I think this is a wonderful story. Our subdivision covenants also do not allow boats (as well as trailers, RVs, Commercial Vehicles, etc…) to be visible and must be behind a fence…
I am going to show this story to my neighbor who has to “hide” his boat…
This neighbor is an electrician and that is his Van with advertisements on the side and he had to build this “hidey hole” to fool the “Nazi Lookie Loos” who patrol the neighborhood looking for violators…
I agree that he should have to keep it behind the fence. A commercial vehicle should not be parked night after night in a residential area.
I agree and this is how my neighbor handled it by extending his driveway back so the advertisments were obcured by the side fence and they are not visible from the street. I’m not sure ,but I seem to remembr his previous van had his phone number on the front and he had that painted over…
Thank goodness I don’t live in a neighborhood with an HOA. I am an HVAC technician, and I most certainly need my work truck–which is a marked commercial vehicle–to be able to run after-hours service calls.
It is preposterous for a neighborhood association to discriminate against plumbers, electricians, HVAC technicians, and other essential workers who need their work truck to be parked in front of their home in order to do their job. It is even more preposterous that it is unacceptable to park a marked commercial vehicle which says “XYZ Plumbing” or “XYZ Electrical Services” or “XYZ Heating and Air Conditioning” but somehow it is ok to park a vehicle which says “Police” or “Sheriff” on it.
There is much to be said about what you have written, but I when I lived in Tucson in the mid '90s, I was in a really strict HOA managed subdivision and we had a parking “Nazi” that marched around the subdivision with a plum bob on a string and the rules included you could not park your vehicles in such a way as to block the sidewalk.
If your bumper hung over the sidewalk, he would place the plum bob string again the offending bumper and lower the plum bob and if it landed on the sidewalk, you got a $25 fine for the second and ever time after for "blocking the sidewalk.
Now, to continue on the thought of a commercial vehicle, one of my neighbors was a commercial trucker with a big, really big, sleeper cab Kenworth Truck, to hide the door registrations and company information, etc… he had magnetic “signs” with no lettering in matching paint color to cover all the letters and members… And to the untrained eye, it looked just like a biggo family truck.
Like me, he had a three-car garage and he parked his truck across the three parking spaces in front of his garage.
He claimed it was his personal vehicle… After that, the HOA rules were rewritten to specify a 10,000 pound limit on personal vehicles… and the HOA tried to force him to stop and took him to court, but the court said although the rule could stand, but since it was specifically written to prevent him from doing what was permitted to do when he moved in, he as exempt for as long as he owned that truck.
Luckily, he did not live close, as he sometimes left that truck running, and the noise and smell often got the police visiting him for being a nuisance…
Yeah I saw that article a while back. We don’t have an hoa but there are covenants covering signs and such and home businesses. I don’t mind. They are pretty tame. Since we were the first property owners we could make changes if we wanted. We did change the pool rule. Only cost $100 for the lawyer. We do have an ordinance for trailers to be parked on a hard surface, so I poured a slab.
It’s rude & inconsiderate parking behavior to block a public sidewalk imo. Children, blind folks, the elderly, all need a clear sidewalk to go about their day safely. A $25 fine for sidewalk blocking is ok by me. These sorts of things can be taken too far of course.
Sometimes when I go to the store, be it the family dollar or the pizza store, I get blocked by vehicles that park on the side of a ADA curb ramp that is designed for people with disabilities.
ADA curb ramp:
An inconvenience like this puts people like myself in difficult situations.
I so hope that Karma gets people like that in a bad way… 
Had a truck on a sidewalk nearby, sometimes block the sidewalk, other times trailer hitch overhanging the sidewalk. Called the police one day, after x amount of hours gave them a ticket. I met the policeman there and he said yeah, I can see it. Neighbor snitched on me and as I was walking up to go to walgreens they met me on the sidewalk with the do you know who I am? I said the ordinance is 2 foot clearance from the sidewalk, don’t like it call your alderman. They say you better make sure everything at your house is in order because we are going to be calling inn any violation on you, and more nastiness. Funny thing a couple years later lady wondering who was calling in dog complaints on (not her) dog supposedly. I said I do not know. She asked are you the one that got us the sidewalk ticket. I said yes, she apologized gave some lame excuses, bright side one less enemy in the world!