Things are not all sunshine and roses in the U.S.A., either

[BarkingDogATLAS]

Here is a success story from the coast of Oregon as an example of what happens to communities everywhere:

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/gated_communities_sometimes_fi.html



Hayden Island houseboat community bands together to boot unruly neighbor (http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/gated_communities_sometimes_fi.html)



Residents of West Hayden Island Moorage spent a year trying to get rid of a loud, obnoxious neighbor who appeared to be inviting prostitutes to his all-night parties. It took lots of work with Portland police to get him out. Steve Weisensee (left) and C.W. Taylor walk behind their floating homes, a dock shared by the house whose resident caused them so many sleepless nights.

[fredblog]

sorry can't view it by the looks of things as we have to be resisdents of West Hayden Island it says

[BarkingDogATLAS]

Are you sure? The links still work for me. I don't live in that state.

[er 59]

The link works if you click on the header at the top,but not if you click on the word cont at the bottom ;)

[Olivia]

I can open the link and am in the North West of England.

[Beth]

thanks for sharing that BDA :) here is the article for anyone who is having probs :)


As volunteer head of security and safety at the West Hayden Island Moorage, Steve Weisensee's worst headache used to be people not cleaning up after their dogs.
That changed when a new tenant rented Houseboat 32.




Soon Weisensee, who moved with his wife to the 56-slip gated moorage nine years ago, had serious problems to contend with.
His worries turned from how to rid the moorage of dog manure to how to push out prostitutes, pimps and drug dealers -- crimes he never dreamed of having to confront when he moved from West Linn to the pristine, floating home community.
Clyde Cornell, fellow resident and moorage board member, said the tranquility that attracted many residents was suddenly destroyed.
"We like watching the fish and ducklings playing in the water" Cornell said, "and, all of a sudden, we have a tremendous nuisance that's ruining the sanctity of all that."
Weisensee and his neighbors knew they had to do something, but they weren't sure what. "It's been a year of absolute hell."
Andrew Frank Robinson moved with his wife into a gray, two-story houseboat on the north side of the moorage in May 2008. Robinson told the owner that he was moving back to the Northwest from Michigan, and said he operated a home security alarm business.
"I wasn't really concerned," owner Rebecca McKechnie said. "If you own a security business, you can't have any felonies, right? It seemed fine."
The Robinsons moved in with a 22-foot motor boat and paid the $2,000 monthly rent. They mostly kept to themselves. Residents range in age from 35 to 85 and many are professionals -- business owners or executives, lawyers and doctors -- who sought out the West Hayden Island Moorage because it's quiet and gated.
But once Andrew's wife moved out at the end of last year, life in the moorage deteriorated.
Neighbors regularly complained about Robinson speeding through the parking lot in his black 2008 Cadillac, parking in handicapped spaces without displaying a permit, and flipping off homeowners who wouldn't let his visitors in through the entry gate.
Charlie Arkebauer said he'd be awakened by the all-night partying going on next door -- particularly, the staccato tap of high heels on the concrete walkway passing his houseboat. "I'd hear the stiletto heels going by my place at 1 a.m., and after a half-hour or an hour, I'd hear them going back the other way," Arkebauer said. "The lights were on all night every night. It seemed like he did his living at night."
Couples walking their dogs at night or jogging in the morning would see women -- two at a time -- dressed in fish-net stockings, high-heeled shoes and revealing skirts and blouses, teetering down the steep ramp to the moorage. They'd see money exchanges at Robinson's door., "The guy's appetite was beyond belief, beyond belief," Weisensee said.
At first, the men at the moorage joked, "Party at Andrew's place." After a week, it wasn't so funny.
The moorage residents often share a glass of wine as the sun sets or gather for barbeques on their decks. But social functions became onerous for the moorage's board of directors as residents vented about Robinson.
In March, Weisensee asked for help.
He met with Mark Wells, a North Portland crime prevention coordinator, who connected him to Neighorhood Response Team Officers Jack Gillentine Jr. and Steven Jacquot. They met with the residents and came up with a strategy. Gillentine told residents: Stay safe, don't put yourselves at risk, but keep your eyes open and document what you see that's suspicious.
Residents jotted down license plates of strangers going to Robinson's home, and took photos of the visiting ladies. "Everybody was on board," Cornell said. "We were on high alert."
On her way to work one morning, Nancy Cornell, Clyde's wife, recovered a gym bag she found floating in the river across from Robinson's slip. She collected the scattered contents -- thong underwear, bras, lingerie and lubricants --and gave it to police.
On April 9, a man with a gun showed up at Robinson's door around 8 p.m. demanding money. He held a .22-caliber pistol to Robinson's head and squeezed the trigger, but the gun didn't go off. Robinson screamed, drawing neighbors outside.
"We're all standing there, and Andrew is yelling, 'I'm being robbed!" Ann Jacobsen recalled. Residents called 9-1-1, but the gunman got away, along with two women who had come with him. Robinson gave police the girls' names and their numbers.
The moorage president called Robinson's landlord. After speaking to Robinson by phone, she began looking for a lawyer to start an eviction proceeding.
The next night, resident Michael Maiden was shocked to find a gun in the shrubbery near the entry gate. Maiden thought it was a toy, until he saw the brass of a bullet. He gingerly picked it up and carried it in cupped hands towards the moorage. Weisensee drove by.
"I said, 'Mike, what are you doing?'" Weisensee recalled.
"Mike was a basket case. It shook him up," Weisensee said, adding that Maiden is a sculptor who doesn't have much experience with firearms.
Police picked up the gun, and traced the phone numbers of the girls who came to Robinson's home that night to an adult entertainment website, advertising, "two hotties ready for u!"
Moorage board members checked how many visitors Robinson had buzzed in during April: More than 200. Most residents average 13 to 25 a month.
The joke around the moorage was: Most people have a war zone outside the gate. We have it inside ours."
The next month, on May 18, Arkebauer heard a thump against the back of his houseboat, and felt the house shake.
"We looked out and there was this woman in the water, " Arkebauer said. "She was in the water, holding onto a Jet Ski with tears coming down her face."
Arkebauer rushed to help her. Robinson stepped out and told his neighbors to move away. "She won't get out of the water because she's nude, unless you leave," Robinson told them.
Arkebauer called police. The woman apparently had been thrown from the second-floor balcony of Robinson's houseboat. Robinson was arrested, accused of fourth-degree assault, and the woman was arrested on an outstanding warrant for prostitution.
One day his neighbors noticed that Robinson had placed a pile of trash bags in front of his houseboat. He hired a man to carry his trash once a week to the dumpster in the moorage parking lot. Concerned Robinson was trying to get rid of evidence, residents swiped the bags from the dumpster.
At first police told the residents not to grab the man's trash, but after seeking legal advice, they told them they could continue, as long as they made it clear officers hadn't asked them to do so.
Neighbors dragged the trash bags to Cornell's garage. "We'd suit up and put on big green rubber gloves," said C.W. Taylor, moorage board president, and then sift through the garbage.
"I needed a respirator at times," Taylor said. They found crack pipes, home-made drug bongs, torn bedsheets. The evidence was given to Gillentine.
By June 2, a judge had signed a warrant, allowing police to search Robinson's houseboat, based largely on the evidence gathered by moorage residents.
About 11:40 a.m., officers dressed in tactical uniforms approached in a Multnomah County sheriff's boat. A PGE worker knocked on Robinson's door. When Robinson opened up, dozens of officers swarmed in.
Hours later, police had Robinson arrange to buy cocaine from his suppliers. Police waited to bust the dealers when they arrived at the moorage.
Residents who had been battling Robinson for months assembled their lawn chairs, grabbed beer and sat back on their recliners to witness the arrests. Some clicked photos.
"It was a relief, trust me," Taylor said. "Our mission was accomplished to a certain degree."
Police seized drug residue, drug paraphernelia and cash from the house. Robinson was booked and released. The landlord continued to press for Robinson's eviction, but the process was slow, and, in the end, didn't succeed.
About a week ago, as a grand jury indicted Robinson on possession of cocaine, he packed up his belongings and took off, skipping out with unpaid rent, and damage to the houseboat.
His landlord surmised he left because he faced "too much heat" from his neighbors in what she described as the little moorage "fishbowl." On Friday, Robinson was arraigned, and pleaded not guilty to the drug charge.
"Truly, it's like a sunny day," Clyde Cornell said. "A pall has been lifted off the moorage."
Wells and police credited a successful community-policing collaboration.
"When you hear the community say 'it's like a sunny day,' "Gillentine noted, "you really don't get much better than that."