I finally quit my HOA board

After five years, I finally quit my HOA board. It was time. It was a thankless "job" and the board had changed in ways that I wasn't crazy about.

When I first jumped in, it was to see through the orderly transition from the developer, and the likely lawsuit to sue the developer for the way they left the association. That's far enough along now that it's on autopilot. The other "young" guy on the board moved out of the neighborhood some time ago, leaving me to fend for myself against what I perceived to be not ideal stuff. And I consider myself young because, relative to the other members, I am. That's where it's at.

But also, after all of this time, we've only had one actual election with a quorum, so with me leaving, there's only one member actually elected. That doesn't feel right to me, and some members of the board were fine with that. I had to push just to get them to solicit applications for the person we would appoint last time. I'm not OK with that. I think it's time for some turnover, though I'm not sure if the members are motivated enough to actually get involved.

On a personal level, it's just another step in evaluating what I want to spend my remaining keystrokes on. This was not something in that category. I felt like I was always a dissenter, I wasn't taken seriously, and our president even emailed the association attorney once indicating that the board "didn't care what I think," then cc'd me on her reply. (Calling him out, he never responded.) Even five years ago, I would have raged and tried my best to assert my position, but now, I don't care. There's no value in chasing that.

Unfortunately, the thing I most take away from it is that people just don't give a shit. Civic engagement in this country is a joke. People bitch and moan, but they don't get involved, which is the reason for the lack of quorum. It's not hard to extrapolate that to the national scene, where apparently people are willing to elect and old man who is by every definition a fascist and a criminal. I mean, there are residents here who still think that the city on their address is the political subdivision that we live in, even though we're unincorporated. It's like they don't pay attention enough to see that they don't vote for people in that city or pay taxes to it. I'm not pointing that out to feel smarter or superior, I just think that's basic civics.

So that's it. I can say that I did it. I know how the sausage is made, and I can move on. There are a million better ways to direct my energy.