BEL-NOR 鈥 The 1,400 residents of this tiny suburb nestled between the University of Missouri-狐狸视频, Incarnate Word Academy and the lush green spaces of Normandie Golf Club and the Lake Charles Park Cemetery take pride in the diverse architecture of their midcentury homes and the mature trees shading them.
Houses are well-maintained and the lawns meticulously manicured. Most of them, anyway. City Hall makes sure of it.
鈥淕rass right now at this time of year is a constant battle,鈥 said Alderwoman Charlee McBride, who also serves as the volunteer building commissioner overseeing Bel-Nor鈥檚 roughly 750 homes.
Let it grow higher than 7 inches and you鈥檙e liable to get a notice from the city, possibly McBride herself. She鈥檚 juggling that with another task to ensure residents are paying for trash service, a tedious chore that involves double-checking property records with a list of paying customer addresses from waste hauler Republic Services.
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鈥淚 expect people to be accountable,鈥 McBride said. 鈥淪hould I ignore the fact that you don鈥檛 have waste service? Should I ignore the fact your grass might be extremely high? Should I allow you to go ahead and move in and let you just fix up the property whenever you decide?鈥
But the zealous 鈥 some say arbitrary 鈥 code enforcement has divided this small north 狐狸视频 County community into two camps, split right down the middle: McBride tied with her challenger, the Rev. Jonell Calloway, for one of four aldermanic seats in the April election. That tie came only after Calloway petitioned for a recount when initial results showed her one vote shy of McBride鈥檚 91.
McBride鈥檚 supporters say the city has staved off property declines seen in neighboring north 狐狸视频 County municipalities within the Normandy School District by rigorously enforcing city ordinances governing home maintenance.
鈥淚鈥檓 feeling good about the administration,鈥 said Joycene Davis, who has lived in Bel-Nor since 1982. 鈥淢aybe there are some people who are used to not having requirements at all.鈥
Opponents, though, say Bel-Nor鈥檚 approach can border on harassment.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a real disconnect between creating a community that people want to be part of and just harassing people,鈥 said Meghan Putnam, a real estate agent who sold her Bel-Nor home a few years ago.
Calloway cited the use of police to deliver code violation notices and the inflexibility for people trying to sell or move into Bel-Nor.
鈥淚 am interested in the aldermanic seat because of the experiences that I and others have had regarding the police coming to our homes informing us that our grass was too tall,鈥 said Calloway, who has lived in Bel-Nor for nearly 40 years.
While some residents applaud the customer service from the city鈥檚 small police force, others complain about the use of police to deliver code citations. Mayor Bill Hook called complaints about the police delivering the notices 鈥渁 little dramatic.鈥 There鈥檚 only a handful of paid employees in the tiny city.
鈥淲e don鈥檛 have a lot of people to go around and deliver stuff,鈥 Hook said.
Calloway, the mother of former state Rep. Don Calloway, now a Washington lobbyist and MSNBC commentator, is passionate enough that she set up a campaign committee and raised some $4,500 in donations. She spent over $2,500 paying the legal fees for the recount.
鈥淚 wouldn鈥檛 be paying that kind of money if I didn鈥檛 care about seeing change in Bel-Nor,鈥 she said.
Given all that money and effort, McBride figured Calloway would win. All she made were some flyers, she said. And now a new election to break the tie is scheduled for Aug. 8.
鈥淚 hope the second phase of campaigning does not get as vicious,鈥 McBride said. 鈥淲e did not know there was such a division until this time. ... Win or lose, I can鈥檛 wait until Aug. 9 comes.鈥
Hook and McBride believe Calloway鈥檚 entrance may be related to a long-running dispute with a woman who bought a home two years ago and has struggled to gain an occupancy permit. They said they heard she is Calloway鈥檚 goddaughter.
But the woman, Jonelle Lofton, and Calloway say that isn鈥檛 true. Lofton said the two families are close and she had asked for help navigating City Hall and has now been turned into a political prop between the two camps. Now she is trying to sell and move.
鈥淚 had no idea I was dealing with a tyrannical city council,鈥 Lofton said.
And while many people have struggled to obtain occupancy permits, it isn鈥檛 solely why she entered the race, Calloway said.
鈥淚f these people are interested in living in Bel-Nor, interested in living in a beautiful community, I think their interest is also in keeping their properties up,鈥 she said.
鈥楥reeping blight鈥
Within north 狐狸视频 County, lined with auto-centric thoroughfares and strip malls developed during the post-World War II boom, Bel-Nor is a lush, green oasis that has largely been spared from the problems of vacancy and falling property values left behind as those with means moved on to newer suburbs. It鈥檚 nearly evenly split between white and Black residents, a truly integrated neighborhood in a region that is anything but.
But city leaders see vigilance as the only way to keep Bel-Nor from going the way of some of its neighbors. Mayor Hook references the 鈥渃reeping blight鈥 surrounding Bel-Nor, pointing out the boarded up houses that line North Hanley Road in unincorporated 狐狸视频 County en route from Interstate 70 to Bel-Nor鈥檚 turreted entrance on Natural Bridge Road.
鈥淲e鈥檙e kind of an island,鈥 Hook said during a tour of the area Thursday. 鈥淲e鈥檙e more North Clayton than North County.鈥
Like a lot of areas of north 狐狸视频 County, Bel-Nor property values took a hit after the 2014 civil unrest that began in Ferguson. But Hook and other residents say Bel-Nor weathered the impact particularly well, partly because of its location and proximity to UMSL and other amenities, and partly because of a city administration that stays on top of enforcement.
And it is particularly rigorous. The city famously lost a lawsuit to the ACLU over an ordinance limiting the number of political signs allowed in yards. Bel-Nor made headlines again five years ago officials did an exterior inspection of every property, sending citations to nearly half of the homes in Bel-Nor.
It hasn鈥檛 performed another citywide sweep 鈥 though Hook said it is considering one 鈥 so it relies on annual rental inspections and sales to trigger building inspections. It鈥檚 when a home sale triggers a municipal inspection that the requirements imposed by Bel-Nor鈥檚 code go well beyond safety considerations and veer into subjective, sometimes punitive, cosmetic requirements, critics say. Cracked driveways. New paint. A scratch on a bedroom door. Dirty bathtubs.
鈥淚f I wanted a homeowners association, I would have moved into a homeowners association,鈥 Becky Harrington, a real estate agent with Re/Max Results, said some of her clients say about Bel-Nor. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e just very rigid.鈥
Several owners told the Post-Dispatch they were unable to move in for months while they tried to make repairs and improvements to the homes they purchased in order to obtain an occupancy permit from the city. Some asked that their names not be used for fear of retaliation from city officials that one resident described as 鈥渞uthless.鈥
鈥淭he thing about Bel-Nor is you don鈥檛 really know when they鈥檙e going to set their eye on you,鈥 said Rachel Johnson, who moved to Bel-Nor with her husband and three children a year ago and managed to obtain a conditional occupancy permit while the family finishes improvements to the home. 鈥淚 just always have a little bit of that sense of vulnerability.鈥
鈥淚t looks wonderful,鈥 she said of the community she has grown to love. 鈥淏ut some things have gone too far. Weaponizing this code enforcement, neighbor to neighbor.鈥
Lifelong resident Kirk Kirkpatrick feels for McBride. It鈥檚 a thankless job as building commissioner. He had it when he was on the Bel-Nor village board back in the early 鈥90s. Don鈥檛 enforce it and the neighbors are mad at you. Do, and the person cited is mad. McBride has been rigorous but fair, Kirkpatrick said. She has even cited him for thousands in tree work in his yard he admits was needed.
鈥淭he codes that they enforced on rental property have really saved the neighborhood,鈥 Kirkpatrick said. 鈥淵ou don鈥檛 have to go very far from here to see what happens when you don鈥檛 enforce codes. ... There is nobody that is randomly picked on. And I鈥檓 a prime example of that.鈥
But not everyone agrees with that. Rochelle Skolnick is McBride鈥檚 neighbor. She has been going back and forth with City Hall over her fence for more than a year. She submitted a permit, which she thought was approved, only to be informed last year that she needed to spend thousands of dollars to replace a chain link fence to match the wood of the remainder of her fence on the other side of her home.
Skolnick an attorney, pushed back on McBride and the city building inspectors鈥 assertions that she needed to replace the fence. After some emails in October about the issue, she didn鈥檛 hear anything more. But in March, she attended a meet-and-greet hosted by Calloway and shared her experience. The city鈥檚 contracted building inspector, Debra Irvin, was there, Skolnick said.
A few days later, Skolnick received a notice of violation about her fence. Skolnick called that 鈥渃learly retaliatory鈥 and accused McBride of 鈥渕aking up the rules as they go along.鈥
鈥淚t鈥檚 clearly very personal,鈥 Skolnick said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 about power. Her power, and it鈥檚 not about the well-being of the neighborhood.鈥
McBride, though, said the delay was only to give Skolnick plenty of time to bring her fence into compliance. She isn鈥檛 vindictive. She is only following the code. Hook, the mayor, agrees.
鈥淚f you go to Clayton, I think you鈥檇 find the same thing,鈥 Hook said. 鈥淓ven in Old Town Florissant, they have rules about what color you can paint your house.鈥
The growing division was evident to James Bady, who moved to Bel-Nor from Jennings over 20 years ago.
鈥淚 saw that coming,鈥 Bady said Thursday from his front yard, beneath a giant sweetgum tree he鈥檚 named Hercules. 鈥淎 lot of people moving out. A lot of new people moving in.鈥