Richland WA: How do you handle ongoing neighbor noise after Animal Control/police involvement?
I've lived in my house for 22 years and never really had problems with neighborhood noise until the past two years.
About two years ago, new neighbors moved in a street over. Suddenly, we started dealing with bloodhounds and other large dogs barking constantly, including throughout the night.
Several neighbors, myself included, tried talking to them civilly. We asked what could be done to minimize the noise and even offered to work with them on the issue. Unfortunately, we were met with insults and arguments, so eventually most of us just walked away. One neighbor even called the police during one of the disputes, but was told it was a civil matter.
Our local quiet hours are from 10 PM to 7 AM, and the ordinance basically prohibits loud voices and other excessive noises from being audible within 50 feet of neighboring residences. After numerous complaints and eventually keeping barking logs for Animal Control, the documentation finally made its way through the courts after about a year, and fines started being issued.
The frustrating part is that the problem was affecting a lot of people. You'd constantly hear neighbors talking to each other about the dogs: "What's wrong with those dogs? I've been up all night listening to them." It became a common topic in the neighborhood.
After all of that, with Animal Control involved and multiple neighbors yelling at the owners to quiet their dogs, my next-door neighbor decided to get two dogs of their own.
The dogs are outside for hours and regularly bark, whine, and yelp late into the night, sometimes until midnight. There is also now a lot of debris and miscellaneous items scattered around their yard, including aluminum pipes leaning against the fence. The dogs knock things over, creating even more noise.
I eventually went over and talked to my neighbor about it. The conversation actually went well initially, but the situation continued getting worse.
Now I'm dealing with constant banging, pounding, and other excessive noises, sometimes as late as 1 AM. I've talked to my neighbor directly and explained that nobody should be pounding and banging on things at that hour. He was eventually cited one night and obviously wasn't happy about it.
Things have become even more complicated because his father, who doesn't live there, now comes over almost every day and frequently makes excessive noise as well, when I talked with my next door neighbor, he said his father only started coming over when people were yelling at the dogs. And no, not as in "Coming over to assist with dog barking" So now I know what's going on.
On top of that, whenever I'm in my own backyard, his father will sometimes yell and swear at me even when I'm not interacting with him or even looking in their direction. Even with video evidence of him throwing dog feces into my backyard the LAW would not do anything, i also have video of him making threats and all the cops did was "Talk" with him. I don't talk to them, never gave them problems and still haven't to this day, yelling to shut dogs up after being asked almost a dozen times by 3-4 different neighbors is pretty normal when people are annoyed.
I've contacted the police about the situation, but I'm repeatedly told that it's a civil issue. I understand that people have freedom of speech, and I'm not trying to prevent anyone from saying whatever they want. The problem is that it feels intentional at this point. I've politely asked about the noise, and instead of resolving it, the situation seems to escalate. Even simply being in my own backyard can result in being yelled at.
I'm not posting this just to vent. I'm genuinely curious if anyone else has dealt with a situation like this, especially when neighbors seem to intentionally create excessive noise or harassment after you've already tried handling things civilly.
For those who have dealt with something similar, what was the correct way to handle it? Did you go through code enforcement, civil court, mediation, an attorney, or something else?