Posted on 11/17/2006 10:46:11 AM PST by TheKidster
GOLDEN, Colo. -- A judge has upheld a homeowners association's order barring a couple from smoking in the town house they own.
Colleen and Rodger Sauve, both smokers, filed a lawsuit in March after their condominium association amended its bylaws last December to prohibit smoking.
"We argued that the HOA was not being reasonable in restricting smoking in our own unit, nowhere on the premises, not in the parking lot or on our patio," Colleen Sauve said. The Heritage Hills #1 Condominium Owners Association was responding to complaints from the Sauves' neighbors who said cigarette smoke was seeping into their units, representing a nuisance to others in the building.
In a Nov. 7 ruling, Jefferson County District Judge Lily Oeffler ruled the association can keep the couple from smoking in their own home.
Oeffler stated "smoke and/or smoke smell" is not contained to one area and that smoke smell "constitutes a nuisance." She noted that under condo declarations, nuisances are not allowed.
The couple now has to light up on the street in front of their condominium building.
"I think it's ridiculous. If there's another blizzard, I'm going to be having to stand out on the street, smoking a cigarette," said Colleen Suave.
For five years the couple has smoked in their living room and that had neighbors fuming.
"At times, it smells like someone is sitting in the room with you, smoking. So yes, it's very heavy," said condo owner Christine Shedron.
The Sauves said they have tried to seal their unit. One tenant spent thousands of dollars trying to minimize the odor.
"We got complaints and we felt like it was necessary to protect our tenants and our investment," said Shedron.
The Suaves said they would like to appeal the judge's ruling but are unsure if they have the money to continue fighting. They said what goes on behind their closed doors shouldn't be other people's business.
"I don't understand. If I was here and I was doing a lawful act in my home when they got here, why can they say, 'OK, now you have to change,'" said Colleen Suave. "We're not arguing the right to smoke as much as we're arguing the right to privacy in our home."
Other homeowners believe, as with loud music, that the rights of a community trump the rights of individual residents. The HOA is also concerned that tenants will sue those homeowners for exposure to second-hand smoke and this could be a liability issue.
The couple said that they would like to unload their condo and get out of the HOA entirely, but they are not sure if the real estate market is right.
Awesome!
WHen your smoke comes thru walls to enter another persons property, it is repellent.
Your smoking in your yard only befouls my environment when I am sitting on my deck breathiing air that contains your smoke.
You may think it is hilarious that people don't want to live with other people's smoke, but it isn't. It isn't just repellent, it is downright unhealthy.
aww i miss our cabin!
a servant? we were allowed to have a servant? geez! ;)
When I have my sliding windows open the neighbor's smoke comes in my house [they do not allow people to smoke in their home].
It's awful. I must get up and talk to them which is always unpleasant ... then I have to close my windows to get relief.
I feel the same way about neighbor's music.
How many ways is there to say I don't want to live in a quarter million dollar house and have the guy next door running a auto garage next door?
This smoker sincerely appreciates that attitude, because it will happen, we've already seen it starting to creep into food issues, and by all of the same people.
If people choose to live in an HOA community, so be it. I just find this ruling to be a bit too much because it just opens the door for so many other things to be declared a "nuisance" and that scares me.
As you say, you don't trust lawmakers, but just because this was done by an HOA and a judge, don't think lawmakers won't be looking at ways to use this ruling.
If the folks in this particular complex have a problem with a bit of cigarette smoke, I could only imagine how they would react if I lived there and decided to make a batch of my habanero pepper jelly...........
It is not downright unhealthy - and the person who told you it was, lied for money.
But you probably won't believe that statement.
And therein lies the problem.
No, and WTF does that have to do with the issue?
It's the same priciple. You're actively structuring a deal in order to restrict people's rights in order to profit. Why not on a larger scale? If you could save a couple million on a purchase and take that right to the bottom line, then what's wrong with doing something within the law as a partner with the elected governing body to ensure maximum profitability from a development project?
Why wouldn't you do that?
Bottom line to me is if you won't abide by HOA rules do not sign the contract saying that you will uphold them. I find so many here on FR who do not understand that concept.
I personally have been there when attorneys have had to be hired. It's expensive and everyone has to pay. In the end, the homeowner signed the CCRs ... the lose every time.
I REALLY cleaned up the language of that deed restriction. Amazing, how yankees think southerners are racists. I have never seen the like in Virginia.
They could but the others who are inconvenienced by the smoke smell could move also. It's not like all these people woke up one day after making a smoking rule to discover this couple had also started smoking that same day.
It's also not like they didn't know the construction was crappy and smells and sounds weren't contained when they moved in.
Man, you are a kid.
Coming on Fr and accusing people of being elitists because they like money and cars is silly.
What you forget is that we homeowners in my elite hood have all decided what we all want. We elect the board, have public meetings, argue at times but arrive at a civilized way of handling prblems. We are civilized.
I think you have class envy. Sorry about that. But you might want to see the redeeming value in working hard to have what you want and like and need in life. Nothing elitist about that.
Your "class envy" argument might carry weight if the people in HOAs were defined by having it. Wealth doesn't buy taste. Have you seen the state of the fine arts these days? HOAs are a method of hiring out taste decisions to a committee.
In SoCal, you have a hard time finding a neighborhood newer than 20 years old that DOESN"T have an HOA involved in some way, and I would hardly classify the majority of those as being bastions of anything approaching taste. With the median price being in the high $300,000s, the wealth descriptor becomes problematic, doesn't it?
When we bought, it was a choice to avoid HOAs, because of the numerous associated horror stories from people I know who had been stung by them over incredibly petty reasons. Frankly, we ended up paying more for a similar house because non-HOA houses were in short supply at the time.
Now, I'm in a place where I can operate a woodworking hobby in my garage and my neighbor can grow a truck garden. If either of us is bothered by that, we work it out. We don't trot over to some committee and try to get the other one's pursuits banned by a coalition of uninvolved people from 3 blocks down the way. I like it like that.
what i really want to know is where's she been hiding all
these years? your "honey do" list needs some attention. ;)
LOLOLOL. Yes, dear. Did you buy the FEWFC HOA gone bad approved green paint?
Then complain about the shoddy construction.
Your smoking in your yard only befouls my environment when I am sitting on my deck breathiing air that contains your smoke.
Do all the vehicles passing by befoul your environment? what about the outdoor grilling? Or is it only the miniscule amount of tobacco smoke that you can discern between the other befoulments outdoor air that befoul your environment?
You may think it is hilarious that people don't want to live with other people's smoke, but it isn't.
You totally missed my point of why I find it hilarious.
It isn't just repellent, it is downright unhealthy.
That is why I find it hilarious, because anyone making such a claim doesn't know what they are talkig about. Such a claim is the paid sound bite created by paid professional nanny statists. Claiming a smell of cigarette smoke in the outdoors is repellent is a legitimate personal opinion. Claiming such is unhealthy is bovine excrement.
About as many as for me to say go ahead if you want to. I don't care if you want to voluntarily give up some of your property rights beyond what is mandated by the law. But don't deny that is what you are doing.
I choose to live freer and less restricted, and grant my neighbors the same. Heaven knows it might come in handy to know a good mechanic some day.
do you have the approved paintbrush to begin work?
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