Shades of Gray

By Bess Keller

Ormond Beach, Fla.

Changing Face Above all, the three sixtysomething men want you to know they don't deserve the bum rap they feel they've gotten from the local newspaper and, as far as they can tell, from the citizens of Volusia County, Fla.

Dressed in shorts and casual shirts, they are sitting around a table in the pastel clubhouse room where two of them gambled a few dollars on pinochle the night before. They are board members of the Aberdeen Homeowners' Association, and they are protesting the idea that their personal selfishness was at the root of a Florida Supreme Court decision that has made them feel a little like outcasts.

The high court decided last May that Aberdeen, a retirement development that rose five years ago like a shimmering mirage from the pine woods, is not subject to what are called school impact fees. The court reasoned that the community has no appreciable impact on the local schools because it bars minors, and thus should be exempt from fees designed to help schools pay for the additional classroom space that...