Elliot Crane gave me the technical spine of it without ever knowing there was a fight. I requested a standard project documentation package for my own job, the kind any homeowner might want for a warranty claim, and he produced it on company letterhead. The product specification sheet naming the model, the manufacturer’s published color designation for classic white CW17, the model number, the order date, and the delivery record with the lot identifier. Then because I asked whether he could confirm material sourcing for warranty purposes, he obtained a short letter from the regional distributor. That letter stated that the panels supplied to both Ashberry Glenn addresses in that period originated from a single production lot of the manufacturer’s classic white CW17 finish. Read that again the way I read it at my kitchen table at 11 at night. One lot. One batch of material mixed in one facility, extruded in one run. The argument that my white was somehow a different white than Dana’s white was not merely weak. It was physically impossible. Not improbable. Impossible. There was no light condition, no angle of the sun, no landscaping harmony, no property-specific consideration on this earth that could make a single production lot of a single color code into two different colors. Vivien had picked the one thing to lie about that a shipping manifest could disprove.
Meanwhile, Russell kept pushing on the records quietly from inside. He did not become my advocate, and he never once suggested he thought I was right, which I respected. He simply took the position that a member’s inspection request under our own bylaws is not discretionary, and he said so in writing more than once with the management company copied. About nine days before the hearing, the management company notified me that the architectural records had been made available for member inspection at their office by appointment. I went on a Tuesday morning and I sat in a small conference room with a banker’s box and my reading glasses for two and a half hours. And there it was, 40 pages in on original letterhead in an original file. Dana Prescott’s architectural request and approval. The actual document, not a photograph sent by a neighbor. Product typed in full. Classic white CW17 typed in full. Approved box checked. Signed and dated by Vivien Caldwell as president and architectural committee chair. I photographed every page of it with the management company’s staff member standing right there, which is exactly how you want a document to enter your possession. And in the notes field at the bottom in Vivien’s own handwriting, there was a line I had not seen in Dana’s phone photo because the angle had cut it off. It read, “Color and style appropriate for community standard.” There was one more thing in that box and it was the piece I had not expected. The file contained the intake stamp for Dana’s application and it showed that the application with the product and color code on it had been received and forwarded to Vivien on a date I recognized immediately. It was two days before the second escalation notice went out on my property, which meant that when she signed the paper referring me to a formal hearing, she was already holding an application listing CW17. She did not discover the conflict later and get stuck defending herself. She knew the model and the code in writing and escalated against me anyway.
I still had the original submittal I emailed to the management office with its date stamp listing the model, the finish, the height, and a plot diagram with setback dimensions. I had the office’s acknowledgement. I had the calendar showing 30 days of silence against guidelines that require the committee to respond in writing within 30 days and provide that absent a timely response, the application is deemed approved. I had done more paperwork before touching a post hole than most people do buying a car, and every page of it had been sitting in my folder since before I owned a fence. We crossed paths in the clubhouse parking lot about a week before the hearing, and she tried one more approach. She said in a tone of weary reasonableness, “Do you really want to drag this entire community through a hearing over a fence?” I said, “No. I want to know why the rule changes depending on who’s standing behind the fence.” She did not say another word to me before the hearing.