Supervisors go on ‘magical mystery’ public hearing tour on Linden Heights road/law enforcement issue

As to where the August 18th “government overreach” debate began for the Warren County Board of Supervisors – it was in the Linden Heights Sanitary District. The fourth August 18th public hearing appeared as a somewhat innocuous matter of designating the district’s roads and streets as “highways” as they had been before Linden Heights broke away from the Shenandoah Farms Sanitary District six years ago.

Assistant County Attorney Caitlin Jordan explained that Linden Heights had been allowed to break off from the Shenandoah Farms Sanitary District by court order in January 2014. By county code approved in 1980, all the Farms “platted roads and streets” were designated “highways” to facilitate law enforcement and patrols without calls to a specific situation on those roads.

The requested change would clarify that Linden Heights roads are not private roads and remain open to law enforcement patrols despite their 2016 split from the Farms Sanitary District, Jordan explained.

“Currently they are included – but the ordinance is not clear because of the changes that happened in 1980,” Jordan told the supervisors of the Linden Heights roads inclusion on tax map designations facilitating law enforcement patrols by ordinance dating to the original Shenandoah Farms Sanitary District roads designation.

As he would also do in the Dungadin subdivision shooting ban public hearing, Joe Andrews spoke to the issue of governmental overreach in opening the public hearing.

Joe Andrews opens the public hearing calling the law-enforcement reinforcing amendment request ‘government overreach’. Royal Examiner Photos by Roger Bianchini – Royal Examiner Video by Mark Williams

“I think this is clearly government overreach. I’ve spoken to a couple of people who have lived in this subdivision that are not fans of this,” Andrews began. “What this basically says is, if law enforcement can come in there and patrol without being called, that is your question. Law enforcement can go anywhere as long as they got phoned. So, if your neighbor doesn’t like what you’re doing or thinks that you’re breaking the law, law enforcement can still go in this area.

“What this is changing is that now law enforcement can go in there without being called. And I don’t think anyone wants that,” Andrews said, despite his admittedly limited neighborhood survey.

Asked about Andrews assessment by Board Vice-Chair and South River Supervisor Cheryl Cullers, Jordan elaborated on her perspective of the clarifying code designation.

“I would disagree that with this ordinance law enforcement can now go in and patrol. What this says is, that law enforcement can, let’s say if somebody is speeding down the road, law enforcement can enforce the speed limit on these roads. It’s not an open ticket where now, law enforcement can come in and patrol … I believe there is a distinction to be made saying that law enforcement can enforce and treat the roads in Linden Heights as highways for the purposes of law enforcement,” Jordan told the three supervisors present. Tony Carter and Delores Oates were absent on August 18.

A quorum of three supervisors was present to vote at Tuesday’s 10-public hearing agenda, with two empty seats for the 4-hour meeting, and 45-minute closed session that followed.

Dazed and Confused

At this point the public hearing took some confusing turns, seeming to leap forward in time to either a future Linden Heights public hearing on noise, guns and public safety or the evening’s next public hearing on the Dungadin recreational shooting ban request.

First, Jeannie Anderson expressed confusion about what was proposed. “I didn’t understand what was taking place tonight, so I cut my survey of the neighborhood short,” she told the board. “So, the questions that I have are what benefit does it provide to the community – and why is it being brought up?”

Anderson continued to say that if Linden Heights residents didn’t want to be part of Shenandoah Farms, they also do not want the same codes for roads that the Farms have. However, Anderson then pointed the finger at Shenandoah Farms residents utilizing Linden Heights roads as a thru point from their neighborhood for the speeding problem in the Heights.

“That disturbs the residents there, some have small children, it’s dangerous. I think there was a high-speed chase through there at one point,” Anderson said of past road issues.

She then pivoted to rumors of legal involvement and noise issues, including the firing of guns in the area.

“I started surveying my neighborhood because I had heard that there were attorneys involved, and they were going to come and ban guns and I saw this … being added. And I thought, why don’t you guys just take care of the whole problem and put in like a noise ordinance or something … instead of taking the freedoms away from others, who you know, they’ve had a very stressful workload and that’s how they like to maybe take shots at target practice at the end of the day or on their day off. There’s nothing wrong with it,” Anderson concluded having somehow taken the Linden Heights road designation discussion into a preview of the next public hearing on the Dungadin Subdivision shooting ban request (see related story).

The following speaker was Nancy Lynn, who said she hadn’t planned to speak on this issue, before trying to ease Linden Heights residents’ anxiety over the road designation.

“I live in Shenandoah Farms – we call law enforcement, and then they don’t show up, and we have (the road designation). They can come any time they want … We never see law enforcement … So, I don’t think having law enforcement having permission will change anything for Linden Heights, in my opinion,” Lynn told the board before commenting on speeding issues, then following Anderson into the recreational shooting aspect not yet on the table.

“I’m not going to be very popular with people for this one because your bullets have to go somewhere. And if there are people who shoot in Linden Heights, they’re shooting within a mile of a home … the bullets have to go somewhere and if they don’t have a proper drop it’s not safe, you just can’t recreation shoot,” Lynn reasoned of a public safety issue slated for the next public hearing and a different subdivision.

Then as she would in the coming Dungadin public hearing, Noel Williams rose to the podium to put a brief, succinct perspective on what she had heard from three speakers over the previous 15 minutes.

“Let’s just be adults here: don’t speed, don’t shoot, and we’ll be fine,” Williams said, exiting with a “Thank you” to some appreciative laughter.

‘Let’s just be adults here’ the supervisors were told by public hearing speaker Noel Williams, who added, ‘Don’t speed, don’t shoot and we’ll be fine.’

Final public hearing speaker Kevin Smith wondered at an end result of speed traps in the subdivision and asked the supervisors not to overcomplicate what was before them.
“Individual solutions for individual problems and complex solutions for complex problems,” Smith told the board.

“We’re still talking about Linden Heights, correct?” Board Chairman Mabe said, drawing a smattering of laughter, if not at the level Williams achieved before him.

After asking for clarification that the sheriff’s office does not enforce property owner association rules – they do not – Archie Fox made a motion to approve the amending of the code section on the Linden Heights roads. That second was met with a 13-second stretch of silence with Cullers being the only supervisor present positioned to second the motion on the call for a motion by the board chair.

“I’m at an impasse here,” Cullers said, suggesting more discussion “to have a more clear” here she hesitated perhaps having second thoughts on that line of thought before continuing, “I don’t think everybody included here are … whether, how much power this gives the sheriff’s department versus just gives them the ability to, not necessarily go in there, but when they go in there if there’s a problem it’ll end up in the court versus, you can’t issue a ticket or anything if they don’t have this – and maybe I’m wrong, and that’s where I’d almost rather postpone the action until I have a more clear understanding so that I know that I’m doing the right thing from our part.”

And with that dizzying end to a dizzying public hearing, the matter was forwarded to a September 8 work session after Fox amended his original motion to a tabling of action, which Cullers then seconded. That motion passed by a 3-0 vote.

Watch Royal Examiner’s below linked video to see Interim County Attorney Jason Ham’s exciting ‘real world’ example of ramifications of the road designation clarification for Linden Heights.

And if you think this reporter made this story up, watch the linked Royal Examiner video for the 26-minute public hearing comments, board reactions, and staff explanations (remember there is a fast forward option), including Interim County Attorney Jason Ham’s response to Culler’s confusion over law enforcement authority implications with a “real world” example of the issue before them. Without a video spoiler alert on Ham’s response, I will observe that it involves at what point on roads drunk driving becomes a crime.

Watch the entire Warren County Board of Supervisors meeting of August 18, 2020, in the following videos. The meeting is in two parts.