Homeowners associations are now starting to pick sides in the county’s hospital wars.

On Sept. 9, the Broadlands Homeowners Association Board of Directors voted to support officially HCA’s special exception application to build the Broadlands Regional Medical Center adjacent to the neighborhood.

Two Broadlands residents, however, were displeased with this show of support, and now, they are suing their own HOA.

Broadlands resident Bruce Biggs and his wife, Christine, who have been vocal opponents of BRMC, filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the Broadlands HOA in Loudoun County Circuit Court, claiming that the association’s recent vote of hospital support is invalid.

“The board didn’t have a voting majority,” said the Biggs’ attorney Lawrence J. McClafferty, also a Broadlands resident.

When the vote came up in September, five of the developer-appointed Van Metre board members abstained, stating a conflict of interest because Van Metre had sold the property in question to HCA. All four resident members (not appointed by Van Metre) at the meeting voted in favor of the resolution.

The Biggs’ suit claims that Staci Kapinos, one of the board’s resident members, was ineligible to vote, because she had sold her Broadlands home in June. Kapinos and her husband currently have a contract on a resale Broadlands house and are temporarily living in an apartment in the neighborhood until settlement, according to a discussion I had with Kapinos by phone today.

“My neighbor signed over her voting privileges to me before we sold our home, so I am acting as an agent of that owner,” Kapinos said. “This allows me to remain on the board.”

Kapinos’ eligibility aside, the Biggs are more upset, their lawyer said, that the HOA board “brought their personal preferences into the boardroom.”

“They were not speaking on behalf of all - or even most - of Broadlands residents,” McClafferty added. “They were speaking for themselves.”

On a related note, Inova Health System representatives Chris West and David Goldberg have been making presentations at Loudoun homeowner’s association meetings over the last few weeks, urging neighborhoods to support the county’s Health Care Facilities Plan. This plan, enacted in March 2005, advised that the Rt. 50 corridor should be given consideration for the next full-service hospital.

“No one opposes a second hospital in Loudoun,” Goldberg said today. “But it must be at the right location and accessible to the broader community — those in the southern and western parts of the county.”

Brambleton’s Board of Directors is leaning toward officially supporting the county’s comprehensive plan, said Rick Stone, the neighborhood’s general manager, but no action has been taken yet. That’s all Stone would say. I did put in a request with him to talk with the HOA president for more details, but I have yet to hear back from her.

Jeff Morse, South Riding’s HOA president, said his board will send its second letter in support of the Health Care Facilities Plan to the Board of Supervisors tomorrow. The community wants the county’s second hospital to be located closer to the Dulles South area, rather than in Broadlands, the site of the HCA proposed hospital.

Do you think HOAs should make official statements on these matters? Or do such statements reflect personal opinions that are best left to individual residents? Chime in below.

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Sept. 30, 2008 - Hospital Propaganda: Sick of It Yet?
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