Martinez is 83% white & affluent. It likely exists because of white flight from Augusta - 50% black.
These people want to get away from the crime, poor schools, & liberal policies of Augusta. The only way they can protect themselves is to pass strict compliance laws to discourage low class people. I imagine many of their laws are tailored to support this policy, & are overwhelmingly approved of by the citizens of Martinez. These people willingly subject themselves to these onerous laws in exchange for security & quality of life.
Some folks build fences with wood or stone. Others build fences with laws.
In this day & age of overt, unchallenged racism by blacks on whites, one can hardly blame folks wanting to protect themselves, their children & property.
HOAs have the same rules for essentially the same reasons.
It's not a choice I am willing to make - yet, but as I get older and/or the country continues to degenerate, it will eventually be necessary.
I agree that some build fences of brick or stone and others with laws. HOA are the epitome of this. I will never ever live in a HOA and allow neighbors to practice tyranny on each other. I hear philosophers waxing away that the human heart yearns for freedom and liberty. I don’t believe that bull crap for one second. Liberty amongst humans is the exception and tyranny is the rule. People yearn to be told what to think and how to behave and equally yearn to tell everyone else how to behave. The human is a pack animal like the baboon. The baboon is successful because he organizes. The human is successful because he organizes and specializes. The human yearns for cooperation, specialization and division of labor. Tyranny is the most efficient way to get this done. So the human heart yearns for tyranny like he yearns food,shelter and sex.
The Adams, Jefferson, Washington experiment in liberty is an anomaly. Tyranny is the natural state of man, liberty paradoxically requires energy to maintain. Paradoxically because it requires energy to require less control not more.