BY ANN GENADER
WEST MILFORD – If residents want to stop people from coming to their doors to try and sell products or services, there’s a new township ordinance that that can now stop them.
Township residents will soon be able to add their names to a list of people who do not want solicitors arriving at their homes.
Citizens that opt in can go to the township clerk’s office at the West Milford Municipal Building, on Union Valley Road to have their names included on a list that says they do not want people coming to their homes to try to sell them something.
Solicitors have previously been required to get permits including their identifications before they knock on anyone’s door.
The new law takes residents’ privacy a step further by giving these salespeople a list of the homes and addresses listed in the township clerk’s office of those that do not want to be solicited.
If vendors show up at any of the listed homes, they are subject to a court summons and get a date to appear before a municipal judge who can then issue fines if the ordinance is violated.
Township Attorney Fred Semrau recommended that the West Milford Township Council adopt the ordinance, and spelled out the rules of the new law during the Sept. 5 meeting.
After a discussion, it passed with a 3-1 majority voting for it.
Councilman Michael Hensley voted against the ordinance and Councilman Lou Signorino abstained.
Signorino said serious questions are raised with the new ordinance that could have unintended consequences.
He said he needed to know more about the specifics, and recalled stories of kids getting in trouble for things like selling lemonade.
Hensley also presented “what if” scenarios – such as a person who was plowing snow in a driveway being asked by a neighbor of the person having his driveway plowed to plow his driveway too.
Semrau said there have been legal challenges to existing laws that allow salespeople to knock on doors until 9 p.m., with the courts upholding the vendor’s right to do so.
He said the only legal relief for residents at the local level is available by giving them a choice through ordinances like the one just adopted.
This doesn’t affect the business, but does affect the property owner.
It is the only legal remedy that the homeowner has to avoid having commercial people from showing up at their door, Semrau said.
He stressed that putting one’s name and address on the list in the clerk’s office does not affect free speech.
He said political candidates and others who are not commercially soliciting can still stop by and children cannot be arrested, but they are not impacted by this ordinance anyway.
During the public comment portion of the meeting, resident Marilyn Lichtenberg supported the action saying that it was vital to the health and safety of the community.
Dave Sisco, another resident, suggested that people could simply get the desired result by merely putting up a sign saying, “no soliciting.”