By Gretchen Wenner
One of Oxnard’s premier neighborhoods, where boats nose up to million-dollar homes and the ocean beckons just beyond the harbor, has a problem borne of its marine environment: Sea walls are getting old. The reinforced concrete walls that protect Mandalay Bay’s 743 homes were built in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They had a projected life span of roughly 40 years — time that’s about up.
A group of homeowners is advocating pre-emptive repairs that would cost a fraction of the estimated $118 million needed for total replacement. A recent evaluation found some stretches are at risk of catastrophic failure, but targeted resurfacing could keep the structures standing 25 more years or so.
The challenge is determining who pays for the repairs, expected to cost millions of dollars.
Bill Scarpino, a resident and member of the Channel Islands Waterfront Homeowners Association, thinks the city owns the sea walls and is responsible for maintenance, just as it is for a public street. He has a folder stuffed 4 inches thick with old city resolutions and court rulings that he says prove it.
Who pays for bulkhead repairs on private properties? (in a gated community with an HOA)
Unless your governing documents say that the HOA is responsible, you should assume that you are responsible for any maintenance on your own property. Ask them this question.
HOA presently is responsible however board wants to transfer responsibility back to homeowners through a change of covenants and a community vote. Do any associations assist with partial payment? This change could bankrupt a homeowner.
No, none that I know of, so I would suggest that you get a number of the homeowners together to vote this down. How ‘well off’ is your HOA financially?
My HOA charges me a bulkhead fee, a Canal Fee, and several others. I have been Paying these fees for 12 years. I sold or really transferred the property to my folks and they pay taxes etc. My 72 yr old Mom gets a notice for trial she is being sued or yet my parents. Never sent a bill, and she is freaked out. It also included 2k plus of lawyers fees and where they said they sent certified letters. This lawyer found them however the HOA did not. Also, let me include this property was built in 2005. They started collecting these dues from the beginning. Any advice? The canal fee in the state of Texas is for irrigation is what I have found used for farming. These are estate lots for fishing and retirement. I do not seeing my neighbors picking cotton outside of their Million dollar estate and putting it on their yacht to go to Galveston for trade anytime soon. LOL!
Sadly, this may be very valid. Often, the HOA gets the bill mailing address from the CAD (appraisal district) for your county. My experience is that these records are quite often not updated. If your CAD record shows an incorrect mailing address, your parents may not have gotten a bill but are still responsible for it. The certified letter thing cannot be true or your parents would remember signing for them. If the canal leads to a state maintained waterway, then the state should still be responsible for that and I would think that this MIGHT be on your tax bill.