I was exploring ways to address ordinance violations in my neighborhood without filing civil suit. If a neighbor does something to jeopardize their health or life or that of their family that’s their right. When they impact the value of the community or my property, that’s different. After failing to mediate the behavior of neighbors, community ordinance should prevail. If ordinance is not enforced in extreme cases why have them? I reference the post of may 28th.
Trying to understand why the community’s ordinance process had failed to address blight, accessory building, fence and building code violations, it was suggested I contact the Mayor. I hoped to understand what community standard was. I know that some communities in the US the standard has occasionally proven; punitive, unethical, immoral, illegal and discriminatory. As it had been suggested by the county sheriff that Manchester Administration had the right to violate a property if a few blades of grass were too long, the ambiguity of the ordinance process was getting to be a concern. Considering almost every property on the street is in some form of ordinance violation if that is a fact, I just wanted to know where the line is, or the Community Standard.
Here’s a brief summary of the understanding I received from Manchester Michigan’s community administrative including, Manchester Community Officials, Washtenaw County Sheriff and Manchester Legal Counsel.
– Manchester does not enforce ordinance consistently.
– Some ordinance are not enforced at all.
– Some violations are applied to one property but not others in the community.
– Some individuals or families appear exempt from ordinance.
– Fees and penalties defined by ordinance are not collected so repair to community infrastructure is funded solely by tax dollars.
– Even though a residence is obviously in ordinance violation, community administration may generate a variance nullifying the ordinance for that property.
– When considering an ordinance violation, Manchester Community Administration may create a previously undefined and undocumented definition. The new definition may violate a different legal requirement such as building code but it effectively nullifies the ordinance for the specific property.
Due to a misunderstanding the Manchester Administrative team failed to clarify before reacting, I was cut off without anything that resembles an understanding of community standard. I played ball, for every violation question I raised, when they asked “do you have evidence” I provided evidence.
I was just trying to understand why all evidence points to Manchester, Michigan not enforcing state or local ordinance, when it is enforced it is not applied consistently, why some properties are not bound by the ordinance other residents are and why enforcement appears to be based on the who owns a property and and not the ordinance. Guess that question will never get answered.
What's next? 