Judge deals blow to couple fighting to keep little white cross in The Villages (Florida)

Villages-A judge has dealt a blow to a couple fighting to keep a little white cross on display aNews ^ | 06/23/2022 | Meta Minton

[aimhigh]

A judge has dealt a blow to a couple fighting to keep a little white cross on display at their home in The Villages. Judge Michelle Morley has ruled in favor of Community Development District 8 in its protracted legal battle with Wayne and Bonnie Anderson of the Village of Tamarind Grove. She dismissed their most-recent counter complaint.

The Andersons had claimed that their display of the little white cross should be protected under the Florida Religious Freedom Restoration Act. However, CDD 8 has long held that the cross is considered a “lawn ornament” and therefore forbidden under deed compliance rules.

[devane617]

The Villages people are funny and kind of demented.

[dforest]

Are they allowed to put it in their window.? Or will they be told you can’t have lawn ornaments in your window?

Why do people move in these little tyrannical places?

[SaveFerris]

The Villages... America’s friendliest hometown

Too bad, really

Oh well, I couldn’t afford it anyways

[SkyDancer]

So if a mussie puts up their moon and star thingie??

[lowbridge]

But they make good music

[jimwatx]

Whelp this is much ado over a tiny cross, but this is what they signed up for when they moved to a place governed by an HOA.

[SaveFerris]

(Why do people move in these little tyrannical places?)

These people work their entire lives to move down here and enforce these rules! /Seinfeld

I read it in The Boca Breeze

Pinko Commie Rag that it is

[laplata]

At one time the people there were mostly conservatives.

[packagingguy]

This is a waste of the court’s time. Do we really need to be so petty?

[DoughtyOne]

I think they also see it as a haven of sorts. The
communities are run tightly, so crime is less, people
there are probably likely to be somewhat compatible
with your lifestyle.

I do have a problem with the infringement of religious
liberty. It would seem some accommodation could be made,
perhaps limit it to two feet by two feet.

That way any other religion could put their icon out
there too, and it not be an unsightly behemoth thing.

[Hegemony Cricket]

A really clever person might go ahead and take down the cross to be “compliant” but then carefully craft an installation with lights and shadows...

[PGR88]

The Villages people are funny and kind of demented.

I had an older colleague who retired and moved to the Villages North of Orlando. Ive never been there. He told me that The Villages has the highest STD rate of any zipcode in Florida.

seems incongruous, being a "retirement" area. Is this true, or just BS?

[Angelino97]

Does the Villages permit Jews to display Mezuzah's on their doorways?

If so, these Christians should sue the Villages for "religious discrimination."

HOAs can impose all manner of restrictions, but they must be enforced equally, without discrimination against any race, religion, gender, etc.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

A while back I moved to Colorado. The rep on Colorado was that the people were fiercely independent.

However, I noticed a lot of covenant communities with strict laws about where you could park your car, what you could do with your front lawn, what color you could paint your house, etc.

All it takes is one "fiercely independent" individual to park his car on blocks on his front lawn to scare everyone else into signing a restrictive covenant.

[Alberta's Child]

This scenario has been discussed many times on FR, and I always post the same thing.

When you live in a home that is governed by an HOA, you know the rules before you ever move in. Respect them and abide by them. As one lawyer friend of mine who specializes in HOA law once told me: "If you don't make the homeowner take down his Penn State flag today, you've given up the legal authority to make his neighbor take down a Nazi flag next month."

[Boogieman]

What about a Jewish person putting a mezuzah on their door? Is that banned in the Villages too?

[Steely Tom]

What about a rainbow flag?

[CatOwner]

A really clever person might go ahead and take down the cross to be “compliant” but then carefully craft an installation with lights and shadows...

I don't know how they did it, but I saw a lawn where they must have over-fertilized a cross pattern in it. When they were feeling especially rebellious and near a holiday, they would mow/edge around the lawn "cross" to have it slightly higher than the rest of the lawn. Neat trick.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

A doorway is different than a front lawn. HOAs, especially those run by retirees with large amounts of free time, have crafted very intricate rules to handle all manner of situations.

My HOA will let you put stuff on your balcony, but nothing can be permanently attached. So you can put up some plants to block people from seeing you while you're on your patio, but you can't put up fencing attached to the railing even though the result is similar.

The devil is in the details.

Fortunately all of the units in my HOA have stairs so there are very few retirees here. So the rules are far less onerous on us than the Prisoners at The Villages.