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Gettysburg — Noise ordinance expensive to enforce. Constitutionality, manpower issues, stall borough noise ordinance.
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Posted: Thursday, July 22, 2010 10:30 pm
BY SCOT ANDREW PITZER - Times Staff Writer | 0 comments
As Gettysburg Borough Council continues its multi-year quest to regulate noise, the board’s solicitor has acknowledged that enacting a constitutional noise ordinance in Gettysburg won’t be easy.
In fact, Council Solicitor Harold A. Eastman Jr. told the nine-member board during its July 12 meeting that the proposed ordinance has been quite a “challenge” during what has become a near two-year legal review.
“The courts have said it must be objective, not subjective,” Eastman told council. “The courts have favored municipalities that have objective standards,” added Eastman.
The borough lacks a noise ordinance, so it is unable regulate excessive truck and motorcycle clatter, among other noise issues. Residents have complained about noise for years.
“We can’t have a noise violation be what our police say is a noise violation. We must define that,” added Eastman.
In order to enforce an “objective” noise ordinance, Gettysburg Police Department will most likely have to purchase decibel-monitoring equipment, and train its officers to use the devices. Currently, there the borough does not own decibel equipment, and no officers are trained to use it anyway.
“It would require equipment and training,” explained Eastman, noting the economic situation in a borough, where annual spending plans are difficult to balance.
“It may not be something that this borough would be favorable in undertaking,” he said.
Previous attempts by council to curtail noise in Gettysburg have been futile, as a proposed noise ordinance has languished for two years.
A proposed noise ordinance was submitted to the borough’s legal firm for review in Nov. 2008, and has remained in limbo. Constitutionality and enforcement concerns have plagued the progress of the ordinance, which was designed to reduce noise pollution.
Council Vice President Holliday Giles has noted that enforcing a noise ordinance is a “manpower issue,” and that the 13-person Gettysburg Police Department often times has other priorities, such as vehicular accidents and public safety.
“There’s no sense in enacting some sort of ordinance that there is no enforcement,” said Giles. “We have a difficult time when it circles around to the enforcement part of it.”
Still, many councilors on the nine-member board are adamant that a noise ordinance is precisely what the borough needs to regulate its noise pollution problem: specifically truck and motorcycle noise.
“We don’t have a comprehensive noise ordinance,” Council President John Butterfield said during a recent radio interview. “It’s time for us to have a comprehensive noise ordinance.” Butterfield has said the borough’s proposed ordinance was modeled after a code in Lancaster City, which has proven to be constitutional.
The borough’s ordinance, per Butterfield, will be “complaint-driven,” meaning that citizen complaints will trigger enforcement — not police.
Neighboring communities have noise ordinances, such as Cumberland Township, enacted in 2008.
“Just because it works somewhere else, doesn’t mean it will work here,” said Eastman, explaining that a “noise ordinance is a penal ordinance,” so a penalty is involved.
“If you pass an ordinance, I don’t believe noise goes away,” he said.
Cumberland Township Police Chief Don Boehs has told me that his department (like Gettysburg Police Department), does not have decibel-monitoring equipment, nor any officers trained to utilize the machinery.
Why?
Because the Cumberland ordinance is complaint-driven, and does not focus on motorcycles on truck noise.
Instead, it focuses on overnight and early morning trash pick-up and construction work, and cannon fire (think re-enactments), making it relatively easy to enforce.
If you’re building a house between 10 p.m.-7 a.m., and a neighbor can hear you, you get fined. It’s fairly straightforward.
“We open ourselves up to problems if we enforce it against motorcycles but not against football games,” said Gettysburg Councilman Bob Krummerich.
Butterfield has explained that the proposed code is “comprehensive” and that it focuses on a variety of noise issues, such as construction, street work, animals and motor vehicle noise, among others.
Even with the manpower and constitutionality concerns, the nine-member board voted unanimously July 12, authorizing Solicitor Eastman to focus on drafting a comprehensive noise ordinance.
There will likely be significant public input over the next few months as council contemplates the ordinance — which won’t even be enforceable, unless the borough purchases equipment and trains its police officers.
Is it an ordinance that the borough can afford?
Noise laws may work in Cumberland Township or Lancaster City, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it will work here.
After all, in Eastman’s own words: “If you pass an ordinance, I don’t believe noise goes away.”
