Does hypocrisy of the Chautauqua Board damage the unique character of our woodland retreat?

Our Chautauqua picnic is coming right up, and, because I hope to be able to attend this year, I look forward to seeing my neighbors gathered together.
So, even though my poll has not ended yet, I want to take this opportunity to present some "food for thought"--think of this post as my "uncovered dish" for the picnic.

In thinking about the many conversations I have had with neighbors, visitors, and Chautauqua Board/Mt. Gretna Borough elected representatives (I will collectively refer to them as "local reps"), I have discovered that, while we all seem to agree that Mt. Gretna/the Chautauqua has a unique character that is very important to us, we wildly differ on how that unique character is surviving and on how to maintain and protect it.

The Chautauqua Resident's Handbook succinctly describes our neighborhood as a "wooded retreat", and I think that is a apt description that each of us residents and shareholders can agree upon. However, it has become overwhelming clear to me that the ordinances, laws, borough codes and general ongoings of those we elected to govern us may be only selectively enforced, and that this selective enforcement may be largely designed to benefit those same "local reps", or even motorcycle-loving cops. It does not seem that our local reps, collectively, act with the intention of enforcing codes, ordinances, etc, with the intention to protect the health, safety, and welfare of us lowly residents, and certainly not to protect our peaceful use and enjoyment of our little slice of this woodland RETREAT. They have demonstrated the ability, however, to enforce them when it comes to benefitting themselves or one of their own family members, and for cops with motorcycle fetishes. Let me explain the facts upon which I have reached this conclusion.

A little clarifying background is needed before I continue. The Chautauqua is basically a homeowners' association that was incorporated over a hundred years ago. Our Borough-Chautauqua solicitor, Kilgore, essentially alleges that the incorporation documents include a paragraph--a covenant, designed to protect the "retreat" character of the Chautauqua, and that we shareholders are all bound by that covenant via a paragraph in our deeds that refer to and incorporate that covenant.

Further, the Chautauqua Resident's Handbook states that it has assigned the Borough the responsibility of enforcing ordinances and traffic laws. However, it also states that the Borough, as with the Mt. Gretna Water Authority, are "CHAUTAUQUA-based entities" for which it is the shareholders' collectively responsibility to support (via payment of shareholder fees, etc). It also highlights several ordinances, which include a noise ordinance and an "abandoned vehicle" on Chautauqua property ordinance.

Now, here are the reasons for my conclusion that our local reps, as a collective body, are failing to act in our community's best interests and to protect the unique character that we expected when we purchased property and commited to Mt. Gretna and the Chautauqua. We expected these existing entities to enforce codes, ordinances, and laws. We expected them to help maintain our property values and to create a quality of life associated with a "woodland retreat", of which there are only two in the entire country.

Residents and property owners have been complaining about the safety and quality of life issues for many years now--even years before I arrived here! I have discoverd documents that show that residents have been presenting these concerns to our local reps (and, yes, those reps have not changed much since then) for many years. I have been to three annual meetings and heard several other people make similar complaints. I have been to Borough meetings myself where the complaints have been made. My better-half has been to Board meetings where she made the complaint, and I myself have written to both the Board, to the Borough, and to the police, expressing deep concern over the potential tragedy presented by the lack of addressing our traffice and noise concerns, and especially by the lack of enforcement of speeding laws here. I also wrote and asked for an explanation of when the existing noise ordinance would be enforced.

1. I can not find any evidence suggesting that any of these complaints generated a substantive responsive from either entity. Thus, to my knowledge, neither the Chautauqua nor the Borough have ever responded to any "citizen" complaint, including my written ones, about these safety, quality of life, and peaceful use and enjoyment of our property issues. Instead, I do know that we are told to present the issue at a meeting (a meeting that we are shunned at and dismissed if we do go). We are told to write a letter (a letter that never gets responded to even when sent via certified mail and asking for a written response). The Chautauqua says it the Borough's responsibility, and the Borough says its not anything that they will take responsibility for...In fact, the Borough Council president himself responded by accusing us of "coming to the harm".

And just like that, our unique character, our woodland retreat, vanishes into the reality that we really just bought into a common suburb, with unfettered unmufflered combustible engine activity (whether from motorcycles, chainsaws, pressure washers, or leafblowers), neighboring industrial activity, gunshots at any hour of the day (whether from gunpowder, air, or springloaded guns), and neighbors we sue for stuff that we don't sue anyone else for. You can have that suburb, have it right here if you like-but I was duped into thinking that this was a "woodland RETREAT", and I am near the point where I begin asking for my money back if some enforcement actions don't start happening for me too.

Ironically, when a local rep made a complaint about noise this spring, the response was truly surprising and out of character. That resident got police response, as well as Borough and police-issued public statements that the police will enforce the codes and ordinances of our community. It was even discussed in the Borough's presentation at the Chautauqua annual meeting. After hearing that the police said that they will enforce ordinances, I sent a letter asking about enforcment of the codes and traffic laws and was told, in short, that it wouldn't happen.

Further, when the noise issue was brought up at a monthly shareholder meeting, it was revealed that the use of a non-mufflered combustible-engine leafblower was preferred by certain Board members, thus explaining to me why other citizens complaints will never generate a substantive collective response from our local reps. These engines, by the way, operate at decibel levels that cause permanent hearing loss for the operator and for anyone within a short distance from the engine, as well as pollute the air with fine particulates and toxins that don't settle out for days. At a minimum, an electric leaf-blower could be considered by the Board member, but why set the precedent of moving your personal priorities and preferences to a position below that of the citizens you represent?

Also, when a motorcycle-loving off-duty Middletown cop sees what he thinks is a dangerous condition on a Mt. Gretna roadway, he makes one call and gets the response of two police districts. In the meantime, he threatens to arrest two Mt. Gretna residents/property owners for a light lawn sprinkler that has been knocked over.

Quite the aggresive response, wouldn't you say? I dare say us lowly citizens would appreciate half that response to our "dangerous conditions" complaints! But, no. Again, we have to endure the obvious arrangment of importance, of status in this community and be forced to recognise that a motorcycle fanatic who is NOT a tax-paying, fees-paying resident of the community will be given a legitimacy that us citizens will not be given-even if that motorcycle fanatic is breaking our air pollution laws, our traffic laws, our vehicle safety equipment laws, and/or our community ordinances and are themselves creating dangerous situations.

2. Knowing that it has failed to respond to numerous and ongoing complaints that directly reflect the preservation of our community's unique character, the Chautauqua nevertheless is suing a Mt. Gretna resident essentially for his actions that allegedly do not conform with the character of the Chautauqua as a woodland retreat.

Funny how this litigation was not mentioned at the annual sharehholders' meeting even though it had to have been on the table at that time, given that it was filed close to the date of the meeting.

I think that the allegations made in this filing present a classic example of hypocrisy in government, and, more importantly for us as a community, may backfire in a huge way.

First, the action alleges conduct that neither the Chautauqua nor the Board has been willing to address (except for this one individual) in any community way--i.e. uniform, fair, or equitable that I can determine. In fact, both the Borough Council president and the Board president have told citizens presenting noise complaints that they can't regulate what persons do on their "private property." This position is egregiously erroneous for reasons I will cover in another post. But, for now, let's just ask ourselves how the Chautauqua can simultaneously maintain these two opposing postions and attempt to regulate this one guy for what he is doing on his "private" property while foregoing to regulate others' conduct.

A sample allegation in the complaint is the charge regarding the installation of signs marketing the resident's business, which apparently is a violation of the covenant that I mentioned earlier. However, this resident doesn't have any signs any different than any other "for rent" or "for sale" sign posted throughout our community, and the signs on his vehicles are smaller and less offensive than signs on other residents' vehicles.

Second, the action alleges that the resident is operating his business from a Chautauqua home, and that the covenant prohibits such a thing. Now, the covenant quoted does specifically prohibit lodging type businesses, inter alia, so this brings me to the question of how the rental and for sale signs are allowed. Is there a modification or exception to the covenant?

Further, this resident actually does NOT do his work in his home, but elsewhere, and brings his instrumentalities of work home with him--as MANY of us year-round residents do. What's even worse is the fact that many year round residents have a home-office--some of these offices belong to local reps themselves or even to their spouse. In fact, I know of other residents who use Chautauqua's common parking areas to park their work vehicles, sometimes for weeks at a time, and nothing is ever said to them. And why should it--if those common parking areas aren't for us to use, then they are only there to benefit the businesses within the Mt. Gretna yet being funded and maintained by us residents...

But here is why this action may backfire on them and cause us some real damage as property owners who rank the unique character of Mt. Gretna as "very important." Because all of this is common-knowledge and easily provable as a defense, this resident now has a great opportunity to get a legal judgment finding that the covenant has not been enforced and this non-enforcement has created a community with a character like that of any other suburb--that there is nothing unique about it anymore. And, that legal precedent will be very difficult to challenge, overturn, or erode, even if it is only a partial finding for this resident's defense.

How and why was this route chosen, and how and why was this one person targeted for enforcement of covenants, codes, etc when it seems as if no one else has been made to comply? Is this hypocrisy and pettiness the best use of our community resources? Given the Chautauqua's and the Borough's chronic reluctance to respond to our complaints and to conduct the enforcement of codes and laws that we are asking them to, I find this particular action of theirs to further erode the community character of the Chautauqua/Mt. Gretna.