Call it the case of the canine controversy; a neighbor dispute that has escalated into a growling mess.
The three-year squabble has created a battleground of a quiet southwest Kansas City neighborhood. Everyone involved requested anonymity for fear of retribution.
On one side: A woman who works part time as a dog obedience trainer. She owns four German shepherds. She says they’re well-behaved and tidy.
On the other: Her surrounding neighbors, who assert that the dogs bark constantly and create insect problems.
She says she sprays to keep odor and bugs away; they say they’ve had to put up heavy-duty traps to catch hundreds of flies. They say the dogs howl at 5 a.m.; she says neighbors toss tennis balls into her yard in hopes of choking her pets.
Neighbor feuds. They’re common, uncomfortable — and, often, they can be solved with communication and cooperation.
Rhonda Harris has heard it all. She’s the manager of the Kansas City Office of Community Relations. She and her staff of nine help resolve city neighbor disputes.
Harris’ office handles an average of 100 neighbor complaint calls a week. The most common, she said, are over noise, parking, pets, boundaries and racial issues. Many are about unsupervised children.
“Neighbors complain about children running in their yards because Mom and Dad aren’t watching. Then the kids are running home because the neighbor has called them a name, then the parents get defensive — next thing you know, the adults are feuding.”
Problems cited in Kansas City mirror those nationwide. Debra Bass, vice president for communications for the Community Associations Institute, based in Alexandria, Va., said “pets, parking and kids” are the most common “as well as the most emotional” issues. The institute represents the 32 million Americans living in homes association areas.
The number of neighbor complaints seems to go up slightly in the summertime, Harris said.
Lots of cases are referred to the Kansas City office by the police, homes association or the courts, Harris said.
The staff first telephones each party and attempts to make peace. About 60 percent of problems can be worked out that way.
More serious issues are referred over for mediation by a staff member. “If we can get them to the table, then we can usually work out something with them,” Harris said.
Even if the situation appears to be impossible — such as the case of the Northland bikers.
That squabble took place a few years back in a quiet neighborhood of families and retirees when five motorcycle enthusiasts moved in.
“They liked to ride `choppers,”‘ those souped-up cycles, Harris said. “They had lots of friends who rode choppers, wore leather vests, spikes, tattoos.”
Soon noise complaints cropped up. To retaliate, the bikers invited other pals with choppers to cruise the street. They pitched up tents and camped out in the yard.
This infuriated the neighbors.
It was time for outside help.
Harris had the group of more than 30 neighbors and bikers meet at a police station in the North Patrol Division. The discussion at first was unruly: Some people were adamant that the bikers move, others were struggling to find a resolution.
Suddenly someone began talking about their common interests. They all liked the area. Many had children. The bikers chatted about their home improvements.
“They all started having conversations, and pretty soon they agreed to have a picnic,” Harris said.
That communication and cooperation are the keys, according to Cora Jordan, author of “Neighbor Law: Fences, Trees, Boundaries and Noise” (Nolo Press), now in its second printing.
“Most people don’t intend to annoy each other. I really believe that,” said Jordan, an attorney in Berkeley, Calif. “People don’t set out to be obnoxious. They don’t hear their own music, they don’t hear their own dogs. They don’t intend to bother other people. It’s usually ignorance.”
Or the problem is blown out of proportion. Jordan cites a Rhode Island fence dispute case that made it all the way to the state supreme court. The judge ultimately ruled that 1/2-inch of one picket of the fence was to be trimmed. “Who’s the winner in that? I don’t think there are any winners and losers when neighbors go to court.”
Jordan added that she is a “big believer” in mediation, because it is so successful. “Most mediations have 90 percent-plus rate of success,” she said.
“People don’t understand mediation because they don’t know it, they don’t realize how easy it is,” she added. “Just call your mediation center — there’s one in every big city now — and the center contacts the neighbor and sets up a meeting.”
In Kansas City the parties meet on neutral ground with a mediator. Talks can go for as long as two or three hours. Once a truce is reached, the staff writes up an agreement and the parties sign. A contingency plan may be added in case the agreement falls apart; some people are referred to further counseling, such as anger control.
Most of the time the process works and peace is restored, even if the dispute has been ongoing and hostile.
