<p>I am an existing poster, posting under another name for privacy reasons. I have recently learned that a group home has moved to our street. There was a neighbor’s meeting about it and a lot of confusion about things like zoning, notification, what our rights are and what is discriminatory. After some confusion as to how this could happen on a street zoned only for single family homes, nobody objects to the presence of the residents, who are physically and mentally disabled individuals. We understand that that the law protects their ability to live here just as any other family would. </p>
<p>The home has a lot of curb appeal from the outside, but an elderly couple lived there and it had not been updated in many years and needed work. Typically this kind of home would be a knockdown , but when the H passed away, the out of state heirs came in for a day and sold it fast for a far below market price, even in this economy. There were some quick renovations done and then residents and a full staff of caregivers moved in. They did it quietly, under a literal cover of darkness. None of us had any idea beforehand and there was no notification or zoning hearing. We have since discovered that the home was bought by a businessman who also owns many other group homes throughout the state , and leases them out to a national non-profit. </p>
<p>Most of us chose to live on this street because it is a non through street and is, or I should say was, extremely quiet. Already this home is causing a lot of noise and disruption. A dozen or more cars are parked all over the driveway, front lawn and street, sometimes many more. Employee cars or the friends, husbands or girlfriends picking up employees after shifts are over speed down the street. Loud radios blare from cars and from the home, including before 7 AM and late at night. The car situation is especially bad during shift changes and their weekly regional meetings, when staff members from other homes travel to this one. Then they are parked all over the formerly beautiful lawn, now torn to shreds, in front of people’s homes and blocking their driveways. Ambulances and police have already been called to the street a number of times. </p>
<p>We will be meeting with town and non-profit representatives soon and I will likely be attending both of these meetings. Is there anyone who has had any experience with a group home on their street? Was it able to eventually integrate with the neighborhood? Are there any questions we should ask? Accomodations we should seek? Do we need to consider hiring a lawyer? What is the bar on calling this house a nuisance? Can the homeowner be forced to terminate the lease if it’s shown to be an ongoing problem? And is there anything to prevent the same thing from happening all over again in the future? </p>
<p>Real estate agents and lawyers, I would especially appreciate your input.</p>
<p>What type of residents are at the home, op? There are a number of possibilities. If there is no criminal element, I would mainly be concerned with the parking and the after hours noise. Several neighborhoods I have been though have “quiet zone” signs to mitigate noise issues.</p>
<p>It depends on the agency that runs the group home. We have several in our area, my D has worked at 2 and now, in a different position, visits them all on a monthly basis. You would never know by driving by them that any of these are group homes. They are well maintained and fit into the neighborhood very well. There are never that many vehicles coming and going. Yes, sometimes they need to call an ambulance or the police, but that depends on the particular individuals in the house. I don’t think she ever had to call either one at the 2 homes she worked at.</p>
<p>We have 3 different agencies that operate group homes. I would be totally comfortable with my D’s agency having a home right next to me. I would actually welcome it if they could replace the neighbor on one side of me. Her agency trains their staff well and stays on top of things. The other 2 agencies I would not be keen on. Part of that reason is that they deal more with people with behavioral issues which can be very difficult. D’s agency is more for the developmentally disabled. The 2 other agencies may have a different philosophy in training their staff as well. </p>
<p>I don’t know what recourse you have at this point since apparently the sale went through with the fact that this was going to be a group home for that agency. The town approved it as such. Definitely go to the meetings with your concerns. Take pictures to show them. Keep track of the noise if you can. These issues can be fixed if the agency cares about being a good neighbor. Good luck.</p>
<p>I’m going to guess that they had to do just a little more than some quick cleaning up and touch up to open a group home. Where I am, these need to comply with ALL ADA requirements including accessibility and life/safety compliance (think dooways, bathrooms, fire alarm and sprinkler system, etc)…in order to be licensed as a group home. I’m not sure this is true everywhere…but I have a hard time imagining a group home that doesn’t comply with ADA requirements.</p>
<p>I can’t comment as a professional but I do have friends who had a group home go in behind them…also very unannounced. The neighbors were very upset that they had not gotten any notice. I will say…they now find this is one of the nicest and quietest homes on the block. These group home residents are wonderful neighbors with a huge supervisory staff 24/7.</p>
<p>In their case, they also realized that a private sale could have been to someone who was less than “respectful” of their neighborhood.</p>
<p>I know you aren’t asking this question…but I’m having trouble figuring out what your concerns are about this group home. If your town enforces things like blight clauses and noise clauses already, this group home would be subject to the same regulations. </p>
<p>My guess is that will improve the property (outside) as time goes on…a good project for the new tenants.</p>
<p>I would also attend the meeting with my concerns.</p>
<p>BUT if I lived in your neighborhood, I would also immediately ask your town zoning office/police dept to ENFORCE the existing ordinances.
Noise before/after a certain hour, parking on front lawn (not driveway), speeding, etc are all violations in our area.
If you request enforcement and it is denied or lacking, you could bring this information to the meeting as well.</p>
<p>As the parent of a disabled young adult daughter but also someone who enjoys peace in my neighborhood, I can see several sides to this issue.
Good luck.</p>
<p>You need to check the zoning ordinances… then photograph and document all issues you see and take it to the meeting. Perhaps the group home could build a parking area behind the house to fix the parking issue?</p>
<p>We have just one in our bucolic village … a halfway house for recently released non-violent prison inmates. It’s located in an isolated area, so the half-dozen cars and unkept premises are relatively inoffensive. In the next town over there’s a group home for youthful offenders. It is located in a neighborhood. Residents there are used to their cars being “borrowed” on a regular basis. Bottom line … it depends.</p>
<p>I think you need to focus on the central tenet of group homes … which is that the residents are capable of living in a community. That means they are capable of following the rules of the community. Good luck resolving your situation.</p>
<p>I agree with this. We went through something like this recently and found out you have to be very careful about how you approach it. * Don’t* make an issue of the fact that it is a group home for people with some sort of disability, low-income or what have you. People will start screaming discrimination and all sense of rationality will go out the window. Don’t be surprised if the media picks up on it.</p>
<p>Document your concerns, take pictures. Noise, traffic, parking, the upkeep of the front lawn, etc. are all legitimate concerns regardless of who is living there. Talk about the standard for the neighborhood. In reality, a group home is a multi-family residence as well as a business operation. Find out what the zoning laws in your area are - don’t be surprised if it wasn’t addressed - especially if you live in an older part of town. Definitely hire an attorney. All of our neighbors pitched in to pay for one, who lived in the area and was willing to do it at a lower rate.</p>
<p>We weren’t able to stop what was going on in our area but the developer ended up making some major concessions that made it more palpable to the current residents. Good luck.</p>
<p>It ultimately boils down to what the local laws and zoning regulations say. It’s important to understand the difference between what you’d prefer they not do and what they’re actually legally prohibited from doing. </p>
<p>The later is something you can monitor and do something about, but the former is ultimately none of your business if it’s taking place on or inside private property.</p>
<p>Agree with momlive. Keep the issues to those related to code violations (noise, parking,…) rather than focusing on who is living in the home. Do you know your city’s code requirements related to parking, noise? If not, find out what they are. </p>
<p>Thank you for all the valuable feedback and I apologize ahead of time for the long post. To answer some of the questions, the residents are developmentally and physically disabled. I know that one person is autistic, several are intellectually and physically disabled. We have been assured that violent people of any kind, criminals who have been released from jail and sex offenders are excluded and are not protected under the Fair Housing laws. </p>
<p>We’ve had people look over our zoning ordinances, which are as strict as anywhere. The biggest shock to my neighbors is that the local zoning really makes little difference. I just got a lengthy email from a neighbor that explains some of this. Federal law requires something called “reasonable accomodation” on the part of local government and has overturned almost every case in which these local zoning restrictions have challenged the location of a home. For example, we are not zoned for multi-family housing, boarding home or commercial business usage plus many other restrictions. These homes are considered none of the above, but are protected the same as any family dwelling. Although state laws vary a little as to the allowed capacity, it’s my impression that they are entitled to move into any neighborhood in any state. Even self governed communities in a homeowner’s association are not exempt.</p>
<p>My neighbor also says that there does not seem to be any limit at all as to how many can be on a street, just the same as you obviously could not discriminate over the number of houses of families with disabled children or the number of minority families within a given radius, either. You can only require notification or spacing of homes if you do so across the board and never if the end result is to impact disabled people disproportionately and he says that just about never happens. A local jurisdiction that tries to enforce restrictions like these will almost always have them overturned if challenged and it is a very high standard, with few exceptions. If they lose, local jurisdictions must pay court costs and other damages. All this has had the intended effect of forcing local governments into compliance. </p>
<p>My concerns? Frankly, if the house does continue to be a disruptive nuisance there may be little or nothing that we can do other than document everything so that the town fines the landlord. I’m just not sure that is going to be much of a deterrent. The landlord doesn’t live there and makes a fortune doing this. Fines are probably just another cost of doing business to him. Forcing the end of the lease will probably never happen because the town won’t risk being sued for discrimination. The non-profit may want to be cooperative, at least I hope so. </p>
<p>I fully understand the need for these homes to be within residential communities. It just seems that you can’t throw common sense out the window if the home is going to fundamentally change the nature of a street or a community and that there has to be a better way to consider everyone’s needs and rights. An in-home business of this scale would have had to submit to traffic studies and zoning variance applications and would have been denied by the zoning board in all of two seconds flat. Multiple homes on the same street can easily turn into a traffic and disruption nightmare. </p>
<p>Momlive, we’ve heard this, too and the violations really are our main concerns. It really is not about the concept of the residents being there at all. There but for the grace of God go any of us. Arabrab, thank you very much for that link.</p>
<p>That is the point. It should not change the nature of a street or community at all. </p>
<p>D’s agency is a non-profit and the entire agency is located within our county so maybe they try harder. As I said, you could never pick out the houses on any street that are part of her agency. </p>
<p>The other 2 agencies that operate group homes are for profits. You may want to check if the group home by you is non-profit or for profit, but I am not sure if it makes a difference.</p>
<p>Just talked to D and she said the same thing that has been said here - if they are violating ordinances, call the police. Her agency would not tolerate the noise or the mess. The for profits? Not so sure they would be as diligent or concerned.</p>
<p>“That is the point. It should not change the nature of a street or community at all.”</p>
<p>Exactly. Because if it DID change the nature of the neighborhood, the approving authorities would be responsible for the effects of those changes (whether the changes be good, or bad).</p>
<p>We have a group home in our neighborhood for recovering alcoholics. They are good guys and get involved in some of the community activities.</p>
<p>I don’t know exactly how the system works, but I know our neighborhood has complained regularly that our end of town gets the lion’s share of group homes. I think they go to zoning, but they rarely listen to the neighbors. (And for the most part the neighbors are overly negative.) I do know that more than 3 unrelated people aren’t supposed to live in a house in a one-family neighborhood in our town.</p>
<p>mathmom, One of our concerns is that an operator, either the agency, the landlord or both, will intentionally concentrate homes in an area for economy of services, in order to be efficient. It may not be a coincidence that they are all in your end of town or anything your town can prevent. They don’t need to go to zoning at all if they are considered the same as a single family dwelling. The unrelated person restrictions would not apply, either.</p>
<p>^That’s sort of what has happened to us and, of course, people get concerned. Housing values are very much dependent upon people’s perception of the desirability of a neighborhood or part of town and all it takes is for a few realtors to say ‘hey, you might not want to live there because of x’ for an area to lose value. When people are looking to buy into a neighborhood, they are generally thinking single family homes for the most part. People fear what they don’t understand.</p>
<p>Having said that, I don’t think people with disabilities, those who are working on getting back into society or those in low-income housing or other such issues should be discriminated against but they do need to be held to the same standards as everyone else. Having a dozen cars parked in front of a house on a daily basis, loud noise, blocking people’s driveways violate those standards and need to be addressed. The problem we have seen is the people who initiate these projects often have no skin in the game beyond collecting their big bucks and walking away. I’m sure it’s much more of an issue with the for-profits as Kitty56 pointed out but often times these developers or operators don’t even live in the community where they are setting these services up. It’s no skin off their back if things go wrong. That is what is so disturbing to me…there has to be some accountability there.</p>
<p>That “perception” problem is what drove a lot of issues when housing was desegregated; I’m pretty uncomfortable with that.</p>
<p>But the real impacts of group homes – if there is excessive vehicle traffic, failure to maintain the yard, noise issue – those should all be fair game for code enforcement imo.</p>
<p>In our case it’s not a single agency or operator. It’s that houses cost less in our part of town. It’s not that most of these group homes are a problem, but a fairness issue. Since we have no say since they don’t have to follow the zoning law.</p>
<p>I don’t think real estate brokers are allowed to say anything about the existence of a group home. A neighbor was told studies show no evidence home prices are affected by a group home, even in a down market. But you can’t force someone to buy a home and I don’t know how you can ever know word on the street did or did not affect an individual sale. </p>
<p>I think arabrab is right and statements of concern over property value have even been considered as evidence of discriminatory mindset. I don’t believe that has a basis if the issue is consistently with the disruptive nature of the house and not the residents.</p>
<p>I also totally agree with MomLive that there are few repercussions and little accountability. It’s been made extremely tough as a matter of policy because otherwise anyone who could find a way to fight the homes would.</p>