maintenance of HOA forest conservation land

I am on the Board of the HOA of a 61-individual-home community in Baltimore County, Maryland. The HOA owns common areas in the community -- one plot is basically equivalent to an individual home lot that was not developed because there was the expectation that a road was going to be built there to connect our community with a new one proposed to be built behind us. We have successfully persuaded the developer of the new community to not build that road -- a major HOA victory! So now all we have to do with it at the moment is mow the lawn.

The more complicated issue relates to the HOA-owned property that is also forest conservation easement, with all the restrictions associated with that. (BTW -- many of us who purchased the "premium" wooded lots are really angry that the builder's agents never told anyone what the implications of owning forest conservation land were -- namely that you can't do anything with it, except remove invasive species and have dying/dead trees removed after getting approval from the County. Any recourse for the builder’s negligence??)

The reason for this posting is this: There is a lot of poison ivy and poison sumac in the forest conservation area. While we can legally remove that because it is considered invasive, it's a very expensive thing to do because the County restrictions limit how that removal is done in order that other species are not harmed. In addition, it would require constant maintenance to keep the poisonous stuff away. We got an estimate and we planned to do it behind one homeowner's property because his lawn abuts the forest conservation land and he is extremely allergic to the poisonous stuff -- to the point of having to go to the hospital -- and it is encroaching on his yard. And then we thought, wait! Are we opening a major "can of worms?" What if someone is allergic to ragweed, and the pollen is making them sick -- are we responsible to remove that? (My husband, an asthma sufferer can attest to the reality of this possibility.) There are only 4-5 homes that back onto the HOA owner forest conservation property, but if we do it for one person, do we then have to do it for all? Unfortunately one of those homes is owned by our one seriously difficult, complaining homeowner, so we anticipate an uproar if he were to discover that we had done it for one and not for him, even though he's never complained about poison ivy, etc.
Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks!!

Seems you need to call in some experts for how to take care of this "white elephant" you have been given. Bet there are some university or local community college contacts you could connect with that could counsel your board. (We have the DEQ in Michigan, what is your State or County's environmental department called?)

I know that some people are extremely allergic to poison ivy - even airborne. Just what the HOA's obligation to neighboring land is questionable. Pull in the experts.

I'm confused about why this is considered an owner's problem when Joan said the property in question is HOA owned. I bolded the relevant part below. I think she's asking if the HOA can do just the one property to relieve the man's allergy, or will that mean they have to do the other 3-4 properties that also abut the land.


How about explaining to the difficult complainer what the undertaking entails and because of that, the project is based on medical necessity. Have the poison ivy sufferer ask his Doctor to certify the allergy in writing, which should then be enough to cover the Board's decision to do only the one property.

Thank you all for your responses. I'm not sure I'm feeling any clearer about how to resolve this issue, though. As CaroleJ said this is only about property that is HOA-owned. We (the HOA board) feel no responsibility to pay to have anything done on land that belongs to individual homeowners, including forest conservation land that is a part of their individually owned property. We do think we have a responsibility vis a vis the HOA owned land that abuts the individually owned lots. We have already paid to have 4 dead/dying trees removed that threatened homes. We first had to have someone from the Dept of Natural Resources approve that action. So the question is, considering that the poison ivy is a threat to a homeowner, do we take-on the on-going and costly job of keeping the stuff away from homeowners' yards. It seems comparable to what would happen if someone used a poisonous chemical on their lawn that impacted their neighbor's health. I think there is legal liability there.

The only thing our covenants say about this is the following, "Any portion of the Common Areas or Lots designated and shown on any recorded subdivision plat of all or a portion of the Property as 'Forest Conservation Easement' shall remain in a natural, undisturbed state and will not be developed, or improvements erected thereupon by the Declarant...except those of a minor nature necessary for such intended use and permitted by applicable law."

I was hoping to avoid paying legal fees to get a determination on this, but it looks like that's the only way to go. I could start by asking the Department of Natural Resources I suppose, but you get different answers to everything from them, depending on who's doing the answering.

Susan -- I love your favorite saying. I just want to know which dogs do have to be answered to??

thanks again, Joan

Here's the clarification:

Unfortunately, there doesn't need to be a trail for a homeowner to come into contact with the poison ivy. (In fact there can't be a trail, either already existing or newly created, in the forest conservation area -- that's against the County rules.) The back edge of four different homeowners' lawns abut the HOA-owned forest conservation land. Poison ivy, being invasive and being a nasty vine that reaches over the edge of the lawn, makes it nearly impossible to avoid when a homeowner mows the lawn. In fact, if their dog runs along the edge of the woods -- where lots of this stuff is located -- the dog can bring it into their home and contaminate them that way. Geesh -- this is such a mess!

I plan to speak with the HOA's lawyer tomorrow -- I don't know what else to do.

I remain a skeptic that the HOA should do anything in this case. The homeowner is responsible to keep it off his own property. And if his dog is the problem, then he is responsible to keep the dog out of the woods.

If the reasoning is valid, then could I be held responsible for my Bermuda grass invading my neighbor's yard? (This is invasive here in Texas.) What if he happens to be allergic? Or could the HOA be held responsible for keeping seedling trees from sprouting on the HO's land?

Here's the gist of the conversation I had with our lawyer today:
The body of law which may govern this has to do with “premises liability” – about a property owner’s duties to trespassers and/or neighbors. There is also the Law of Neighbors & Trees (sic?) which includes the opinion that a neighbor can cut back another neighbor’s growth that is encroaching on them at the property line. At the same time, it is not the responsibility of the neighbor from whose property the encroaching is originating to cut it back. (This is such complicated legalese!)

I explained that we wanted to be able to do something to alleviate the situation for this homeowner -- he's not being difficult, he just asked for help -- but were concerned about the precedent it might set. He said that if the homeowner could claim – perhaps substantiated by a doctor’s note – that his condition constitutes a disability, then under the fair housing act he can request “reasonable accommodations.” This would allow us to do the work and address this one homeowner's needs, without requiring us to do it for everyone else whose property abuts HOA-owned forest conservation easement property.

He also said that we could propose to the homeowner that he share the cost with the HOA since we are not required to do this work.

Frankly, I'm still not sure how we should proceed. I like Kurt's idea: It couldn't hurt to request permission from the County to put a five or six foot (or even 3 foot) swath of grass between your houses and the forest, and I really appreciate what VickiL2 said about taking the issue of poison ivy seriously. I also think that the County should be assuming more responsibility about the whole thing. They're the ones who approved the building of homes with fairly small yards right up against this wooded area with all the risks they have proven to contain -- falling trees and noxious plants. Since building our subdivision the county has come to realize that these small islands of forest conservation in the midst of subdivisions don't really support the environment in the way intended: trees suddenly isolated by all the ones that used to stand with them and provide support and wind buffer combined with the impact of the construction process itself are dying and falling in droves. This has turned formerly forested areas into land parcels that are now becoming overrun with noxious plants and other invasives as the trees fall and the forest floor gets the sunlight that encourages the invasives' growth.

I'm happy to share this info but don't think it's really made anything much clearer!!

By the way, there seems to be some good information on control of poison ivy here:
http://poisonivy.aesir.com/view/control.html

Most of the people found that "brush-be-gone" was the most effective method of control.