Bob de Feyter [03/27/2002]

By Bob de Feyter

News flash! The Conway Police Department will no longer be giving out fines. If this were to happen, the results would be predictable. Most people would continue to respect the laws even if there were no fines. A few people would take advantage of the situation. We don't have police for the vast majority of the people who are law-abiding citizens. We have law enforcement for the very few people who do not follow the rules. Well, rest assured that the Conway Police Department is doing its job. The Conway selectmen, however, may be a different matter. While the police department is responsible for matters related to traffic, parking and crime, the selectmen are responsible for the enforcement of other town ordinances. Last year, the Town of Conway did not collect one single fine for the violation of town ordinances. The results are predictable. Most people continue to respect the ordinances even if there are no fines. A few people take advantage of the situation. We don't have to have enforcement for the vast majority of people who are law-abiding citizens. The question is, should we have code enforcement for the very few people who do not follow the rules? Before resting assured that the Conway Board of Selectmen is doing its job, consider what happened with storage trailers.Back in the year 2000, the Conway town staff became aware of a problem with storage trailers. The town staff identified 13 different situations where storage trailers appeared to be in violation of town ordinance. Notices were sent out. Some of those who got the notices appealed to the Conway selectmen. Now the town ordinances on storage trailers are adopted by the planning board but the enforcement of the ordinances is a responsibility of the Conway selectmen. The selectmen decided they didn't understand the ordinance (although the town enforcement staff did) so the selectmen placed a moratorium on enforcement until such time as the ordinance was "made clear."Now the Conway Planning Board took two years to complete a review of the storage trailer ordinance. In the end, they didn't change anything in the ordinance. What they did was add a requirement that future storage trailers have a buffer and that space on a site being used for storage trailers should be figured into green space and other calculations for the site. The Conway Selectmen who said they did not understand the older, simpler ordinance now are said to understand the new, more complex ordinance. But still, there is no enforcement. The Town of Conway has decided that nothing will be done on storage trailers until a property owner brings something else to the planning board that requires site plan approval. If a storage trailer is on a site without town approval, it can continue to be there until the property owner decided to bring another site plan issue to the planning board. This is like the Conway police adopting a policy that they will not do anything about illegal parking until an offender comes to the police station on some other matter. Of course the Conway police would never adopt such a policy because they know that anyone with parking violations would just stay away from the police station. But the Town of Conway has just such a policy with regard to storage trailers. Anyone with a storage trailer problem is going to avoid the planning board. There is no effective enforcement on storage trailers. Yet there are good reasons why the town should seek to deal with storage trailers. In the commercial areas of Conway, we don't allow automobiles to park anywhere. We have parking lots and even within the lots there are designated spaces for automobiles. If the little automobile has its designated space, why should it be different for the much larger storage trailer? Where there is a need for a storage trailer, an appropriate place should be found. There certainly isn't any benefit to the Town of Conway to have ugly storage trailers haphazardly throughout our commercial areas. Conway is a destination resort. Our town should be attractive. And there is no benefit to Conway taxpayers if storage trailers are being used to avoid paying town property taxes. If storage trailers are being used as permanent storage, they should be placed on the site plan and taxed by the town. I have used storage trailers as just one example of the difficulty in enforcing town ordinances. The town enforcement staff try to do their job. There just isn't firm support from our elected political leadership. If the Conway Police Department didn't issue any fines, questions would immediately be asked about why we have a police force and what is their job? The Town of Conway in its enforcement responsibility did not collect a single fine last year and no one seems to notice or care. I don't want to suggest that collecting a fine or two would solve all our problems. I'm all for enforcement through other means. Just when other means don't work, we should use all the tools at our disposal. Collecting a few fines might do two things. First it would show that there is some support at the top for enforcement. Second, it would shift a little of the cost burden of enforcement to those causing the problems. It strikes me as unfair that Conway taxpayers, most of whom respect town ordinances, must carry the cost of enforcement while those who see personal benefit in ignoring the ordinances face little if any financial consequence.We don't need a police state. We do need a polite state where the Town of Conway shows respect for the vast majority of citizens who observe the town ordinances. Bob de Feyter is a resident of Conway and a former member of the Conway Planning Board.