User talk:MadelineMcG

Brooklyn Acres Mutual Homes, Inc.

Est. 1942; located mainly in Brooklyn, Ohio

Historical Setting

The US entered the Second World War immediately after the Japanese Air Force bombed the US Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on December 7, 1941. Virtually every able-bodied American man was drafted or volunteered to serve, leaving almost no men at home to make steel, build tanks, assemble bombs as so on. To fill this urgent need, the US actively recruited women to come to the big Rust Belt cities like Cleveland and become factory workers AKA "Rosies the Riveters".

In order to house these women and their families, the Cuyahoga County Housing Authority built a barracks-style housing style complex, located (mostly) in the City of Brooklyn, Ohio. This housing complex later came to be known as Brooklyn Acres Mutual Homes Inc.

Origins Of BAMH

After the war, in recognition of their service and patriotism, the CCHA gave the land and all the structures on it to the Rosies and their families, styling the new property ownership as a co-op. The land, 600 units of housing and some common buildings were given to the woman, and each took a 1/600th interest in every inch of land and in every dwelling. There was a mortgage on the property and to meet it, the owners each paid a monthly fee until it that mortgage was satisfied in 1976.

The women who worked in Cleveland factories during World War Two, if any still survive, would be over 110 years old today. As the original owners died off, the co-op treated the homes as reverted back to the co-op and redistributed them to new owners, based on the new owners' family relationship with a Rosie, and if that did not provide enough occupancy, then to anyone with the character and financial means to become an owner the others would likely find to be a good neighbor. This determination -- as to who would be a suitable new owner -- was made exclusively by the various elected boards, without due process rights allowed to the applicants. This process is thought to have led to a regrettable lack of racial diversity among BAMH owners today.

Between 1946 and the present time, turnover continued to cause title (AKA exclusive right to occupy for life) of all 600 homes to be returned to the co-op for redistribution by the various elected boards. These “unowned homes” were redistributed as any elected board saw fit, without allowing applicants any due process or right to judicial review. Today, it is estimated that approximately 200 of the 600 homes in BAMH are owned and occupied by the direct descendants of the original Rosies. This total is expected to continue to fall in years to come.

Present Ownership Form

Under the present ownership scheme, owners of Brooklyn Acres Mutual Homes Inc. take an undivided 1/600th interest in every home, common building and every inch of land, but at the same time, they also take an undivided, exclusive right to occupy and possess their individual home. After the original mortgage was retired in 1976, the then-owners chose to continue the monthly fee so that funds could be developed for such things as grass cutting, snow removal and roof replacement. That monthly fee continues to this day and is generally regarded as equal to approximately ½ the fair market rental value of each home per month.

Description of BAMH Homes

BAMH are constructed of concrete block. Most BAMH homes have shared walls, and are either 4-plexes or duplexes, although a few free-standing units are also on the property. A lengthy and rather contradictory set of bylaws explains when a repair will be made by the association and when it will be the duty of the owner, and an elected board has a very lengthy history of past decisions regarding such matters as broken windows to turn to when making a decision. However, the owners themselves have no access to these past decisions and no right to judicial review of any denied variance request.

BAMH owners are encouraged to buy "renter's insurance", but as they are owners and not tenants, this is not the proper legal form of insurance and some companies will not sell to a BAMH owner. These insurance companies want to sell condo unit owner's insurance to BAMH owners, but as BAMH is still a co-op, this is not possible.

A typical co-p is a high-rise building, and the owners of every unit have a legitimate need to dictate the construction and maintenance of all such units for their mutual protection. The co-op ownership form is usual outside NYC and only 6 such properties are believed to exist in Ohio. Of these, only BAMH is a large plot of land with hundreds of detached and semi-detached one and two-story homes sited on it. It is believed that all the other Ohio co-ops in existence are high-rises.

BAMH Board-Controlled Improvements And The Resulting Problems

The city of Brooklyn, Ohio, where most of BAMH is located, and the city of Cleveland, Ohio where the remainder is located, both have housing codes which apply to all residential homes in their jurisdictions. In some cases, a home continuously occupied by the same owner must be improved to remain complaint; in every case, a home that is sold or rented must be made compliant with then-current housing codes. The code covers such things as electrical wiring, porch raiings, stair design and so on. Home improvements often must be done subject to permits and inspections by building code enforcement officers.

Because the form of ownership used in the original grant of the BAMH property to the factory workers in 1946 was a co-op, no deed of transfer has ever been recorded on any individual BAMH home. Thus, at every point in time across several decades, the owners of BAMH homes have been completely unaware of what current housing code requirements were, when a permit must be pulled, and so on. While the various elected boards of BAMH over the decades have improved the homes, there remains a tremendous gap between the requirements of the current housing codes and the condition of virtually every BAMH home.

This problem has been significantly exasperated by the refusal of various elected boards to approve changes sought by the owners which were actually improvements required by the housing code. Fire safety, electrical safety, stairs, sound-proofing, and so on have all fallen far below legal housing code standards, but the owners have accumulated many millions of dollars in various trust funds, and these common BAMH-owned cash resources appear to be more than adequate to bring the all the homes into full compliance with the housing codes, without additional expense to the owners. If this is done, thereafter BAMH owners would need pay only a very modest monthly fee to fund such things as grass cutting and snow removal on common land. The exteriors of the homes have never changed much in appearance, as the various boards over the years seem to have valued the "look" of the original military-style barracks. Consequently, the current owners urgently need curb appeal and land management, as well as accommodations for the safety of both the able-bodied and disabled, housing code violation abatement, removal/improvement of dangerous concrete steps, street lighting appropriate for a residential neighborhood, underground electrical and phone lines, and so on.

Existing Form of Ownership And Its Challenges

BAMH owners hold the exclusive right to reside in their homes for life. They must surrender that right, if they choose (or are forced) to move, and at this time, they cannot transfer it, sell it or leave it to anyone in their will. Currently, titles to all BAMH homes revert to the association at large upon vacancy, to be redistributed to new owners by the elected board at its sole discretion. This deprivation of full property rights and title, together with the intense scrutiny owners are subjected to with respect to such things as installing a flagpole, have made the process of modifying these excellent, concrete-built homes for the purpose of aging in place very challenging, and may be replaced with a more traditional condominium-style ownership form in the near future. Denial of the right to make necessary modifications required to render a home safe for a disabled person often forces that owner to leave before their death, and appears to constitute an extreme and inexcusable deprivation of that owner’s property rights without just cause, due process or fair compensation.

Possible Future Ownership Form

To address these and other concerns, it is expected the courts will place BAMH owners on condominium style titles in the foreseeable future. In such an arrangement, each condominium unit owner would hold the title to his unit and its appertinent land, while also holding a 1/600 share title in all the common buildings and common BAMH land. Thus, a condo board would control only the use of common buildings and land and the owners, collectively, would create a set of bylaws as to the permissible and impermissible behavior of unit owners and their tenants or visitors.

BAMH owners would be free to (and responsible for) bringing their homes up to current housing safety codes, and could modify the homes, inside and out, as they saw fit. Existing BAMH trust funds, running to several million dollars, are thought to be more than sufficient for the one-time improvement of all BAMH homes needed under current housing codes. Thereafter, individual homeowners would have that obligation to remain compliant, just as all homeowners have.

BAMH owners would be free to dispose of their units just as any other condominium unit owners in the US may do, by sale, rental, inheritance or as security for a loan, to leave their homes temporarily vacant and unoccupied as they wish, and so on.

BAMH Offices

Brooklyn Acres Mutual Homes Inc. maintains an office at 6301 Woburn Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44144 and the office staff may be reached at (216) 351-4300 during regular business hours.

MadelineMcG (talk) 02:52, 27 September 2014 (UTC)MMG