The CAI (not CIA)

So who is the CAI? It is the Community Associations Institute.. a very powerful but behind the scenes, quiet organization that we all pay for. If you live in an HOA controlled community there is a great chance that part of your HOA tax (dues) goes to this organization. The published purpose of the CAI is to teach HOAs how to function and to teach the HOA board members how to conduct HOA business.
The real purpose of the CAI (besides collect a lot of money to pay its directors) is to lobby local, state and federal governments for or against legislation that might effect HOA power over property owners (which really means spread around our HOA tax money to those politicians that will help the HOA agenda the most). Another purpose is to teach the HOA officers how to maintain control of the property owners. It's really not much different than a dictator training camp. Read about it for yourself at www.CAIonline.org
According to CAI statistics, the number of private governments, or what they call community organizations, has increased from 500 in 1965 to over 205,000 today. There are 42 million Americans living in community association controlled developments. 50% of all new development in metropolitan areas is controlled by community associations. There are 6000 to 8000 new associations created each year... I'll repeat that one... 6000 to 8000 new private governments every year.
So, what does this all mean? Private governments with no system of checks and balances, small bands of renegade dictators control more and more American lives. They make the law, enforce the law, interpret the law and decide the punishment. They answer to no one.
If you have been house hunting any time in the recent past and were looking for a home less than 10 years old, the chances of finding one not controlled by a private government is slim, particularly in southern Middle Tennessee. To live anywhere near the area you wish, you don't have much of a choice whether or not to choose one of these dictatorial neighborhoods and you certainly don't have a choice whether or not to comply with their law. Most often you don't know what your getting in to until it's too late. The guy selling you the house certainly isn't going to tell you that he was fined 5 times in the last year for leaving his trash can out 2 hours too long or had to tear down his new deck because he didn't to ask permission to build it.
More and more of us are giving up our constitutional rights every day. Sure... maybe your HOA is run by reasonable people but you have no way of knowing who will be in power next year or the year after. If it is that guy on the next block that has a Hitler complex (you know the person I mean)... your life could be turned into a living hell and then there is nothing you can do about it.