TRR photo by David Hulse Town Attorney Andrew Boyar, left, had a bell on hand to get attention at Tuesday’s Highland Town Board meeting. After inquiries by Councilman Peter Lilholt, the bell was donated by the Ten Mile River Boy Scout Camps for Highland’s Sullivan Renaissance project, which includes replacement of the town hall’s original bell tower. Officials said the bell closely duplicates the old school building’s original bell. (Click for larger image)

Zoning complaints, overgrown cemeteries and a dead horse

By DAVID HULSE

ELDRED — On the whole May 8 was a lousy night to be a public official in the Town of Highland.

Meeting in their regular monthly session, the town board got a triple whammy from a room filled with residents upset about issues left unattended for months, even years.

It began when John Camp detailed the sights he and his wife see regularly on the long walks they like to take around the Yulan area. Camp detailed a “cat lady’s” house overrun by felines, a boarded up building surrounded by machinery debris, another property with car tires, and a bicycle frame laying in ditch that smelled of septic waste. Camp said his wife’s nephew had compared their community to “a third-world country…Isn’t there a law to make people maintain their property?” he asked.

Planning Board member David Greenberger followed with a town-wide view and an even longer list including an abandoned home, junked cars, “junky” yards, and rusty guard rails. Some people, Greenberger said, won’t even accept volunteer help to clean up the mess.

A resident since 1973, Greenberger said he knew the codes existed to correct many of the problems, and “if people get on other people’s backs it will get cleaned up.”

The nice town he once moved to is “getting not nice anymore,” he concluded.

A group of Crawford Road residents followed complaining about a home where they claimed mistreated dogs, raised commercially, and other animals were creating health hazard, crushing property values and generally destroying their quality of life.

Doug Foster said dogs barking until 2:00 or 3:00 a.m. have forced his wife to wear earplugs to sleep. Foster claimed 14 of the dogs, left without water, died during summer heat three years ago. More recently, a horse on the property died in the field and was left unattended for three weeks.

Neighbor Michael Guidice said dog wastes are bagged and stacked by the house and create a stench that it drove off the town’s investigating animal control officer.

Neighbor and Realtor Linda McKean said she had been in thousands of homes during her career and this one is the worst she’d ever seen. “I won’t let the kids go there,” she said.

Last on the complaint list was Mary Ellen Sutherland, representing the Montoza Cemetery Association. She charged that despite a town law enacted to cure the problem, Highland has four private cemeteries that are obviously abandoned and have been left uncared for.

Supervisor Alan Schadt said he had been investigating the cemetery problem, but received no help from the association when he’d asked for it.

“It’s not our job to get compliance. It’s your job,” she replied.

The board directed the town attorney to investigate the zoning issues and said it would do what it could about the animal problems on Crawford Road.