An HOA's Abysmal Neglect of the Community Center

Dear Reader: The conversation below is in three parts. The first two parts are excerpts: (1) I’m trying to alert the HOA board members and property manager about maintenance needed on our Community Center; and (2) the property manager replies to the query. Then in part (3), I respond to the property manager’s reply. --SL

*** UPDATE - After another personal appeal to the HOA president, the muck was finally removed from the gutter in November 2021.

** PART 1 ****************************

October 20, 2021. [To Steve Drake, President of the Quail Valley HOA]

Hi Steve D,

Here are a few maintenance items that I believe need the board's urgent attention. …

COMMUNITY CENTER ROOF ROT. At the Community Center, the facia board is rotting at the point where muck in the gutter collects. Weeds grow up there, in the muck. I first alerted the board to this problem on August 16. …

Thanks for your attention to these matters.

Sincerely, Steve Lapham

** PART 2 ****************************

October 21, 2021

Dear Mr. Lapham,

The clubhouse roof was last checked on September 2, 2021 and there is no roof rot. The fascia boards are beginning to rot due to age and because they are made of wood, and replacement of these boards is normal maintenance that usually occurs in conjunction with painting that is done every 3-5 years. The gutters are cleaned every November once most of the leaves have already dropped.

Sincerely, Ruchita Patel, Agent for Quail Valley

** PART 3 ****************************

October 28, 2021. cc: Steve Drake; Quail Valley Friendly Team [of concerned residents]; others.

Dear Ms. Patel,

I was glad to receive your quick reply, but dismayed to read it. What I relate (below) about gutters is elementary home maintenance. We, the residents, pay about $600,000 per year in HOA dues. We are receiving substandard service.

First, weeds growing out of a gutter is a sign of poor maintenance on any structure. It is an eyesore. It makes the neighborhood look bad. It looks slovenly. It is not what the residents want.

Second, when tall trees are present, they will be dropping leaves and seeds, and gutters must be cleaned at least twice a year, not just in November. Usually, gutters are cleaned at least …

* In the spring after the oaks and silver maples have shed their pollen sacks and winged seeds (respectively). In the northeast, spring cleaning of gutters is routine. See the first six seconds of this video by Mike Holmes, author of Holmes Inspection.

* In late autumn after the leaves have fallen from deciduous trees, and Norway maples have shed their winged seeds, oaks their acorns, etc.

The photos above show that a facia on our Community Center is rotting primarily because it is always damp at this particular spot. The rot is accelerating. Compare the split surface seen in photo 1 (taken in August) with the widening crack in photo 2 (taken two months later). The HOA has not performed proper maintenance to remove decaying plant material from the gutter and downspout, so the adjacent wood is wet, and it rots, month after month.

Third, when muck has collected in any gutter to the point where plants are growing in it, then the muck must be cleaned out immediately. It is an acute problem, like a toothache, and mitigation should not be delayed until the next scheduled cleaning. Here is an analogy: My car requires an oil change every 12 months. But if I see oil leaking onto the pavement under the car, I take it to the repair shop right away. I do not wait until the next scheduled oil change to take remedial action. Something is wrong, and the damage is ongoing.

Fourth, the location of the weeds, growing right over the downspout, is a sign that the whole downspout is probably clogged with rotting plant material that is turning into soil. It’s also a sign that thorough inspection and maintenance have not been done for quite a while. When we had this problem at our church a few years ago, we had to pull off the whole downspout and discard it. It was corroded and full of damp, rotting leaves. Water couldn’t get through it. We had to replace it with a new downspout. We hosed out all of the downspouts, and placed springy wire catches at their tops to keep out debris. Let’s be sure those wire catches are used in these gutters too, at Quail Valley.

Fifth, problems multiply when this important maintenance is not done. For example, when it rains, the muck clogs the gutter. Then water backs up and dampens elements of the roof at numerous spots all along the flashings and gutter—not only the fascia. The photos above, taken 2 months apart, show the abnormal, accelerating deterioration of the fascia. It’s obvious. But there may also be damage happening at other locations, damage that is not visible from the outside. That would be bad news. I wonder if an inspector has actually gone into the crawl space with a flashlight to look.

Sixth, the number of cleanings per year should be stepped up until this problem does not recur at all in future years. Maybe three or four cleanings per year are needed.

In sum, if weeds and small tree seedlings are growing out of a gutter, the alarmed homeowner (or alarmed building maintenance staff) should take immediate action. They should clean out the gutter and revise their maintenance schedule to prevent the problem from recurring. I hope you will now administer that preventative maintenance for our Community Center here in Quail Valley, and inform all the residents, perhaps in the Quill newsletter, that this work has been done, and the maintenance schedule stepped up for future years.

More broadly, this is an opportunity to educate residents, including board members, about a widespread maintenance problem in our community—debris collecting in gutters. Perhaps 20 houses in Quail Valley are showing the same problem—in the gutters front and/or back. Many people simply are not aware of their responsibility to look up and recognize the problem.

Please, let’s not have the HOA now send out violation notices that threaten to fine 20 homeowners. Let’s try education and conversation. I’ve spoken with four homeowners about this problem, and none said that they were aware of the weeds growing in their gutters. None said that they were alerted or educated by the HOA’s inspector about it.

Sure, there are a lot of first-time homeowners in our community. Is that an opportunity for the HOA to punish, or to educate? I think our QV HOA could be doing a much better job at educating the homeowners. That’s one reason I write these essays. In addition, the HOA could be setting a good example by properly maintaining commonly owned assets such as the Community Center.

Sincerely,

Steven Sellers Lapham

** **************************** **

Steven Sellers Lapham is a 21-year resident of Quail Valley. A retired editor, he can be reached at MuskratMusic@gmail.com. The "Living on Cuckoo Court" collection of essays is on Patch.com. Read about the nationwide problem of "HOA corruption, dysfunction, and abuse" at Independent American Communities.