLC continued.

2. But not only are the plaintiffs to blame here. Where in the heck was our newspaper, The Daily Sun, which is little more than a marketing tool for the Developer, while this lawsuit was festering for years? Once again, the Daily Sun (as it did when the IRS investigation, which presented an existential threat to our lifestyle, and other events prejudicial to home sales in The Villages occurred) either suppressed the news or obscured it or both. Today's article on the subject, the first that has been published, borders on the incomprehensible. Why are we, the Villagers, only learning about this lawsuit now and why doesn't the article explain the details of what is happened? Shame on you, Daily Sun, for misrepresenting yourself as a newspaper.

3. The Villages Charter School is a for-profit operation run by the Developer. Why did the Developer set it up, since it is probably not very profitable, in and of itself? He obviously did it to encourage businesses to rent from him so their kids could go to school there. Yeah, the LLLC is probably a "break-even" adjunct to the Charter School. But it is "break-even" only because there is not a lot of money to be made in continuing education. The benefit of the LLLC to the Developer: a marketing tool to sell more houses. Apparently the lawsuit was enough of an irritant to the Developer to cause him to walk away from the LLLC now that The Villages is just about built out.

I would have hoped that the Developer would have felt a greater responsibility to his customers so that he could have worked out some kind of accommodation with the plaintiffs, but maybe the plaintiffs were being unreasonable. You really cannot tell what happened from the Daily Sun article

The bottom line, as I see it: What we, as Villagers, should be doing, rather than looking for someone to blame, is hoping that the Developer's decision to close the LLLC will be reversed. However, the LLLC's closing now appears to be a fait accompli. Since we lack a real homeowner's association, with the power to raise funds by assessing homeowners, and since the Villages Homeowners Association is nothing more than a front for the Developer, maybe the Property Owners' Association can do something to persuade the Developer to change his mind. The sad thing is: I am not sure what, if anything, the POA or anybody else, can do at this point to cause a reversal of the Developer's decision. And furthermore, nothing that any of us say in this forum is going to make the slightest difference.

Excellent - thank you for your commonsense interpretation of this mess.