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Reprint From:  
Clear Lake Citizen News
CLCCA NEEDED - LIKE IT OR NOT
April 6, 2000

We absolutely need the Clear Lake City Community Association (CLCCA). Over the years, the Board of Trustees of the CLCCA, Inc. has done a good job in maintaining the quality of life in Clear Lake City without being overly intrusive. The Board serves without compensation and deserves our thanks for their commitment to civic responsibility. It should also be that civic responsibility that reminds them they are elected to represent the citizens of this community and not any hidden agendas or special interests or personality conflicts they may have. Board meetings should be open to anyone who wants to come and express their opinion regardless of what it is. The action of the Board at the last meeting to limit discussion to only eight citizens doesn’t promote openness. The actions of some in the audience at that meeting weren’t very commendable either. There is no room for personal attacks or name-calling at a public meeting to discuss our mutual concerns. We are all in this together, and there must an open and frank interchange between the Board and the citizens conducted in a civil manner.

The letter from Mr. Robert G. Musgrove in the March 22, 2000, Citizen Opinion Section was very appropriate. We absolutely need the CLCCA, Inc. to fairly and strongly enforce our deed restrictions to community standards in order to maintain our property values. But at the same time, it is the "deed restrictions" that must be enforced, not some arbitrary or temporal interpretation of them. We absolutely do not need the Board to try and enforce arbitrary and subjective extensions to our deed restrictions that may be crafted by a few and enforced by fewer still. Such embellishments, whether they be called "maintenance guidelines", "policy statements", "rules and regulations", or whatever are left to the whim of the Board. The Board is composed of short-term incumbents who may arbitrarily create or change such documents at their will without citizen approval. The Board may not change deed restrictions without a binding vote of the majority of the property owners.

If you are a resident in the CLCCA, please go and find your copy of the deed restrictions you received when you closed on your home. If you can’t find them, they are available at the CLCCA, Inc. Office at the Recreation Center, 16511 Diana Lane. They are also available at the Freeman Memorial Library in the Reference Section. Please read them. You will find nothing about faded paint, or cracked driveways, or mildew, or Christmas decorations that have been up too long, or some of the numerous other "apparent deed restriction" violations that you may have been accused of in a letter from the CLCCA, Inc. Such "violations" are a result of this and various past Board of Trustees’ attempts to clarify or interpret the current deed restrictions by passing various policy statements or guidelines. Their motives may well have been altruistic and in our best interests, but they also may well have been uninformed. If our current deed restrictions are indeed outdated or vague or do not reflect current community standards, there is a lawful means to change them. It is contained in your copy of your deed restrictions. It requires a majority of the property owners to approve any amendments. The very last time I looked, we still live in America, and like it or not, the majority rules. And like it or not, we absolutely need the CLCCA, Inc. to enforce APPROVED deed restrictions.

If you have any comments about deed restrictions or their enforcement, please contact one of your Trustees or come to the next Board meeting and express your opinion. That meeting is supposed to be held on April 18, at 7:00PM in the meeting room next to the CLCCA, Inc. Office at 16511 Diana Lane

Clear Lake City
e-mail  jtchapmaniii@msn.com

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