- April 26, 2024
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Earlier this spring, I found a note taped to my garage door. It was a friendly reminder that if I didn’t put my garbage can out of sight, I would be hanged.
Figuratively speaking, of course. Hanged in the court of public opinion, as it were.
I was contrite. It was true that my recycling bins and garbage can were outside for the world to see, and that I was causing much embarrassment to our fair city as a result.
As any self-respecting homeowner would, I started looking around to find someone else I could tattle on and pay it forward.
A few days later, I called Code Enforcement Manager Barbara Grossman on an unrelated matter, and she spilled the beans. Apparently, I was one of many victims of a project called Operation Can-Can. It’s not a big priority of the enforcers — they mostly put up those notices only in response to a complaint from a neighbor.
And boy, do they complain. One resident of the L-section sent Grossman a long email saying the neighborhood was going downhill fast. I see his point: I recently saw a packing peanut blowing past my mailbox.
The L-section isn’t the only target of Operation Can-Can. A P-section man whom I’ll call Larry complained about his neighbor’s garbage can. After a notice on the garage, the neighbor moved the can to the backyard, but that didn’t satisfy Larry. He called the city again and said, “I can still see it.”
The law is, after all, that the garbage cans must be kept out of public view. And if your neighbor happens to be Larry, and he happens to like spying on you from the public view, you better hide them or you will have notices frequently posted on your garage.
Grossman said she gets conflicting emails regularly. One will say their neighborhood looks like someone set off an atomic bomb under a mountain of sewage (my paraphrase), and that code enforcement needs to do something before property values fall. The next day she gets a venomous email saying the city’s petty code enforcement officers act like they’re seeking a promotion in the Gestapo (my paraphrase).
What is the proper balance?
It seems to me that we need a more personal approach. Imagine if, rather than calling the city to tattle on someone for having an overgrown weed, Larry notified the neighbor himself, without involving the government.
To avoid the embarrassment of taping a notice to the garage door, instead Larry could write it on a paper plate, load it up with chocolate chip cookies, and put it on the neighbor’s doorstep with a big red ribbon. When they finish the cookies, they will discover Larry’s humble request. And, they’ll be in a much better mood. They'll happily mow their lawn and won't experience the shame of being notified publicly.
I’m glad we had this talk, Larry. Just so you know, I prefer milk chocolate chips over semisweet.
