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Two homeowners in East Boise are preparing for a potential court battle on their front lawn, or lack of lawn. 

This spring, Ken Fox and Florian Penalva assessed the drought and the length of time needed to maintain the lawn in summer, and decided to adopt a different strategy. These two business partners also live in a Barber Valley sub-division of the East Valley Community Association HOA. They decided to tear down each of their lawns and replace them with bright green turf.

[During rapid development, some Boise wells are drying up. How is this going? ]

They were satisfied with the appearance of the new chemicals and maintenance-free codes until the HOA wrote to say that this violated the rules of subdivision. HOA is now threatening to take legal action to force them to return to traditional grassland.

When this happened, the water level of the Boise River was nearing its lowest point in history, as a lack of spring rains and weeks of record temperatures evaporated more water supply from the valley than usual. Now, irrigation may be closed one month in advance, and Suez urges customers to save water.

Fox said: "Of course, it turned out to be very hot and dry this year." "But of course, we ended up with beautiful lawns, and many or most of the lawns near us looked terrible because they were burned by the heat."

In May of this year, Penalva put forward the idea of ​​planting turf in his yard after using turf in his business and achieving great success. He asked Fox if he would like to complete the work at a lower price, and the gardener began to tear the grass to install the turf. Fox said this prompted HOA to write a letter telling the two owners to stop to obtain permission to continue the installation.

Penalva lives in this community full-time, while Fox travels back and forth between this home in Barber Valley and another home in Ketchum.

Fox and Penalva checked the branch's CC&R and saw that the only rule for lawns required it to be "full turf, no water weeds" and there was no ban on lawn lawns, so they proceeded. They inferred that the term "whole turf" does not necessarily require that the lawn is alive. It only needs to completely cover the lawn surface in front of the house with some kind of grass. HOA replied with a letter informing them that if they don't do it themselves, they have signed a contract with a local gardener to remove turf from the lawn.

A series of letters went back and forth for several weeks, until attorney Patrick Galloway received a letter on behalf of HOA. It said that unless Fox and Penalva remove their turf and replace it with natural grass, or submit their turf application to the HOA committee for review, they will be sued. According to the letter obtained by BoiseDev, they were also instructed to repay the legal fees of US$285 incurred by HOA.

Galloway told BoiseDev in an email that if owners like Fox and Penalva want to make changes, they should run for their HOA board. '

"The thing you mentioned is a very standard case," he wrote. "Most communities need live vegetation for landscaping. Our office represents hundreds of community associations. I suspect that most communities in Idaho do not allow artificial turf to be installed in the front yard."

Galloway cited HOA regulations in a letter to Fox and Penalva, requiring HOA to allow them to complete any improvements to the house, including landscaping.

This is not the first time Fox has clashed with the East Valley Community Association.

Last summer, Fox contacted HOA and started building a shed in his backyard. He said he filled out the appropriate paperwork, but the project was rejected because Fox said the shed would protrude a foot from the fence and it was too big. He reduced the design and submitted it again for negotiation with HOA next month. Fox said the shed was finally approved, but only if he planted a row of trees to block the view from the street.

He didn't build the shed, because the trees and redesign added a lot of cost to the project, so Fox abandoned it. However, he did spread the news of the encounter with his neighbors. This left a sour taste in his mouth, prompting him to install the lawn instead of applying for an improvement permit from the HOA.

"Then I wrote a letter to other homeowners describing what happened to me in this shed. They should consider the next time they elect board members, because this is how these people will try to control what you can do with you. Property," Fox said. "I sent it to all 140 or so members of the association."

Correction: The previous version of this story did not correctly identify the full-time residence of Florian Penalva. The article has been corrected to reflect that he lives in East Valley full-time.

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