Hi Lemmy, My HOA sent out a email saying dogs are no longer allowed on any grass in common areas or front yards including grass between sidewalk and curb which is… everywhere except our own tiny backyards. The reasoning is some dog urine effected dead spots. Honestly I didn’t even notice them, it’s 95° here and all the grass looks sad.
It’s a walking town and we are not a gated community, non-residents walk their dogs here all the time, so this rule can only punish those who live here and has no ability to effect others.
Anyway, this seems like a ‘we have tried nothing and we are all out of ideas!’ moment so I wanted to see if anyone here had any suggestions I can pass on to maintain a “good” curb appeal ground cover-wise while allowing dogs to do normal dog stuff.
I can converse with the HOA board in good faith, but this rule is basically banning dogs from the neighborhood - which I super did not sign up for.
Pertainent info: PA, USA - Town Home style homes - small central common grass - owned for 8y.
Edit: it seems like people may have glossed over the question part and skipped straight to HOA bashing (which is warranted at times!) so I will rephrase:
What ground covering or neighborhood solutions to similar (perceived) issues have other communities employed?
Ban HOA’s. I really don’t understand why there allowed to exist.
Can the dog owning houses replace their grass with wood chips or something?
The HOA is taking the ‘our responsibility is to keep a consistent curb-appeal’ stance so I think seemingly random houses not having grass at all may not be acceptable - though maybe that’s appropriate for the strip between the sidewalk and road.
i will never understand the US’s obsession with “consistent” housing
It’s easier once you realize it’s mainly real estate developers trying to oppress minorities by setting up a a bunch of shitty rules to be enforced by a petty wannabe-dictator named Ted
