Posted on 03/09/2006 1:27:54 PM PST by Coleus
MAHWAH -- Two white watering cans and a yellow broom dangle above the porch of a stone and shingle house perched atop North Hillside Avenue. Just below, empty flower pots and plastic chairs and tables clutter the entryway. "No trespassing" and "Beware of dog" signs line the sloping property.
The more-than-100-year-old house has been home to Samantha Moor for 10 years. Its sloppy condition is the reason she nearly spent the night in jail. Moor, in her late 40s, was arrested Tuesday morning and sent to the Bergen County Jail for failing to pay $4,921 in fines issued by Mahwah for property maintenance violations. She was bailed out by her former husband just before midnight.
The township has issued Moor 37 summonses dating to April 2004. A warrant was issued for her arrest when she failed to make payments, as set forth by a municipal judge. "Since she couldn't afford to make the repairs, she couldn't afford to pay the fines," said George Cotz, a lawyer Moor called from jail on Tuesday. She was expected to appear in Municipal Court in Mahwah at 1:30 p.m. today, although Cotz, who is trying another case, won't be at her side.
Moor could not be reached for comment. Cotz said her phone has been disconnected. "I don't think she particularly has any marketable skills," Cotz said. "Before she got married and had a child, she was a clerk in an office. And I think she's got health issues.
"She really has no money," he said. "I don't think this is a show." Moor's troubles started with a dishonest contractor who tore apart her house and walked away with her money, according to Ian J. Hirsch, a Hackensack lawyer who used to represent her. The contractor was fined in Mahwah Municipal Court, but that didn't help Moor, Hirsch said. "The house stayed the way it was," he said. "The scaffolding stayed, there were shingles in the yard. It started to become an eyesore."
Moor's neighbors began complaining, and eventually the fines started piling up. "The town building inspector was very, very nice," Hirsch said. "We genuinely tried to help her. But she doesn't have any money, so what can she do?" When Moor was arrested Tuesday, she called another lawyer, Hirsch suspects, because she owes Hirsch money. "Had she called me, I would have helped her anyway," he said.
When Hirsch represented Moor, she was taking classes to become a plumber, he said. "She's trying to hold onto a piece of property she's not going to be able to." Moor's property taxes were paid in full in 2005, officials said. But her first-quarter payment, due Feb. 1, has not been received. Hirsch describes Moor as a nice person whose problems have snowballed. "Some people belong in jail. Not Samantha Moor," he said. "You don't put people who are struggling to survive in jail."
John Lane, Mahwah's property maintenance and zoning enforcement officer, says Moor's problem is that she hasn't complied with the ordinances or the court orders that attempted to enforce them. If people comply and show an effort, he said, the township will work with them. "The ultimate goal we're looking for is compliance," Lane said. "We'd rather residents put the money toward property maintenance" than fines.
The idea of racking up thousands of dollars in fines, he said, is not unusual in the sprawling township. Going to jail over them is. In nearby Ramsey, both are unheard of. "We've never had anything that extreme," said Ramsey's zoning officer, Richard Mammone, who has been with the borough for 30 years. Most of the property maintenance complaints in Mahwah come from neighbors or other third parties, Lane said.
An enforcement officer investigates the complaint to check its validity. If the violation exists, residents are given a letter saying they have three days to comply. If they don't make the necessary changes, a second letter is issued saying the resident has one day to comply. If they still don't comply, a third letter is sent warning that a summons will be issued, he said. After that, a summons is issued every day the property owner fails to comply.
I think that the state of New Jersey should be arrested for having a messy political system.
Ignorance is no excuse, it is the people's responsibility to be informed, and to take active part in their government. If instead they decide that they do not wish to be involved, and they want no responsibility for the working of that government, that's a decision as well.
There are plenty of places where you can go live where restrictive laws are not an issue; go live there.
But to come into a place where the people have by either active choice, or by passive approval allowed such laws to be set in place, and decide that you will not be governed by the prevailing laws is exactly what you labeled my post...bulls%it.
I live in a HOA community, the regs governing this township where clearly spelled out long before I made the decision to buy my house; I also visited the city's government center to familiarize myself with their laws and regulations.
In the course of closing on my house, I signed agreement to all those regs.
Everyone who purchased a home in this township signed the same documents that I did, and now, just like I am contractually obligated to maintain my property according to all those regulations, the city and township are contractually obligated to me to enforce them.
Our Founding Fathers are doing nothing of the sort, they gave us the system that allows you the choice of living where there are no regs, and me to make the choice to live where I live.
The woman in the article received 37 summons over a two year span of time.
"John Lane, Mahwah's property maintenance and zoning enforcement officer, says Moor's problem is that she hasn't complied with the ordinances or the court orders that attempted to enforce them. If people comply and show an effort, he said, the township will work with them."
If the woman had TRIED to DO SOMETHING during the TWO YEARS that the city had been asking her to PLEASE do SOMETHING, they would have worked with her.
She didn't, and now, victimhood is granted to her.
Give me a friggin' break.
Wrong. We live in a Limited Republic not a Democracy where majority rules over individual rights.
Private property rights where one of the select few foundations this great Nation was based on.
You do not have the right...nor does / should the Gov't to dictate how others live on their property that they own.
Again, if you want all the areas around your house (within your view) to look a certain way....then you should have to purchase that land. Plain and simple.
The death of individual property rights in this Country is leading us right down the path of becoming European light.
But the "common good" is just so important, isn't it. And by god our Gov't (local / State or federal) surely better not allow my property value to decrease. That is what our Gov't are for.
Sad to see how pathetically grown adults have come to look to Gov't to protect them from anything they don't like anymore.
Private property rights WERE one of the select few foundations this great Nation was based on.
Whatever happened to love thy neighbor and Christian charity? I will see if there is a fund to help this woman. It could just as likely be me.
Devouring widows' houses comes to mind. Whoops, she isn't a widow; she's divorced. She doesn't count. She doesn't deserve a home of her own.
Purchasing a home involves a contract, when you enter that contract, you signed agreement to it.
You are not forced to live where you don't like the laws and regulations.
"You do not have the right...nor does / should the Gov't to dictate how others live on their property that they own."
Move into a house with three wives, and brew moonshine for a living...better yet, buy a house in a neighborhood, and turn it into a auto repair shop.
"The death of individual property rights in this Country is leading us right down the path of becoming European light."
More bulls%t.
You can go buy an acre of land on the side of a mountain and live your entire life naked and eating nothing but gooseberries if you want to.
Your problem is with the right of like-minded individuals to regulate their property via a shared contractual agreement.
You want YOUR freedom, but you don't want anyone else to be free to make choices you don't agree with.
How friggin' hypocritical is that?
This is the most convoluted concept. You do not buy property as a "shared group". When you purchase land it, it is as an individual (if you are buying property for yourself). The notion that the Gov't our "groups of others, looking out for the common good" can dictate what you do with "your" land is foolishness.
With your logic those who find a type of "flower that is going extinct"...or find some shallow holding water (wet lands) on one's property ....they do have the right to have the Gov't come in and tell you what you can and can't do with your property now....
It is your mindset that is allowing the erosion of individual rights and property rights. If you don' think that is moving in the direction of European light.....You haven't been overseas to see how property owners there have virtually NO rights whatsoever Vs the "common good".
Furthermore you must also think it is fine for the Gov't go come in and take one's property if they can find a "better use for it".....under your logic there is nothing wrong with this.
LOL. I'll tell you . . . someday. ;-)
Exactly! Others should not be able to make choices regarding land I own! - They can make all the choices they want with land they own......if they want all the land around them to be a certain way....then buy that land....and "lease" it to others.
But when one buys and owns land in this Country it should be theirs...and no Gov't do-gooder should be telling others how to live on that property (assuming rational behavior here...and not trying to go down a middle school path of suggesting all sorts of obvious illicit actions).
You agree to the upkeep and maintenance of common grounds and amenities offered...pools, playgrounds, club houses, etc.
You agree to share the costs involved in maintaining those common grounds and amenities, you agree on architectural limitations regarding alterations to the exterior of the houses, you agree to paint your houses a certain color, how many trees constitute landscaping, what types of trees are allowed, and even which kinds are required.
You agree not to put up a vehicle up on blocks for longer than it takes to change tires.
Etc, etc, etc...
So again, you are dead wrong.
You don't HAVE to do any of those things if you don't want to, but you will not be sold a house in that township, and if you buy it, and break your contract, you will be fined, and your house may be taken from you.
I'm not taking away anyone's property rights, I am defining the parameters of the community where I chose to live, no one forces you to live here, so you don't have to agree with the rules.
Just don't fool yourself into thinking that you can both live in the community, and not abide by the rules.
This is a sad situation. Perhaps the neighbors did not know her story, but now that they know perhaps they will offer help.
You can't buy the land unless you sign agreement to the HOA's regs, if you sign the agreement with no intention of abiding by them, you comitted fraud, and you WILL lose your property.
Your choice was made at the time that you decided to purchase property regulated by prevailing laws.
You can't chose to disregard prevailing laws.
Or I can enter into a contractual agreement with other like-minded individuals on the way the areas around all our houses will look, and live in a community where only people who will abide by that agreement are allowed to purchase property.
You seem to have a problem with people making choices that you do not agree with.
I'd get help.
Read the Fourth Amendment, maybe.
Amendment IV -- The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
What part of that was violated in this case?
Smokin' Joe, you are welcome to be my neighbor.
I doubt you understand the meaning of either polysyllable there.
"Are there no prisons, are there no workhouses?"
Majority doesn't rule when it comes to law. Nor the work of busy-body do-gooders.
A township has no right to grandfather in how people will use their property in a given area...for the "common good".
If you are with this concept.....you are also agreeing to the notion that if a "do-gooder" finds shallow holding water on your property the Gov't has a right (for the commmon good) to declare it wet lands and tell you want you can and can't do.
In your mindset another "do-gooder" (for the common good) can find any type of flower (possibly going extinct) or such on one's property and if this happens the Gov't has a right to come in and tell this person what they can and can't do with their own property.
You keep convolutedly suggesting that "if a group" does this or does that it overrides the right of the individual.
That is European light. It goes completely against the foundation of this Country where was based on individual rights over that of the "group".
Additionally the notion of "fees" paid to upkeep "community" property is a completely different subject. You don't own those "pools" or "playgrounds"....you simply have a fee-based charge for the use of them. But you don't not own them.
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