With the memory of last month’s early morning brawl still vivid, the town of Gorham is seeking an ordinance to combat rowdy residential behavior.
“We’re not going to stand for it,” Councilor Burleigh Loveitt, chairman of the ordinance committee, said before Tuesday’s Town Council meeting. “We’ve had enough.”
And so Tuesday, councilors, in a 5-1 vote, directed its ordinance committee to recommend rules to regulate the disorderly use of residential properties.
The action comes less than a month after a 1 a.m. brawl at a fraternity house, involving some 40 people, spilled onto School Street. On Dec. 13, police arrested three college-age men, who were not University of Southern Maine students, in a melee stilled by six police officers outside Sigma Nu. Police said knives and brass knuckles were involved in a fight that apparently erupted when several uninvited guests crashed the party and refused to leave the fraternity property when the party was over.
Just a couple days before the incident, residents on Preble, Elm and South streets met in Robie Gym with fraternities, other students, university officials and police. The neighbors of fraternity houses aired complaints that included noise, public indecency, theft, street fights and vandalism. Loveitt said the Town Council and residents were “sick and tired” of the behavior.
Before the Town Council meeting, Loveitt said an ordinance would apply town wide, but he singled out one downtown neighborhood – the Preble Street area – as a current, chronic problem.
But Town Councilor Brenda Caldwell said at the meeting she doesn’t favor an ordinance that would target one group. She said high school students have had parties, too.
Town Manager David Cole said the town had found language in a Portland ordinance that could be useful in Gorham.
“This item would not just apply to fraternity houses,” Cole said.
Gorham Police Chief Ron Shepard told town councilors an ordinance would assist police when landlords wouldn’t cooperate with them.
“We’re not doing this to target fraternities,” Shepard said
Shepard said earlier this week that police have had problems at apartment houses in different areas in town. But last month’s School Street fight put the issue of disorderly conduct on the “front burner,” Shepard said.
Council Vice Chairman Mike Phinney said an ordinance could give the town “a stick, if people aren’t willing to work together.”
Town Councilor Phil Csoros was the lone vote against sending the measure to the ordinance committee.
“Lets clamp down and work with the university without creating another ordinance,” he said.
Councilor Noah Miner attended the neighborhood meeting last month, and this week advocated continuing meetings to minimize incidents. Shepard said initial meetings eight years ago had an impact, but the number of calls to police rose over time.
Only two members of the public were on hand for the Town Council discussion of the ordinance proposal, and both spoke. State Street resident Jeremy Greene said an ordinance would have been helpful in the past to him as a landlord to “get rid of” an undesirable tenant.
Matthew Taggett, Sigma Nu president, asked the Town Council if fraternities could have an input in developing an ordinance that would impact them. Loveitt said ordinance committee meetings are public and any interested party would be “welcome and treated courteously.”
Besides Sigma Nu, other downtown frat houses are Delta Chi at 23 Preble St., and Phi Kappa Sigma, 27 Preble St. With university students on the semester break, representatives from Delta Chi and Phi Kappa Sigma couldn’t be reached for comment Monday and Tuesday.
Rhonda Laughlin, who lives and works on Elm Street, said noise, destruction and disgusting behavior have happened for the 12 years she’s been there.
“Move them on campus,” Laughlin said Monday as a solution to neighborhood problems. “How much of this would you tolerate on campus?” she said, referring her question to the university.
Laughlin, of Whispy Ends hair salon, said university students getting haircuts have been pleasant.
“They’re all nice until they get alcohol,” she said. “They get loud and obnoxious.”
Earlier this week, Taggett said Sigma Nu is instituting plans to maintain control at parties. Taggett said the fraternity would increase the number of members as monitors inside and outside its house. And, Taggett said, Sigma Nu would limit entrance to its house to university students only.
Before sending the proposal to its ordnance committee, the Town Council approved Loveitt’s amendment to the council’s original order, deleting the word “rental” in describing residential properties to be impacted by an ordinance.
Bruce Roullard, a School Street resident who lives near the campus, said Monday an ordinance shouldn’t be limited. Roullard, who serves on the Sigma Nu housing corporation, said an ordinance should encompass all entities including commercial properties and the university.
“It should be applied across the board,” Roullard said.
Loveitt said Gorham residents have experienced property damage and threats to their personal safety.
“We have a problem,” Loveitt told the other councilors before Tuesday’s vote.
‘We’ve had enough’ – Gorham seeks rules to keep peace
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