Thursday, January 25, 2007 Older Editions

Residents hope bylaw can force neighbor to clean unkempt yard

By April Guilmet

After a reported decade of requests and neighborhood grievances have failed to clean up a yard in their neighborhood, 15 Kirkland Drive residents have petitioned to create a Building Property Maintenance Code.

On Friday, residents John "Bo" Kennedy and Kenneth Hyde Jr. submitted a Town Meeting warrant article because of the ongoing conditions at 27 Kirkland Drive, which Sam Santangelo has owned since the early 1960s. In recent years, Santangelo's son, Mark, has been running his business, Andover Seeds, there.

"This is beyond a messy lawn. This is blight," neighbor Alfred Sotera said. "I think the warrant article might give the town of Andover some teeth to help solve this kind of a problem as it arises."

Director Public Health Tom Carbone said he's regularly received complaints about the property, but there is currently little he can do.

"When it's been appropriate to take action we have. But for the most part, the yard is unkempt, but it's not a health hazard," Carbone said. "If it's not a health issue, we can't do much."

The homeowner, Santangelo, who has recently been ill, said he's aware some of his neighbors are upset, but has been unable to do anything about it. He said his adult son, Mark, who also lives at 27 Kirkland Drive, was unavailable for comment.

"Mark is trying to do something when he can, and when I feel better, I'll join him," Santangelo said. "We plan on cleaning the whole place up."

Santangelo added that he was hospitalized last October, and until recently has been recuperating in a nursing home.

Located on a horseshoe-shaped road lined with well-groomed yards, the Santangelos' front yard is scattered with plastic lawn furniture, dozens of buckets, trash cans, blue vinyl tarps and brown plants. Some neighbors, who claim a large Dumpster has been in the driveway for at least nine months, said they fear their property values are in steady decline.

"We talk to them in the yard. Every year they say they're going to take care of it," Kennedy said. "But they don't do anything about it."

The warrant's petitioner, Kennedy said he's lived next door to the Santangelos for the past 30 years. But within recent years, Kennedy said, the situation has gotten so bad, he's put up a fence.

"Now the Dumpster's out there, it looks like they're growing buckets," he said.

He said he's complained to the town in the past, as have other neighbors.

"Public Health has been there several times, but unless you see a rodent, you can't do anything," Kennedy said. Since the street's shape causes everyone living on it to be affected, he said there have been several neighborhood meetings to discuss solutions.

"Many of us are getting up in years and worry about not being able to sell our homes someday. The whole neighborhood is being punished by this one family," he said. "I don't want to cause harassment, but in this situation we don't know what else to do."

The proposed "Building and Property Maintenance Code" will duplicate one adopted by Methuen in 1998. Hyde emphasized that only direct abutters or those living within 300 feet of the offending property would be permitted to file official complaints.

In particular, Hyde noted that the bylaw states that accumulated items hanging around the yard must be screened - they need not be removed. "So they could put up a fence or a shed," he suggested.

Hyde added that the bylaw would be enforced at the town's discretion. "And if they don't feel the complaint is worthy, then they won't issue it. Simple as that," he said.

But should the town feel a complaint is valid, an investigation would take place, followed by a two-week warning and consequent fines.

Hyde, whose wife, Deborah, grew up in their current home, will serve as speaker for the article during Town Meeting.

Concerns about his property values led Cornelius McLarney, a resident of Kirkland Drive since 1960, to sign the petition. He said that he too has complained about the situation - both to the town and to the Santangelos - but to no avail. "(Right now) the town can ask you to clean up, but they can't tell you to," McLarney said.

"And we talk to the owners on an individual basis. They say they will fix it, but nothing ever happens," he said. "It's not a personal thing. We just want to see it cleaned up."

Sotera, who lives across the street from the Santangelos, said he hopes a new warrant article may help preserve property value, or what he called "the biggest single investment most of us have ever made."

"I feel really sorry for the direct abutters. No one would buy their houses. It's like they're trapped in their own homes," Sotera said.

Methuen experience

The bylaw has, so far, been a success in Methuen, said Methuen mayor William Manzi III. Manzi, who served on the city council in 1998 when the bylaw was adopted, recalled a situation in one Methuen neighborhood that similar to the current one at Kirkland Drive.

"One house on Meetinghouse Road, I think that was the trigger for this whole thing," Manzi said. "It was a situation of a nice neighborhood where this one house wasn't completed. So the grass grew six feet high."

While Manzi said the article was considered controversial at the time, it's been quite helpful.

"We try not to use it as a mallet, but as a prod for action," he said. When the town receives a complaint that appears justified, the ordinance allows them to go visit the home.

"It gives us some leverage to get the homeowner to do the right thing and comply. And if they need help, we help them," Manzi said, adding that provisions are occasionally to assist those who are elderly, infirm, or in financial trouble.