Lehigh St. resident faces fine mess if no clean up

Richard Tedesco

A Lehigh Street resident whose home has been the subject of complaints by neighbors and summons from the village faces a trial in Williston Village Park next month – and possbile fines – if he hasn’t cleaned up his act by then.

In Williston Park village court last Wednesday night, Williston Park acting Village Court Justice Beth Swendson-Dowd told Bernard Stoehr of 101 Lehigh Street he would face a trial on Nov. 7, with or without an attorney, if he had not removed the debris from his yard by then. 

“There seems to be a lot of debris,” Swendson-Dowd said, looking at pictures of the backyard that had been entered as evidence in the case. “You are facing fines in the range of thousands of dollars.”

At the outset of Stoehr’s court appearance, village prosecutor Edward Emanuele told Swendson-Dowd, Stoehr had not complied with calls to clean up the yard.

Emanuele had conferred with Stoehr before the Lehigh Street resident was called to stand before the judge. 

She said she told Stoehr that if he was unable to pay the fines, the village could put liens against his property.

Stoehr said he could not afford to make repairs to the home. He said he had been out of work for the past four years and he had not been receiving unemployment benefits for the past year.

“There’s no money. There’s no work,” Stoehr told the judge.

Swendson-Dowd suggested that he start dragging some of the debris from his backyard out to the curb for garbage pick-up to address the concerns of neighbors who had been calling village administrators to complain about conditions on his property.

Stoehr asked the judge if the court would be satisfied if he was able to remove some of the debris before his next court appearance.

“Improvement helps,” the judge replied. 

Several of Stoehr’s neighbors on Lehigh Street had complained at the Williston Park Village Board meeting last Monday night of the smell coming from the debris in Stoehr’s backyard and the condition of his house.

“This home is condemnable. I stand before you asking you to do something,” Lehigh Street resident Annmarie Dulce. 

Village of Williston Park Mayor Paul Ehrbar said the case had to take its course in village court, where Stoehr could be obliged to remedy the situation.

“We can’t just send a bulldozer there and knock his house down,” Ehrbar said.

Neighbors said the case had been adjourned twice during the past two months.

Ehrbar said the village justices had been informed that the village board wanted to see the situation resolved quickly.

Village attorney James Bradley said that forcing Stoehr to respond in village court offered the “fastest recourse” in the case. But he said it also might be possible to obtain an injunction against the homeowner in county court and said he would explore the situation further.

In village court on Wednesday, Stoehr said health problems had prevented him from cleaning up the debris. He said that it took him a week to remove a tree that had recently fallen in his backyard.

“I’ve been in and out of the hospital since this started,” he said.

Swendson-Dowd said she sympathized with him, but said the court needed to be responsive to his neighbors’ concerns.

“I’m sympathetic to your infirmities but I’m also sensitive to the concerns of the village,” she said. “I’m telling you to help yourself by doing whatever clean-up you can.”

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