@Jugulator20 That’s assuming that a majority of the other board members believe that another vote is necessary . OP has not established that the cameras truly are a problem at this point . The benefits of the cameras in the community may far outweigh her discomfort with them. There’s a lot of variables at play . I would be hard pressed to remove them if homeowners funds were used to purchase them. I’m fairly certain they were not inexpensive . The board also has to make sure that it does not appear that the cameras were removed because a new board member wanted them removed . I’d caution OP not to join the board if only to address issues that make her uncomfortable . That doesn’t help her or the community .
I don’t think someone is crazy for complaining about seedlings that may someday grow into trees that will block their view. If they can be shown to be dwarf species, fine. But I have looked at houses that used to have an ocean view until the intervening neighbor decided to plant something that grew high enough to block them, or chose to let shrubbery go untrimmed with the same effect. Big difference in the enjoyment of the homeowner and the value of the property.
I asked for last year’s minutes. Other neighbors think the camera feed goes to this guy’s house, but they don’t know for sure. I’m not trying to be a bitch here, but it’s my property, not theirs being watched by the president who I find to be an a $$hole and perhaps a tad on the power trip side.
I totally get being on the board is a thankless job.
Being verbally abusive to his wife and shooting animals is enough for me to form an opinion about him. I really am not interested in giving him the benefit of the doubt. I am perfectly content having no interaction with him on a neighborly or personal level.
But he better be able to share that feed and explain the pricing and details about the monitoring. Who knows, I may agree with it.
One of my neighbors and I share a wall between our driveways. They are very nice and we get along well. There is already a huge pecan tree whose roots are pushing up against the wall and causing some cracking, thought our contractor says there is no rist of collapse or anything. The neighbor planted a japanese maple VERY close to the wall on what really is our property (its on the other side of the wall but its our land). I politely asked her to move it, as clearly when it grows, not only would it drop stuff on our driveway, but the roots will definitely impinge on the wall. H She was fine with moving it, but her first response was that it probably wouldn’t cause problems to the wall for 10 years. Well, I don’t want ANY problem with the wall. And we’ve been fine with her planting small things on that land that is up by the top of the wall, but this was not ok and she was fine with moving it. Wish she’d have asked before she planted it and we could have avoided her having to move it.
@eyemamom You also want to check to see if it is against the law for him to videotape the exterior of someone’s property. In some areas it is only against the law to audiotape someone without their consent. I’m not saying it’s right to be able to do that , I’m just saying that it may not be illegal. I’m assuming the local police department could tell you if there is a law against it.
@Consolation - let me clarify. The seedlings were a small variety, not on or near the property line (10-15 feet in), and the sightline from the neighbor’s house over and beyond them was to a road. A somewhat busy road. Sunset is sort of in that direction, but the neighbor could see that better by trimming their own trees, of which they had a small forest. But I’ll end there because there were many other stories involving these people and they are really not necessary to hear except that the DRB/HOA rules helped to enable them.
Jym, Japanese maples are very slow growing, and their roots are not invasive or large. I have a few that I personally planted next to the house and walkway for that specific reason. Regular maples… ugh.
Regular maples have very shallow roots and that can cause trouble.
Not ok with any tree being planted less than a foot from the wall. specially in our property. Just, no. Plants, small shrubs, flowers, fine. Trees. No.
@jym626 I consider it to be very poor judgement of your neighbors to plant something permanent on what they knew was your land, nice or not, their side of the wall or not…
@greenwitch, I understand. 
But there are situations involving plantings that are legit.
@jym626 my MIL delighted in planting the messiest trees/shrubs/vines/what have you right up against her property line, just to drive her neighbor crazy.
Her neighbor, in turn, delighted in constantly poisoning those plants and/or lopping them back the minute the plant crossed into their yard (air rights).
It made for some weird looking boundaries between their otherwise normal suburban yard for decades.
In my neighborhood I had to remove two trees that were oversized for the yard (thuja giant in a 10 foot deep front yard!). I had to pay 100 dollars for an “ask fee” and wait 60 days for them to approve it, and I can only plant an emerald arbovitae there to replace it, according to them. Thanks, HOA. Like I’m a dummy who can’t figure out what to plant in my own front yard (as the original builder evidently was).
Then they sent me a nasty note telling me to hurry up and plant the replacement. I sent them a letter from my attorney noting that their bylaws give me 9 months to replant. Nine months it shall be.
Next house will have no HOA. Probably because it’ll be a boat. And we will be pirates.
If that camera was pointed at my house it’d mysteriously meet with an accident. Repeatedly.
What drives me crazy are vines. If you’re going to plant vines against your fence, don’t be lazy and expect your neighbor to trim the tops so they don’t strangle her camellias which aren’t even against the fence! Some of these vines remind me of the maze in the Harry Potter movie and should have scary eyebrows painted on them. They always invite their weedy cousins to the party too.
We are the second owners of our home, so we inherited the strange arrangement of our land being on both sides of this funny shaped wall (it was designed that way to save a large tree between the 2 homes) . Try to visualize that the neighbors house is on a hill, so while our driveway is only a very slight incline, theirs goes uphill, and our land that runs along the side of their driveway up along the wall goes uphill too.The flat part of their driveway by their garages is at the top of the the wall (from our perspective). We also inherited the sprinkler system that runs along the far side of the wall.
Anyway, our sprinkler system is in the part of our property on the side of the wall by their driveway. There are shrubs there and if she wants to plant in there, I dont care-- I cant really see much of it anyway. SHe used to have her lawn guy trim the bushes down near our mailboxes, but she does her own lawn now and doesn trim those things (would be a bit of a job). Anyway. We capped off a few of the sprinkler heads that were doing not a lot of good in the shrubs at the top of the wall. One day my neighbor was doing some gardening in that area and pulled at something that she didnt know what it was. Well, it was the capped sprinkler and she got absolutely drenched and had to come over to get us to turn of the water. We could have asked her to pay to repair that (it had to be done) but we didnt. We just took care of it when we had the sprinkler system tuned up. Seeing her absolutely soaked and covered in water and mud was amusement enough