Petition against local business ???

Question

Our street recently signed a petition against a local business's planning permission for parking space, service & delivery area along with the noise from their printing press.

When we signed the petition, we'd the heading saying "Petition to object planning permission (249499498 & 4393423232)". These reference number refers to the actual planning permission i.e. the service area, delivery area, etc. as per the letter all the householders sent by council, saying that this particular business has asked for such a permission & if we want to object, we may do so by the end of the month, which is why we all signed the petition against it.

For the past couple of days, they'd been knocking almost every door of our street scaring & threating people & given the impression that "I" (along with couple of others, who arranged this entire petition) "caved them in" by means of lie, by telling them something else & getting their signature on the petition.

Answer 1

*Well for one, you need to report the threats, those are illegal and can make this business look even worse than they already do.

*Next, I think a petition is public information. If there is a petition against you, you may have the right to know that.

*You need to gather evidence to go with your petition. Record the sounds you get to hear and take photos of them going door to door. Take photos of anything that looks like evidence of the harm they do to your neighborhood.

*Show your concern for your neighbors, advise if they are threatened they should call the council and report it.

*Call your local new agencies, to include ALL radio stations to tell them about your petition. News is a powerful tool.

Answer 2

It is legal for the business that requesting the zoning commission/city council to get a copy of the petition, as it is legal for someone to get a copy of any documents of a court case against them. It is not legal to threaten signers of a petition with a law suit, they have no bases for a suit if the petition does not make fraudulent statement of facts. You on the other hand may have a case for a law suit if they have defamed your name, people will testify to the fact of the statements made defaming you, and they now question your integrity, and you can prove you have been financial harmed.

You will need to speak to a lawyer about this to determine if you actual may have a case.



Yes the petition still has bases of power when the council or zoning board meets.



beware that in many cases like this the council/commission/board will delay a decision , or reschedule the hearing for a future date(which they don't state at the meeting). This is done in hope that witnesses and individuals that want to speak concerning the petition, lose interest and do not appear at the hearing. Often the later date for the hearing notice is given as close to the allowable legal time as possible. This often creates scheduling problems for people that are protesting the zoning change.



Also, you should know that unless homeowners close to business show up at the hearing, sign up to speak(according to the rules of the council or commission/board) to protest--the petition has little weight when there is a counter petition/support aggrement.



If you go to the hearing, just state your reason for objecting the permission. It will carry a lot of weight if you can get someone that signed "your petition" and then signed the other petiton/support letter to speak stating they were threaten with a lawsuit if they did not sign the "counter petition", and they fear that their property resale value will be harmed if the permission is granted, and their right for a quite use of their property will be taken away.



Even if you loose the decision of the council/commission/board, homeowers may still have a case for a civil suit against the business if they can prove lost of property value and/are lost of quite use of their property.

Answer 3

Freedom of Information



If the business requested a copy they would have to be given one. But the council were probably obliged to give them a copy. Basically you can't put something on paper about somebody without them seeing it.

With regards to your petition, if the council want to go ahead with the planning permission they will completely disregard your petition.