Idling in Pinebrook-Response to Nextdoor.com Comments

Scott Lewis, a Pinebrook resident, recently posted a comment about a neighbor’s idling truck on Nextdoor.com.  Mr. Lewis has made his concerns about his neighbor known to the PHOA Board on several occasions.  We understand that he objects to the fact that his neighbor warms up his diesel truck vehicle and lets it idle before driving it.  This is a licensed vehicle that his neighbor operates on his own property, though the noise and fumes certainly carry beyond the property boundary at times.

This is a local dispute between neighbors, and the Board has addressed it in the same manner that it has with numerous other neighbor-vs-neighbor complaints over the years.  These complaints have included dog barking and other noise issues, boundary disputes, lights that shine off the property and numerous other matters.  Here, as in those matters, the PHOA Board’s consistent advice to Mr. Lewis has been that he should address the issue directly with his neighbor and resolve it on that level.  The fact that PHOA has declined to spend tens of thousands of dollars to hire a lawyer to pursue it on his behalf does not make the PHOA negligent, let alone criminally so.

Mr. Lewis is not without a remedy, however.  He has access to all of the law and code enforcement agencies of Summit County if he feels that criminal, building code, or health code violations have occurred.  The PHOA has also reminded Mr. Lewis that our CC&Rs explicitly grant each of our members the right to directly enforce them.  In particular, Mr. Lewis has every right to enforce the CC&Rs in the courts if he believes his neighbor’s conduct is sufficiently noxious toward him that it amounts to a prohibited nuisance.  To date, at least, he has elected not to do so.