Another group of renters, a different time, same bullshit. People who think parking rules are not for them and its okay to park on a lawn in the city. If everyone parked on the lawn in the city, we wouldn't have lawns.

When (e:Joe) nicely exclaimed through the window, to one of the parkers that its illegal to park on the lawn, he apparently upset them. Matthew LaChiusa, of the American Repertory Theater of WNY, came out to confront me and said, "he is sick of this and isn't going to take it anymore." and that the Church of the Ascension gives them permission to park on the lawn. I seriously doubt this after the intense drama we had in the past over lawn parking. (e:paul,52485) (e:paul,54105) (e:paul,53913)

First, I found this totally weird because I have almost never talked with Matthew LaChiusa other than the first day they started and secondly because I have graciously let them use my skirt to get into Church's illegal driveway for a very long time. I really thought this was all behind us.

I was kind of surprised he was not just saying, "oh sorry, we will move the cars." So I said, "who the fuck cares what the Church says, its illegal, you can't do it and you are taking a nice lawn and turning into a disgusting muddy parking lot. Do people park on your lawn, or your neighbors lawn?"

If the Church is really okay with it, why not just park on the big lawn on the North St side.

He told me I shouldn't use such foul language. At this point I decided the best solution was to turn on the power washer, but sadly it was out of gas ;(

Then they added a second car to the lawn. The third for the evening. Then I decided to call parking enforcement, you know the city loves parking money ( its $50 a ticket afterall) and I gave them a chance to move so I don't even feel bad.

Over time the renters at the church have done such a job on the driveway, grass, sidewalk, walkway etc. Its sad because it seems like the Church people really do a good job keeping up their property otherwise. So many of the browstone sidewalks are cracked from vehicles driving on them.

So here's the deal Matthew LaChiusa. In the end, I am going to win. You can either make sure your attendees and staff park nicely in the driveway like civilized people or I am going to drive them out like last group and make sure that no one ever wants to come here to see your plays again. You can choose.

The car is back in the lawn.

Parking on the grass is definately illegal. This morning I called the city to confirm.

Just in case the church "doesn't know which this is." I am adding a license number.

(e:Matthew) talked on the phone with the warden from the church last night. The guy sounded surprised people parked on the lawn. Then this morning as I left for work - another car on the lawn.

Who the fuck thinks it's normal to park on the lawn in an urban setting? Especially one with plenty of free street parking and even a spot in the driveway right next to it.

It is so trashy looking, not that the grounds at the church can look much trashier at this point with all the grass ripped up from the plow and the leaves from last year having destroyed the remaining grass.

I can't believe this is still going on. All I want is for them to not drive on my property or to block my in the driveway.

Today I get a letter from their lawyer asking us to forward the letter to our lawyer. He didn't even get Terry's name right.


I love how it mentions "their driveway." It seems simple to me. Here is the property map. Notice their "driveway" is only 3.5 feet. Not wide enough for a car. Since then they have slowly added more stones to their grass, and just parked on the grass until it became drivewayish, but the skirt remains the same size.



When the previous owner bought the house in 2001, the church had an agreement with the new owner of the house to allow the church unobstructed access to the driveway to "provide ingress and egress from linwood avenue to the grantors remaining property." This makes it clear that their part of the skirt was not large enough.



The kicker is that "the reservation of rights shall not be covenant that runs with the land and does not bind all successors, heirs or assigns of grantee."

Well thats me. I bought the house from the guy with 2001 agreement in 2006. At that point there was no agreement, nor do I permit them to use my land or driveway for access. It would have been a different story if the people were not so rude and obnoxious, and did not do things like drive on my lawn, block me in, scream at me telling me they went have been here longer than I have, etc.

Here are the docs in PDF format:

1. Letter from Mark Peszko ::READ PDF::
2. Property Map ::READ PDF::
3. Defunct Agreement ::READ PDF::

This is why you can't drive a full sized street plow a full block down a sidewalk. I have to question if the amount of damage it caused was worth the 3 or 4 times it was plowed.

They obviously don't care about the character of the neighborhood. Between that and their ever expanding illegal driveway it looks like total shit right now.

Now that the snow is melting and the giant pickup truck is still plowing the freakin sidewalk - it is a disaster.

Is the convenience of not shoveling worth dealing with the amount of damage they will need to repair in the spring.

They already barely had any grass from the tracker/rider lawnmower tear up and their inability to rake leaves.

The ruts and piles are like a foot deep.

Now that the snow is finally melting you can see how much of the grass they had been plowing and parking on.



Update: here you can see what matthew is talking about.



They also stopped putting their trash bins in their corral which has lead to this:

I want to know who hires them and what company it is? Today they totally blocked half the street again with snow, plowed the grass, baracaded my driveway and even plowed over the dance campaign no parking or driveway sign. I used to think the dancecamp hired them but now I am thinking maybe it is the church.

Why can't these stupid fucks park like normal people. You cannot expand your driveway into a parking lot without going through the proper channels. Especially when you are using my driveway to make it possible. It just looks looks so trashy with cars parked on the lawn.



The people parking can't even figure out how to maximize the space they have. Like how is the black car going to get out.


Here you get to find out how.



If you really don't think parking on the grass is an issue, why don't you park on your giant parking lot on North Street?



Another one just did the same thing, but even worse. When we had multiple cars we would just move so the other person could get out. Instead, they do this.

I guess the church people just have a love for parking on grass. Look
how much they already extended their strip of gravel by putting rocks
over the grass they ripped up parking on it. I wonder how far it's
gonna go. The more they park on the grass, the more torn up it gets,
the more of a parking lot they have.

Soon they will gravel over the whole thing. I mean look it's not even
a freakin straight line. The end is at a 15 degree angle into the
grass.

At least they have less cars than yesterday (e:paul,48965)


When we first moved in they only had a 3.5 foots strip that they kept parking over. Now its a full 5-6 foot area. Notice only 3.5 foot of skirt is on their property which means they use ours or just drive over the grass.


Church of the Ascension by Walter Braua, Warden To Donald J. Mayer
Warranty Deed Dated January 31, 2002

...the grantor (church) reserves for itself not its successors, heirs or assigns, the right to continue to have unobstructed access over that portion of the above described premises which are be conveyed herein, which portion is specifically described as "Stone Drive" on the attached survey made by Foit-Albert Associated dated December 7th, 2001, Job No. 01-23062 for the purpose of providing ingress and egress from Linwood Avenue in the grantors remaining property, which is adjacent to and contiguous to the conveyed premises and this reservation of rights shall not be a covenant that runs with he land and does not bind all successors, heirs, or assigns of grantee .