Dogwood Valley court date nears

A civil case involving residents of Dogwood Valley and the Dogwood Valley Citizens Association (DVCA) is scheduled to be heard in Charlottesville's United States District Court beginning Tuesday, June 24.
The case -- Joseph Mitchell Miller et al, vs. Dogwood Valley Citizens Association, Inc., et al. - contends that the DVCA, its officers, and members of its board of directors "constitute an enterprise with a pattern of racketeering," based on court records.
Stanardsville Mayor Gary Lowe is president of the DVCA. Joseph Mitchell "Mitch" Miller is a resident of Dogwood Valley.
Neither Lowe nor Miller returned calls to the Greene County Record this week.
The action is pursuant to the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, a federal law which was created to fight organized crime. Now, it is often used for the settlement of civil claims by people injured in their business or property by reason of a RICO violation.
Dogwood Valley is a rustic subdivision of 320 lots located in the mountains above the South River in Stanardsville. Legal issues surrounding Dogwood Valley began to receive press coverage roughly four years ago.
On March 24, 2004 the Record's then-managing editor, David Hendrick, reported that a dispute between Dogwood Valley landowner William Winkelman and the DVCA had found its way in January to the Supreme Court of Virginia, "where … a resounding and surprising defeat to Association" was delivered.
According to Hendrick's report, Winkelman was an absentee -- but long-time -- owner of two lots in Dogwood Valley who had been surprised when he learned that his lots had been auctioned off by the DVCA for his failure to pay a $35 special assessment.
Winkelman, Hendrick reported, claimed to have received no notice of a special assessment, much less word that his land was about to be auctioned.
Lowe, who was serving on the DVCA Board of Directors when the case reached the Supreme Court, had reportedly purchased one of Winkelman's lots - a 2.5-acre parcel then assessed for $5,300 - at auction for $1,000.
That sale, Hendrick reported, was Lowe's first connection to Dogwood Valley. However, Lowe also told Hendricks that the DVCA had begun to take aggressive steps to curtail lax payments of special assessments to Dogwood Valley landowners in the mid-1990s, and that Winkelman had been given "plenty of due notice."
Under the powers granted by the Property Owners' Association Act, a measure passed by the Virginia General Assembly in 1989, the DVCA board began to use foreclosure and auction of delinquent properties to encourage assessment payments.
But in January of 2004, the Supreme Court found nothing requiring DVCA to maintain roads or common areas. Moreover, it found that DVCA "is not a property owners' association within the meaning of the Property Owners' Association Act."
The decision overturned the ruling of Greene County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Bouton, who had ruled that the DVCA did have the authority to issue assessments and conduct non-judicial foreclosures.
But that did not stop the assessments, or lawsuits.
DVCA requested that the Supreme Court rehear the case and began the process of investigating its options on the federal level. DVCA attorney George Dygert filed "curative action" documents in the Greene County courthouse, and Miller et al went to the press.
In October 2005 Miller told a reporter for The Hook, Lisa Provence, that since he bought property in Dogwood Valley around 1998, DVCA had instigated 35 legal actions against him and his family members that had cost him more than $100,000.
Miller filed lawsuits, too. The month before Provence's article was published, he filed a $150,000 libel action against Lowe.
And, three more Dogwood Valley residents -- Doug Dye, Jay Hatcher, and Grant Colby-- filed suit against DVCA, claiming the group has no right to charge for special assessments after the Supreme Court ruling in the Winkelman case.
DVCA attorney George Dygert of Charlottesville also filed a libel suit in his own behalf.
On April 7, 2006 Colby, Dye and Miller - each seeking $1 million -- filed the RICO suit against the DVCA and five of its board members. They alleged that DVCA was continuing to place liens on properties and file frivolous lawsuits against those who complain, typically non-suiting shortly before the trial date.
In October 2006, Greene's General District Court responded to Dygert's "curative action."
It ruled that DVCA is not a "Property Owners Association" and therefore had no right to "assess special assessments, charge interest … charge penalties, attorneys fees, docketing fees, or any other charge other than the regular assessments set forth in Deeds of Dedication."
In November 2006 Federal Judge Norman K. Moon denied DVCA's request to dismiss the RICO claim.
In January of this year, the Supreme Court found that Greene's Circuit Court had not erred when it determined in 2006 that DVCA did not qualify as a property owners' association.
A bench trial is set for June 24-27, 2008, beginning at 9:30 a.m. each day in the United States District Court, Charlottesville.
Maryland lawyer Joe D'Erasmo is representing the plaintiffs. He did not return calls to the Record for this article.
Though Lowe also did not return the Record's calls for this article, he was asked at the Monday, June 10 meeting of the Stanardsville Town Council if he felt the legal issues with the Association would affect his ability to serve as mayor.
"No," he said at the time. "It has not affected any previous serving of my civic duties, and I don't anticipate it affecting any in the future," Lowe explained.
He was appointed mayor of Stanardsville this spring, following the death of Jerry Bortner on March 21 of this year.
Lowe is also the current chair of the Greene County Republican Committee and is on the Board of Directors for Stanardsville Area Revitalization (*STAR), where he chairs the design and implementation committee.