Residents Oversized Vehicles

As the elected representative of Summers Landing, the Homeowners Association (HOA) Board of Directors (BoD), wants to be sure that our actions reflect the wishes of the majority of the residents in our amazing community. The HOA BoD is therefore seeking the community's input regarding oversized vehicles, such as campers, boats, and trucks, which have long been a concern of the BoD relative to covenant enforcement.

Our HOA Covenants regarding oversized vehicles states the following:

"No boats, boat trailers, personal watercraft, campers, recreational vehicles, utility trailers, commercial vehicles and/or other oversized vehicles may be stored and/or maintained on a Lot unless they are stored inside a garage or, with the approval of the Architectural Control Committee, are screened and are not visible from any public street on the Property."

The rule noted above is pretty clear: If you want to keep an oversized vehicle on your Lot, you need to make sure it is not visible from the street when foliage is NOT in bloom.

The fact that screening is mentioned, implies that the HOA has some leeway in defining screening and that elected HOA BoD is expected to apply common sense and reasonable judgement rather than thoughtless rigid enforcement of rules written for our community over two decades ago by unknown others.

In essence the HOA BoD has two options: (1) It can enforce the covenants to the letter and simply PROHIBIT ANY AND ALL oversized vehicles and boats, or (2) the HOA BoD can interpret "screened" to mean "reasonably and mostly screened," thereby giving homeowners with oversized vehicles at least a little leeway. Whatever the HOA BoD decides to do, DOES NOT RESTRICT FUTURE BOARDS OF DIRECTORS FROM FOLLOWING A DIFFERNET POLICY.

The consensus of the HOA BoD is that the Summers Landing Community is sufficiently rural that reasonably screened oversized vehicles, provided they are not too large, would not detract from the beauty of our community.

The HOA BoD has sought to maintain a delicate balance between rigid enforcement and allowing common sense accommodations that do not unreasonably restrict a homeowner's ability to enjoy his or her property without negatively affecting a neighbor's right to do the same. The HOA BoD recognizes that this introduces a degree of subjectivity to the enforcement of oversized vehicle situations, but then all enforcement is subjective to some degree.

Summers Landing Residents must understand that it is the homeowner's responsibility to screen any such oversized vehicle to the satisfaction of the Architectural Control Committee (ACC) and/or the HOA BoD and that it is not the homeowner but the ACC and/or HOA BoD, that determines whether or not an oversized vehicle is "adequately screened".

If the screening of and oversized vehicle has been approved by the ACC or the HOA BoD and the vehicle is replaced by a larger vehicle, or relocated on a homeowner's lot, a new application will need to be made and approved by the ACC and/or the HOA BoD.

If you have any comments on this issue, please email them to the HOA BoD President, Mr. John Thyen, at jdthyen@gmail.com. The HOA BoD AWLAYS WELCOMES input from our SL Residents.