SAFETY REMINDERS FOR RESIDENTS TO KEEP IN MIND THIS HOLIDAY SEASON

While everyone wants to enjoy the holiday season in their community, it is important to make sure everyone stays safe during this enjoyable time. Here are 4 safety reminders that will help everyone in the community stay safe.

1. Outdoor Yard Ornaments

During holidays and even birthdays, gaining in popularity are gigantic yard signs, blowup novelties, special effects, and more. With all of these comes risks. If you are going to use ornamental yard decor, ensure that it is within your property boundaries and does not go on to sidewalks, driveways, or common areas.

Glass ornaments can be attractive to young children and can break easily. Stepping or crawling on the glass is a problem, but some ornaments also contain lead, mercury, or methylene chloride, which can poison children if they touch, taste, or swallow them.

2. Disrupting Noises

Ensure your yard decor or outdoor festivities and parties are not loud and disturbing the solace of your neighbors. Don't use outdoor decor that makes noise or has flashing lights that can disturb your neighbors.

Make sure you are informed about your association’s noise rules. It’s not uncommon for homeowners to file general grievances about the level of noise they hear coming from a neighbor’s home. This might be loud music or noisy parties that go late into the night.

3. Electrical Items Outdoors.

While holiday lighting does contribute to the splendor of the season, it is crucial that outdoor light safety be of the utmost concern for the protection of you and your community.

Make sure you plug in all outdoor electrical decorations into a ground-fault circuit interrupter (GFCI). This safety outlet is designed to cut the power if electricity comes into contact with water, which is common outside. Also make sure your outdoor lights are labeled “waterproof” if you live in a wet area.

Don't run your extension cords through window or door cracks. The cord could become pinched, which can ruin the insulation around the wires and lead to a dangerous shock.

4. Parking Problems

Another problem during the holiday season are parties that result in parking problems. This problem can be exasperated because many visitors are spending the holidays with families, resulting in more parking congestion. This congestion can also endanger children in the community.

Parking problems like these can result in community disputes and complaints. This usually results in enforcing HOA parking rules, which are a set of policies that regulates where residents and guests leave their vehicles. These rules are part of the HOAs governing documents such as the CC&Rs.

These are some safety concerns to keep in mind this holiday season. Check your HOA rules to be incompliance with lighting, parking and animated decorations.