[GizmoWhiskers]

Originally Posted by Bogie Shooter

Not when one person submits 50+ complaints. This becomes selective enforcement.
I say sign your name and you must live in the District where the complaint is filed.

Not sure how the clipboard people are remaining annonymous but solution... the 40 plus people file class action suit against the enforcement of rules not enforced for the past 25 years.

Complaints ONLY from within the villa neighborhood itself OR each small named neighborhood within the district. Not even whole district.

T V should be doing waivers for any infractions not reported within say 2 -3 yrs from receipt of installation as neglect of reporting. This would stop the current selective enforcement that is happening.

T V should evaluate the infractions for beautification (ie brick boarder wall and flower beds not permitted but would have been approved in the long run vs removal) vs homeowner neglect and previously installed items that lack cohesiveness in the overall theme of the neighborhood.

They check for aggregious offensiveness based on the overall neighborhood aesthetic cohesiveness (when you know you know if something is beyond acceptable).

Is the annonymous status due to emailing complaints? You call on the phone they take names.
T V should disregard ALL emails not properly identified as being unjustified harassment- no name and contact info email is trashed. Homeowners deserve the right to know as discovery as threat for staulking.

T V community standards should be forced to do their jobs. They should be the clipboard people and neighborhoods should have been checking neighborhoods monthly from day 1 by inspecting themselves.

The vigilante vendedeta policing sometimes 25 yrs after installation should be called harassment and staulking and complaints should be treated as such with an eye toward legal basis.

I say to those hit the way they have been by mass email scandal lawyer up. Set a precident, it's about time. This is problem that is the fault of T V start there.

[kenpoboy]

Photo of the trolls...?? really?? they're like ninjas.....better chance of getting a photo of Bigfoot.

[RICH1]

Two old “ biddies” on a cart ! Lol
That should bring it down to just about 40,000 suspects

[Joe C.]

IMHO, complainers should NOT be anonymous.
However, the only complaint should come from an abutting property owner or an owner from across the street.

ALSO, if a complaint is filed, and found not to be legitimate, the complaintant should be fined $100.

It may not solve the problem, but may ease it a bit.

[Hank’s mom]

Not that simple!

[Bogie Shooter]

Originally Posted by villagetinker

I have thought about this several times, especially after our neighborhood was hit with around 3 dozen complaints, over the phone.

Here are my thoughts about how to change the existing system to maintain the anonymous system and at the same time eliminate the "trolls".

1. Anyone desiring to file complaint would be required to get a form from Community Standards (either online or at the office). Community Standards will design the form. Phoned in complaints will no longer be accepted.
2. The complainer would fill out the form, which would include the nature of the complaint, the location of the infraction, and whether it is a serious infraction. Serious infractions would involve, buildings, water flow/drainage, infraction of build lines, permits, etc. Minor infractions would typically be signs, lawn ornaments etc.
3. One (1) complaint per form.
4. The completed form would need to presented in person, with complainer’s village photo ID to the VCDD. The photo ID would NOT be recorded. The reason for this is that going forward, only people living in the same village would be allowed to file complaints in that village.
5. There would be NO identifying information on the person filing the complaint.
6. There will be a charge to be paid for each complaint filed, cash only. The charge could start at say $10 per complaint and be adjusted as necessary to limit “troll” activity. To maintain anonymity, there will be NO receipts or records of the payment.
7. If the review board finds the complaint to be valid, then the existing procedures will be used to get the property into compliance.

I am sure there would be some tweaks needed to ensure that the identity of the complainer is not recorded or revealed.

Excellent starting point!

[Papa_lecki]

I like some of the suggestions in here

VT suggesting you pay some fee to file the complaint- even $1 or $1 per complaint will curtail some

I also like having different categories of complaints - the house with the overgrown weeds and car on cinderblocks vs the home that is 6” over the setback

Some sort of grandfathered absolution - i.e. if the improvement was done over 3/4/5 years ago it stays.

[ThirdOfFive]

None of the above.

There needs to be a third choice; i.e. have the powers-that-be in THE VILLAGES take over the responsibility of assuring, through regular monitoring, not only that standards are met, but fixes applied. The current system is akin to having the average motorist report speeders, with the cops following up only once the report is received. What kind of GAWDforsaken "reasoning" led to this current muddled mess is anyone's guess, but it smacks suspiciously of the selfsame powers-that-be deciding to shirk their obvious responsibility of assuring that standards are met and enforcing the rules if they are not, in the interests of--what? Profits? Image? I don't know. In any case, it is a mess and this "poll" will only result in a specious "answer" (i.e. the majority of respondents say....) that once again sidesteps the entire issue of where the responsibility OUGHT to rest.

That said, the fixes, even if those powers-that-be own up to their own responsibility in this matter, are neither simple nor easy. Nor will those fixes be quick: it has taken years to get is into this mess and it will probably take the same amount of time to get us back out.

In the interests of "no complaining without suggesting remedies", my suggestions are as follows:

1: Have the powers-that-be take over monitoring for compliance as soon as possible, according to a set schedule and pattern that is impartial in nature but which includes ALL of the various villages according to the standards in place in each Village. Doesn't have to be Community Standards doing the monitoring (though that is the glaringly obvious place for it) but a dept. set up for this purpose only.

2. Concentrate (at first, anyway) on only the glaringly obvious stuff, and have that list formulated and made public before monitoring is begun: Broken and duct-taped windows. Serious mold issues. Lawns overgrown with weeds. Cars up on blocks for weeks at a time. Dead trees. Broken siding. Garishly painted houses. Things like that. Forget the picayune bee ess such as inappropriate lawn ornaments. Those have little or no bearing on neighborhood continuity or property values anyway and serve merely as bones of contention for the hair-splitters.

3: Formulate a policy that ALL properties sold to buyers of homes in The Villages, if it can be proven that the property was sold by The Villages personnel with any of the egregious violations mentioned in (2) above not corrected by the time of sale, are grandfathered in if the sale date is more than five years before the date the infraction was first noted. If the sale date is less than five years before the date the infraction was noted, then absolve the homeowner of any responsibility to bring the property back into compliance and assure that The Villages, NOT the homeowner, is financially liable for the fix, if any. This does not apply if the violations were the result of things done to the property, or homeowner neglect, on the part of the homeowner, that occurred after the date of sale to the homeowner in question.

4: Start with a clean slate. Any infractions found by Villages personnel, if found to be the responsibility of the owner to correct (see #3 above), regardless if the infraction was reported before by Villagers or not, shall be given a generous window of time to correct: say 90 days to begin, another 90 days to complete. Levy fines ONLY if the work is not completed as ordered, and levy them in a totally impartial manner.

5. No fine forgiveness.

6: Establish a system where, in cases of disputed decisions regarding infractions, the issue shall be heard promptly by a board of arbitration consisting of three members: one acceptable to The Villages, on acceptable to the complainant, and one chosen at random. The decision of this board regarding the resolution of the issue shall be final.

This list is composed on the spur-of-the-moment and undoubtedly contains loopholes that the more legalistically-minded among us will equally undoubtedly point out, but that aside, the SPIRIT of how things should be handled remains the same. Details can always be hammered out, if the will to actually fix things in an equitable manner is sincere.

A posted noted a couple of weeks ago that "rules without enforcement are merely suggestions". The mess we're in is due solely to the powers-that-be shirking their responsibility in this matter, with all too many people ignoring those suggestions with impunity and fixes, if and when applied, are done so in a totally arbitrary manner. Time to face the issue squarely and take fair and responsible actions to get things back on track.

[Bilyclub]

Those Community Watch people have a whole page or two of daily duties that need to get done during their tour. Rules are rules no matter who reports them.

[merrymini]

The complaints went down but I doubt the infractions did. You would pit neighbor against neighbor. Terrible situation. Keep it anonymous.

[merrymini]

Originally Posted by Bogie Shooter

Not when one person submits 50+ complaints. This becomes selective enforcement.
I say sign your name and you must live in the District where the complaint is filed.

How would you know this if they are anonymous?

[gmracket]

When we moved here in 2004 we had an ornament in our front flower bed. We didn't know all the rules at that time just moving in was our job. The Villages Compliance Department came by and told us that we had to move it. It had to be touching the concrete walk versus the middle of the bed. We did that and that was it. I understand rules. Too much can be daunting, however, I think it's the cowards way out to complain anonymously. Most of these are silly complaints. If that's the case, we all would be guilty of some violation. How about the ones complaining. Have they looked at their yards?

[Bogie Shooter]

Originally Posted by merrymini

How would you know this if they are anonymous?

Submitted by email…….same email address.
Info from rep from Community. Standards.

[Challenger]

Originally Posted by villagetinker

I have thought about this several times, especially after our neighborhood was hit with around 3 dozen complaints, over the phone.

Here are my thoughts about how to change the existing system to maintain the anonymous system and at the same time eliminate the "trolls".

1. Anyone desiring to file complaint would be required to get a form from Community Standards (either online or at the office). Community Standards will design the form. Phoned in complaints will no longer be accepted.
2. The complainer would fill out the form, which would include the nature of the complaint, the location of the infraction, and whether it is a serious infraction. Serious infractions would involve, buildings, water flow/drainage, infraction of build lines, permits, etc. Minor infractions would typically be signs, lawn ornaments etc.
3. One (1) complaint per form.
4. The completed form would need to presented in person, with complainer’s village photo ID to the VCDD. The photo ID would NOT be recorded. The reason for this is that going forward, only people living in the same village would be allowed to file complaints in that village.
5. There would be NO identifying information on the person filing the complaint.
6. There will be a charge to be paid for each complaint filed, cash only. The charge could start at say $10 per complaint and be adjusted as necessary to limit “troll” activity. To maintain anonymity, there will be NO receipts or records of the payment.
7. If the review board finds the complaint to be valid, then the existing procedures will be used to get the property into compliance.

I am sure there would be some tweaks needed to ensure that the identity of the complainer is not recorded or revealed.

Old post, but well thought out. I would support such an approach.

[jparsoneau@aol.com]

If you feel so strongly enough that you need to report it. You should put your name down on it. If you’re not willing to put your name on it it’s obviously not that important. And yes, if these trolls are out there, taking pictures I would take a picture of them and post them. Why hasn’t anybody else.
I would also have an issue if I bought a house that is a joost Home and Village real estate agent listed it and sold it to me and none of that made me aware of the out of compliance issues. I feel that they have some liability as well.