October 19, 2006 Issue                                       

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©2006 The Chestnut Hill Local

Opinion

(Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

Signs, signs.... everywhere, signs

So... more than a month has passed and the main topic of discussion in Chestnut Hill has not changed. The overwhelming majority of e-mail I get that I can’t quantify as spam concerns the issue of Bowman Properties and its ubiquitous red and white signs. I’m not sure if Chestnut Hill has a history of angry mobs, but judging by the tone of many e-mails I get, we may establish that precedent in the next month or so.

The sentiment is understandable. A lot of people, both business owners on Germantown Avenue and residents off the avenue have a lot of money invested in their shops and homes. They’re concerned about those investments, and they’re looking for answers from Chestnut Hill’s leadership. The neighborhood wants answers: What are you going to do about the signs?

I bring this up because some people have noted that they feel continued coverage of the sign affair and the publishing of frank letters and one unflattering cartoon may be enraging Richard Snowden, Bowman’s principal partner and alleged architect of the sign strategy (“alleged” because Snowden has said little publicly about the signs. He hasn’t even taken credit for the sign idea).

And perhaps the paper is enraging Snowden. But anyone who hangs signs promoting the unraveling of the understood social fabric of a neighborhood — the threat of bringing in “undesirable” shops to spoil the preserved village character that everyone in Chestnut Hill holds dear — has to expect a few rocks back.

I also bring this up because it is a challenge that the community’s leadership should consider. This friction may have been generated by differences between Snowden and the Local, Snowden and the Chestnut Hill District or Snowden and the Chestnut Hill Community Association, but the signs have dragged in the whole neighborhood. Everyone feels affected by the signs and everyone has a stake in seeing them taken down.

On the same token, the neighborhood has a right to express impatience. Bowman’s signs are ridiculous and wholly unnecessary. It is frustrating to be placed in a situation over which you have no control.

Still, it’s worth appreciating the fact that the community’s decision makers and leaders are in a tough bind. The Chestnut Hill Community Association will meet with him this week. They affirmed at last week’s executive committee meeting that they aren’t interested in forcing the paper to apologize for past coverage of Bowman Properties, a demand Snowden has voiced several times.

The Chestnut Hill District has already met with him. They, like the CHCA, don’t have much at their disposal other than to talk to him. Even enacting a sheriff’s sale on Snowden’s property currently under liens resulting from unpaid Business Improvement District assessments would have little effect. No matter what the cost, Snowden has the money to pay the assessments and stop any forced sale of his assets tomorrow.

It’s good that the community’s leaders are doing what they can to meet with Snowden to bring these signs down. Chestnut Hill residents should be patient with them. If it were up to the leaders of these organizations, the signs would come down tomorrow. The signs can only come down when Richard Snowden decides to take them down.

It’s his game, and he owns all the pieces.

Pete Mazzaccaro

A clarification, an invitation and a duck
By Ed (These columns write themselves) Feldman

Part One: The Signs

This is about signs. It’s not about me, a duck, Ron Recko, his dog, or even about vacant stores. It’s about the signs that went up weeks ago that everyone hates. Anyone who tells you differently is trying to confuse you. These signs were put up by Richard Snowden of Bowman Properties. But the reason for these signs, their true meaning, and the date that they will be removed is still a public mystery.

The only thing that we can be sure of is that they are a detriment to our neighborhood and that we want them gone. But how?

More than one member of the CHCA board has called the Department of Licenses and Inspections and learned that no permit for the signs was applied for, and that an inspector would be sent to investigate. This would seem to indicate illegality. But despite my repeated pleas to the Business Association, the Business Improvement District and the CHCA, NO PUBLIC ACTION HAS BEEN TAKEN.

At the CHCA Executive meeting on Oct. 12 — a public meeting — I proposed a series of actions:

• First, engaging an attorney for the purpose of exploring legal remedies regarding removal of the signs;

• Second, contacting Bowman Property tenants who have been, by Mr. Snowden, brought into this dispute, although they have no role in the affair other than being tenants of the man who placed the signs. Here the details are hazy, because tenants have been reluctant to speak on the matter. But if they feel that they have been unfairly treated, pressured, or threatened in any way, I urge them to contact any member of the CHCA board. They are our constituents, and they deserve our support;

• Third, continuing to use the press to shine a light on the entire matter.

No action was taken on any of my proposals. While many have told me of private conversations and meetings with Mr. Snowden on this matter, they have all been just that: private, and therefore subject to conjecture, innuendo, and rumor. And most importantly, kept from you, the public.

Yet the signs are public. And the outrage is public. I, and a clear majority of those elected to the CHCA board in the last election, ran on a platform of transparency (what a lovely word picture). Private meetings on public matters run contrary to this principal.

Jim Foster, a CHCA board member, composed a small letter to be published in the Local, inviting Mr. Snowden to air his side of the story in the Local. Mr. Foster has contacted various Hill organizations to sign and therefore endorse a PUBLIC discussion of the matter.

As of this writing, the following groups have declined such an endorsement: the Historical Society, the Business Association, and the Business Improvement District. Why? Again, these groups seem to favor private meetings with representatives of their own choosing rather than a public forum open to all of us who have all been impacted equally by these signs, which grow more numerous each week. So this invitation, as of this writing, is not going to appear in this week’s Local. So allow me to extend one:

Mr. Snowden, I personally invite you to the public CHCA board meeting on Oct. 26, at the Free Library in Chestnut Hill to discuss the following: Why were the signs put up, what is their purpose, and when will they be removed. While this line of discussion may lead to other issues, these are the central ones. If this date is inconvenient, then give an alternate date to the CHCA and we can arrange a town meeting on the matter. If a written discussion is preferable, then contact the Local and arrangements will be made for one. Inaction on your part to make your opinions known, in public, to the residents of Chestnut Hill on this matter, can only be interpreted as indifference or hostility to the entire neighborhood that you profess to love.

Part Two: The Duck

While no stranger to celebrity, I was unprepared for the fame that has come to me concerning Lil’ Quacky. He (she?) seems to have gained more notoriety out of public view than in. And while the unanimous response (to me) about my actions has been one of approval, this may be due to the fact that those who disapprove don’t have the stones to speak to me at all.

I like it that way. But because those in control of our diminishing and damaged menagerie (why did they get so many flimsy creatures? Toronto only used cows — they knew,) refused to negotiate with me personally about L.Q.’s return to the avenue, they have bothered those whom I care about to get me to return my adopted fugitive.

And so to spare my friends more nonsense, and because my point has been made, and because even though I am removing the offending language from the duck (I can say without any hesitation that I have never written anything more surreal in my life) — you all know what it did have written on it — I am returning The Duck.

And even though I have been given no assurances, I assume that Lil’ Quacky will be returned to its original spot, at the entrance to our community, at the all-night flower shop (Shout Out Doggs!) at Cresheim and the avenue, where it can greet all newcomers in the spirit of Hill openness, tolerance and the freedom of artistic expression that we have all become accustomed to.

I also look forward to it raising a lot of money when it is auctioned off in November. So there will be The Peace. But if something should befall him/her, if he should hang himself in his prison cell, or be struck by a bolt of lightning, then that I do not forgive.