Free Republic

Ownership of electric vehicles may be on the rise, but one Florida homeowner is still getting grief from his homeowners’ association about his new Rivian R1T. Weston Hills Country Club resident Glenn Gordon describes his surprise when he received a letter from his HOA telling him that his pickup is against community regulations and that he could not keep it parked in his driveway overnight, local news station WPLG reported. The neighborhood rules, which were reportedly written in the 1980s, stipulate that trucks, trailers, RVs, and commercial vehicles cannot be parked in the community overnight. The HOA says that Gordon...

A judge in Florida has rejected the city of Dunedin's motion to throw out a lawsuit over its fining of a homeowner $500 a day for having long grass. The Institute for Justice is defending Jim Ficken, who faces $30,000 in fines or even foreclosure. But a judge in the Middle District of Florida denied the city's motion to dismiss his lawsuit, which argues the fines are excessive under both the U.S. and Florida Constitutions.

Abstract Wind energy has emerged as a promising alternative to fossil fuels, yet the impacts of wind facilities on wildlife remain unclear. Prior studies estimate between 10,000 and 573,000 fatal bird collisions with U.S. wind turbines annually; however, these studies do not differentiate between turbines with a monopole tower and those with a lattice tower, the former of which now comprise the vast majority of all U.S. wind turbines and the latter of which are largely being de-commissioned. We systematically derived an estimate of bird mortality for U.S. monopole turbines by applying inclusion criteria to compiled studies, identifying correlates of...

Last November, Japan’s Environment Ministry issued a stark warning: the amount of solar panel waste Japan produces every year will rise from 10,000 to 800,000 tons by 2040, and the nation has no plan for safely disposing of it.Neither does California, a world leader in deploying solar panels. Only Europe requires solar panel makers to collect and dispose of solar waste at the end of their lives.All of which raises the question: just how big of a problem is solar waste?Environmental Progress investigated the problem to see how the problem compared to the much more high-profile issue of nuclear waste. We found: Solar...

BRENTWOOD, NH (WMUR/CNN) - A New Hampshire homeowner is under court order to clean up his yard that's littered with thousands of boxes. If he doesn’t, the town will do it for him and stick him with the bill. Meanwhile, his neighbors are hoping their community will finally go back to normal. Michael Bates found himself back in court after failing to clean up his property in Salem, MA. The town estimates that there are some 2,000 boxes containing printers in the yard.

Andrew raises good questions. Trumps gun talk is worrying.

Just what does Condo Commando mean? Moving to Florida from Northern regions, new Floridians may be confused both by this term and by the exact meaning and authority of a Home Owner’s Association (HOA). Let’s first consider how to characterize someone who volunteers for or is elected to serve on a Homeowners’ Association Board of Trustees. Clearly this is a topic which affects people nationwide given the number of folks expressing frustration and anger in comments on various websites. There has even been a Texas shooting spree, the purported result of corrupt tactics on the part of a state Homeowner’s...

Committees are now drafting bills to be presented in the March session of the Florida legislature. If enough citizen input is received demanding regulation of single family residences in Florida’s gated communities and regulation of drug-re-hab centers now being located in private neighborhoods (which may or may not be gated), relief just may be coming for oppressed homeowners, their families, their children! About ten years ago, the Flower Pots bill was successfully passed which regulated only residents of condo communities. However, the State of Florida was reluctant to do anything about giving protection to those of us who own and...

I am currently witnessing a neighborhood drama that I’m sure plays out on a daily basis in communities across the country. Neighbor A is originally from Wyoming. This probably means nothing to most of you, but having lived in that state for a while, it conjures up a specific archetype for my family — a person who prefers to keep to him or herself but is friendly when forced into proximity with others and figures that laws perceived to be absurd or overreaching are not worth following. This doesn’t present much of a problem in Wyoming where there are more...

State wildlife officials are seeking public comments on the status of the American pika in California. This tiny member of the rabbit family, a high-mountain resident, is thought to be threatened by climate change. . . . Comments must be submitted by March 15 to Department of Fish and Game, Nongame Wildlife Program, Attn: Scott Osborn, 1812 Ninth St., Sacramento, CA 95811; or by email to pika@dfg.ca.gov.

Jeb Bush has penned a minifesto concerning economic opportunity that is worth giving a good think. He argues that while freedom entails the risk of failure, statism ensures the certainty of stagnation. In his opinion, the opportunity to succeed, even with the attendant downside of possible failure, is preferable to the certitude of gradual but inevitable demise. Noman adds that earthly hope lies in freedom and the growth--personal, moral and economic--that derives from its exercise. Hope cannot lie in a certitude destined to elude temporal, contingent beings in a world marked by limitation, or in false promises that no society...

Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley is threatening to ram through a sweeping new land use plan that imposes an environmentalist agenda on the state’s sprawling rural populations — a move that could spark a tax revolt and mass exodus unless it is rewritten, county officials and state legislators told The Daily Caller on Monday. O’Malley has indicated that he intends to impose what some lawmakers are calling a draconian new environmentalist agenda, known as “Plan Maryland,” through executive order and regulation, rather than through the state legislature, even though his fellow Democrats dominate both chambers. Plan Maryland’s expensive new mandates for...

Bummer! I ordered a yard sign on the Internet, a beautiful McCain-PALIN sign! I vote! I live in America! I live in the deep South, even! But I also live in a covenanted community, a golf-course community full of stepford wives and pissy no-tolerance types who run the Homeowners' Association. And I just read the following on their web site: Section 15. Signs. No signs shall be displayed upon any Lot or Living Unit other than a sign identifying the name of the contractor during construction of a dwelling . . . provided said sign meets the design criteria of...

A Wheat Ridge woman has upset some of her neighbors and sparked quite a controversy by choosing her to hang a U.S. flag upside down outside her home. Beth Hammer said she is flying her flag "union down" to protest the country's role in the war in Iraq, and her homeowners association is not happy about it. A hearing on the matter is scheduled for Wednesday night. Hammer, 64, is one of an increasing number of people who are very angry about the war. But it's the way she has expressed that anger that has rubbed some the wrong way....

CLAREMONT - There will not be a sequel to the mini-scandal known in some circles as "Flag-gate." Claraboya residents, many of whom were engaged in a fierce neighborhood dispute over tiny American flags during last year's Fourth of July season, have pledged to behave themselves this year. Tom and Nancy Telford, the two neighborhood real estate agents who planted flags last year in their neighbors' front yards with Nancy Telford's business card attached, left off the business cards this year, and mailed out a postcard to their neighbors giving them an advance opportunity to decline a flag. Last year, after...

An Air Force vet is in a dog fight in his own neighborhood over hanging the American flag outside his Draper town home. "Basically they're just trying to strong-arm me." Kevin Capito says he's frustrated after calls, e-mails, and even legal threats to take down his flag. "That was more than insinuated. He said that would be the next step, is that they would take it down. They would pay somebody to take it down and they would put a lien against the house. The village town homes' Homeowners Association and management company contend it's against the rules since they...