July 31, 2014
Mr. (name omitted),
Thank you for your email and all of us at (address omitted) appreciate your concern. There are several aspect to your email that I would like to address.
Firstly, we are all adults here, as you said. We would prefer to not be addressed in a condescending tone as we find it to be unprofessional and not conducive to effective action. In the future, please consider addressing us in a more appropriate manner.
In regards to your first point, we apologize for the prolonged period in which the trash bin has been left out. As you may or may not know, there is nothing in the contract that specifies the time interval nor location of the trash bin outside. Similarly, there is also no mention of this in the General Statues of Connecticut. Despite these facts, we will make a more concerted effort in the future to take it in at reasonable time intervals.
For the second point, there are two clauses in the contract that we agreed on that come close to addressing this. Clause 17 simply states that the premises must be "in good condition" and clause 19 states that "good housekeeping is expected of everyone". Neither of these statements mention the limits on the number of bottles allowed on the front lawn. I have spent more than hour looking through the General Statues of Connecticut looking for any objective regulations on cleanliness of front lawns and found nothing. As the condition of the lawn is safe and whatever bottles are there are contained in a localized area, we at (address omitted) see no reason that the current level of bottle littering is unreasonable. If you would like to make the argument that our lawn is unsightly, that is simply your opinion. But again, there is nothing in the contract that states our front lawn must be aesthetically pleasing to look at.
The third point mentions the unfortunate problem of rodents. I agree that a rodent problem may be considered a nuisance, but to blame the emergence of rodents on us is immensely unreasonable. There is no logical basis to claim that simply our presence is what induced this infestation. Correlation does not lead to causation, and it seems that you are choosing to blame the problem on us, when in fact, there is no evidence to support this. One may not make a normative claim based on a descriptive fact as this is an obvious logical fallacy.
In the fourth point you mention noise and parties. As you may or may not know, we have never been fined for a noise violation since we have been living at (address omitted). Whenever we have had parties we have respected all rules and regulations as set by law enforcement officers. We encourage our neighbors to contact the police or us directly in the future if they feel we are being too loud.
I have noticed that you are equating the height of the natural Connecticut foliage/shrubbery with our apparent apathy in regards to landscaping. I would like you to know that the preservation of the natural foliage in the back has been a conscious choice of our part as we appreciate the aesthetic appearance of the plants. In addition, I am a member of the tri Beta Biology honors society and find the rarity and elegance of these plants cosmetically and scientifically fascinating.
If you believe that the lawn should be trimmed, we can of course do that. Though I would like to point out that again, the contract you required us to sign makes no mention of a specific height that the plants of the lawn must be at.
You also have chosen to continually threaten us with university action against us. For your own information, the student handbook has no mention in regards to University action in regards to off-campus housing issues. Any "issues" that you would decide to bring to our attention has nothing to do with the university, thus threatening us with university action is groundless, rendering it futile.
In summary, it is clear that you are upset with us. The decisions we have made are ones that we believed will lead to no harm to anyone in our community. As I have addressed above, the majority of your allegations you have made against us simply have no merit and are unfair. We will change our behavior as to tending the lawn, removing the trash bin, and keeping the number of bottles on the front lawn at a reasonable level. The rodent accusation however, is not based on any reasonable evidence as stated above.
We will act rationally and do our best in the future to please you and the surrounding community. We would like to stress, however, that this is because we care about the feelings of others. As seen by the level of detail included above, we know what is legally appropriate and what isn't. Subsequently, we would prefer if you would please stop making unreasonable accusations and requests as we know what has grounds and what does not.
In regards to reasonable evidence however, I would like to bring to your attention an unsafe aspect of the property I had the displeasure of experiencing. I leaned on the front railing the other day only to have the entire structure collapse under me. I fell and came very close to sustaining a serious injury. Upon looking at the base of the railing, I noticed that the entire base had rusted through and must have been structurally unstable for months. Under Sec. 47a-7. Landlord's Responsibilities in chapter 830 of Connecticut General Statues, "A landlord shall … keep all common areas in a safe condition". Thus, this was your responsibility and I find it disheartening that you had not decided to make us aware of this prior.
(name omitted), we would prefer to keep the relationship we have civil and professional throughout the upcoming year.
Sincerely,
(name omitted)
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