Opinion ID: 2585492
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Lakeland Line of Cases

Text: The court of appeals adopted the line of cases following Lakeland Property Owners Association v. Larson, 121 Ill.App.3d 805, 77 Ill.Dec. 68, 459 N.E.2d 1164 (1984). That case involved a situation nearly identical to the present one, in which a majority of lot owners voted to add a new covenant creating mandatory assessments and vesting the homeowner association with the power to impose liens for non-payment. Interpreting very similar covenant modification language (allowing a majority of the property owners to change the said covenants in whole or in part, id. at 1167), the court disallowed the adoption of the new covenant. It held that [t]he provision ... clearly directs itself to changes of existing covenants, not the adding of new covenants which have no relation to existing ones. Id. at 1169. The Lakeland reasoning has been adopted by other states. In Caughlin Ranch Homeowners Association v. Caughlin Club, 109 Nev. 264, 849 P.2d 310 (1993), a subdivision's original covenants imposed assessments only on residential parcels, although the modification clause provided for amendment of the rates. A year after the covenants were filed, a commercial club was developed and began operations on the property. Some six years later, after control of the homeowners association had passed from the developer to the lot owners, the homeowners association amended the covenants to levy assessments against the commercial parcel. Basing its reasoning on Lakeland, the Nevada Supreme Court disallowed the amendment, holding that the covenant modification clause allowing amendments referred only to amendments of existing covenants as opposed to the creation of new covenants unrelated to the original covenants. Id. at 312. In Boyles v. Hausmann, 246 Neb. 181, 517 N.W.2d 610, 613 (1994), the modification clause allowed the majority of the homeowners to change [the covenants] in whole or in part. The plaintiffs' lot was allegedly rendered unbuildable when the requisite majority of the homeowners association amended an existing covenant to increase the setback requirements. The Boyles court disallowed the additional covenant because, even though the restriction was appended onto an existing covenant, it was new and different. Id. at 616. Finally, in Meresse v. Stelma, 100 Wash. App. 857, 999 P.2d 1267 (2000), the covenants for a six-lot subdivision allowed a majority of the lot owners to change or alter them [the covenants] in full or in part. Id. at 1269. Five of the lot owners voted to alter the covenants to increase the access road easement, thereby stripping the sixth lot owner of a portion of his property. The court disallowed the amendment, holding that the amendatory language of the covenants does not place a purchaser or owner on notice that he or she might be burdened, without assent, by road relocation at the majority's whim. Id. at 1273-74.