Subscribe to RSSCouple in Dispute With Group Over Gay Pride Flag
MESA, Ariz. (AP) — Steven and Zeniff Vanderran say homophobia and ongoing disputes with their homeowners association are behind an order to remove a gay pride flag from their Queen Creek home.
“I’ve marched for gay rights since I was in my 20s — I’m 54 now, so for 30 years,” Steven Vanderran said. “I know homophobia when I see it.”
He is referring to a prohibition by the Cambria Ocotillo Home Owners Association against displaying the flag the couple began flying in 2003.
Steven Vanderran, left, and Zeniff Vanderran display a flag promoting Memorial Day and gay pride on their Queen Creek, Ariz. home on Thursday, June 4, 2009. The couple say homophobia and ongoing disputes with their homeowners association are behind an order to remove a gay pride flag from their home. (AP Photo/East Valley Tribune, Ralph Freso)
Cambria Ocotillo’s design guidelines only allow certain flags, including decorations for certain holidays, according to Jonathan Olcott, the association’s attorney. The association also allows military and U.S. flags.
“The story here is about a fellow pushing the envelope,” Olcott wrote in an e-mail. “It is a story about a poor soul who is not content unless he is in a scrape with his HOA.”
The Vanderrans, who are gay, argue that their request to fly the gay pride flag was approved in 2003 by a previous management company. They took the flag down in August 2008 after receiving a complaint from the association. They still display several holiday-themed gay pride flags.
A letter to the couple from Olcott said the association’s design guidelines permit holiday flags.
“The board interprets the term ‘holiday’ as the recognized national holidays. Those are New Year’s Day, Martin Luther King Day, Easter, Memorial Day, July 4, Veteran’s Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day,” the letter said. “A day celebrating Gay Pride is not yet a nationally recognized holiday.”
Steven Vanderran said that argument doesn’t jibe, pointing out that Easter isn’t a nationally recognized holiday either, even though the board permits Easter decor.
Olcott’s letter went on to say they could only display the rainbow (gay pride flag) “as a background for a holiday flag, as long as the holiday insignia is larger than the exposed portion of the rainbow flag.”
The couple says it has been the subject of slurs and mockery since the dispute began. In a May 11 posting on a local blog, a writer said the decorations were offensive and “If they want to flaunt their preferences in sex partners like that, they need to move into a gay community.”
Olcott said the association’s intention is only to prevent clutter and it’s not singling the couple out.
The Vanderrans counter the dispute is rooted in previous neighborhood scraps, including a legal scrum in which the couple was challenging the board’s legitimacy.
“They haven’t come out and said anything anti-gay,” said Zeniff Vanderran, who owns the home. “I know that they would deny that they are.”
Zeniff Vanderran said the board’s hassled them in other ways as well.
“We never have weeds in our yard,” he said. “They’ll still send us unwarranted letters saying that we have weeds when we don’t.”
Mark Lunt, a neighbor, said he doesn’t consider the couple’s gay pride flag clutter.
“Steve works really hard in the yard,” Lunt said. “In fact, everybody on this end of the street comes to Steve to ask for his opinion on what to plant and when. So, they keep a very nice yard. They’re nice neighbors.”
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Information from: East Valley Tribune/Scottsdale Tribune,
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
I live in a neighborhood with an HOA. When I bought into that neighborhood, I was required to sign HOA papers. In the HOA contract are guidelines regarding how my yard is to be maintained, how my house is to be painted, where my cars are to be parked, what types of fencing I can use, and how (and which) flags I can and cannot display. I bought the home knowing the guidelines. Signing the paper was the acknowledgement that I agreed to those terms.
In my neighborhood, a homeowner was required to remove the American Flag. He yelled and screamed that the HOA was “anti-American” and “anti-Military”. He held candle-light vigils in his front yard. He held anti-HOA signs at the street entrance of our neighborhood. The bottom line: the flag was mounted on a huge (and illegal) pole, and the flag itself was the width of his house. The flag was in violation of HOA papers that he himself signed when he bought the house. The pole and flag were eventually removed.
My point is this. I’ve seen the picture of Steven and Zeneff’s flag mounted above their garage. Quite frankly, as a due-paying gay neighbor, I’d want the flag removed. It’s tacky — and it clearly doesn’t meet the HOA guidelines. Until the rules are changed (thru HOA changeover or by Steve and Zeneff becoming board-members or thru the board process) then the flag should be removed, as should ANY other flag that doesn’t meet HOA guidelines.
Steven and Zeneff knew what the rules were when they bought into the neighborhood. Now they have to play by those rules — the same rules their neighbors have to abide by. The same rules that keep their neighborhood a desired location. If homophobia exists here (which is certainly a possibility) it still doesn’t change the rules.
They should sue this supposed board for discrimination.
Steven and Zeneff should find a way to display the flag in a big window from the inside of their house. Most HOAs do not control what is displayed inside, only what is on the outside facade.
This is why overly restrictive HOAs should be outright illegal. There should be a basic right to paint or decorate your house whichever way you want without exception or discussion.
Plant a flower garden, but in rainbow sequence colors.
And this is why I’d NEVER purchase a home in a condo, cooperative, or neighborhood with a legally recognized HOA.
This is clearly a case of discrimination and has already been settled in case law. An HOA cannot decide which decorations are acceptable and which are not. The Easter example (a religious holiday) is particularly telling. It’s an all or nothing situation. They cannot pick and choose.
Home Owners Associations are not always there in the beginning. When I got out of the service, I moved back to the home I grew up in and immediately began having problems with the recently created Home Owners Association because my car was parked in a way they didn’t like. I attended the next HOA meeting and finally got recognized. I stood up, held up my birth certificate and said, “How many people in this room have a birth certficate that says ______, Texas?” (The town in question is near but not in Houston) Only one other person in that room raised his hand and nobody on the HOA board did. The point is that not all homeowners agree to the onerous rules the associations try to enforce, they are often used to carry out grudges and they always devolve into power for power’s sake. The should be illegal in this country.
As a gay man and former HOA board President I’d suggest that perhaps Steven and Zeneff should sell their condo and buy a single family home in a neighborhood that’s not governed by a homeowners association. They can paint their house whatever color they like, plant anything in the yard they’d like to, put rainbow flags in their windows, park their car in the driveway if they want to, etc.
Likewise, their neighbors can let their grass die, they can park decrepit hulks of cars in their driveways (or put them on cinder blocks), they can put a Confederate (or KKK) flag in their windows and they can paint their houses in camouflage colors.
People live in communities managed by HOA’s because they LIKE the uniformity. The uniformity is what insures that the complex/neighborhood maintains its resale value. If Steven and Zeneff no longer want that uniformity, sell and move somewhere more to your liking.