ALTUS -- Don Johnson has taken all he can stands, and he can't stands no more from boom boxes at a local car wash, and the Altus City Council has taken up the former mayor's cause.
Complaints from people around town, and especially in the area near the American Car Wash on East Tamarack Road, spurred the council to discuss the issue Tuesday night, with Johnson leading the call for action against what he says is "not just a little irritating noise ... it's a big irritating noise."
Johnson wrote a letter to city officials on Jan. 20 laying out his complaint, stating that he lives several hundred yards across the field from the American Car Wash and that the windows of his home shake regularly from the noise emanating from the boom boxes "night and day."
"I lost 40 percent of my hearing in Vietnam and when I hear a noise like this -- it has to be loud!" Johnson said in his letter.
Addressing the council Tuesday night, Johnson said that he lives about 100 yards from Wal-Mart, "a good neighbor, by the way," and about 300 yards from the American Car Wash, "not a good neighbor."
By way of comparison, Johnson said that last summer he called the manager of Wal-Mart in the middle of the night to complain about the drone of an idling refrigerator truck. The manager, he said, had the truck moved in five minutes.
However, he said, he has talked to the car wash owners, attendants and manager on several occasions, and he is told to call the police.
He has indeed called the police, he said -- 10 times since Oct. 1.
Johnson said that a police officer told him that he could not sign a complaint against the car wash owner, but only against the person who is blaring the loud music. He said he then asked the police officer what would happen if he were having a loud party at his house, and was told that he could be given a ticket for disturbing the peace.
"There's something wrong with our ordinance if we don't hold the business owners responsible like you hold me responsible," Johnson said.
Johnson said he is grateful for the police officers' response to his complaints and that he feels "terrible having to call them all the time."
People in Johnson's neighborhood recently purchased nine cedar trees, at $425 each, to place as a buffer against the noise, and Johnson is not the only one whose patience and nerves are being tried. "I've talked to all my neighbors, and they're all aggravated about it," he said.
City Attorney Catherine Coke explained that the city appointed a committee in 1993 to tackle the problem, and at that time opted to forego the use of decibel-measuring equipment in use in other cities such as Lawton, which approved ordinance revisions this month setting the permitted decibels for sound amplifying equipment at 55 decibels (down from 60), taking the measurement of decibels from the property line on which the equipment is located. Sounds at car washes -- to include customer vehicles, stereos and on-site equipment -- may be 70 decibels from 7 a.m. and 10 p.m., and only 55 decibels from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m.
Altus ordinances provide that a ticket may be issued if a police officer can hear the noise 50 feet or more away while he's in a vehicle with the windows up, or if a citizen complains about loud or unusual noises on private or public property.
"We need to hold the owners responsible for their businesses," Johnson told the council.
To which Coke responded, "It's the people that are doing it, not the owners."
Police Chief Mike Patterson said police cannot issue a citation in cases such as boom boxes blaring from a car wash without a signed complaint from a citizen. "A lot of these calls, the people ... they're not happy about the loud music, but they don't want to sign the complaint," he said.
When asked whether additional police "counseling" on the scene of blaring boom boxes would be useful, Patterson said many folks with expensive stereo equipment are not necessarily receptive. "This is a classic example of when the golden rule goes a long way," he said.
Coke emphasized that whatever ordinance the city comes up with must apply to parking lots, commercial shopping centers or anywhere a car is parked with music blaring from it.
The council agreed to appoint a committee, with Councilman Sid Willis as chairman, to further study the problem.
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