The Guy Without A Phone wanted to talk about snow—in June, on the phone.
That was the first I heard from him, a voicemail thanking me for a story the Hamilton Post ran in March 2014 about the township’s snow procedures and laws. He ended his message by saying, “Don’t try to call me back. I don’t have a phone.”
In the months that followed, I received several more voicemails from him—after the first message, he always identified himself as “The Guy Without A Phone.” He always called at odd hours, at 11 p.m. or 3:30 a.m. or 5:15 a.m. He always referred to me as “Mister Anthes.” And he always, always talked about snow.
To this day, I’ve yet to speak with him. But I feel like I’ve gotten to know Guy. In his messages, he has let little bits of his personality crack through the veil of anonymity. I know his approximate age—“I’m not a senior yet, but I’m getting there.” I know he suffers from some physical maladies that make mobility an issue, especially on snow-covered surfaces. And I know he’s calling because he feels like I have the venue to make more of a difference than he can.
This winter, Guy had been particularly interested in a portion of Klockner Road between Lamont Avenue (next to the Alvin E. Gershen Apartment towers) and Whitehorse-Mercerville Road. The Gershen Apartments are affordable housing for senior citizens and young disabled people, and Guy said he has watched a number of people from the building struggle to traverse the quarter-mile stretch between the two intersections.
One property in that segment was the worst offender—its owners neglected to shovel its sidewalk, allowing a winter’s worth of snow and ice to pile up and freeze into a single mound. Guy said the walkway was impassible, and it forced pedestrians out onto Klockner Road. He worried about seniors walking in a road with a high speed limit and—in the winter—potentially slippery conditions. He asked me to investigate why the property owner hadn’t shoveled the sidewalk, and why the township government had done nothing about someone flouting its rules.
One week, Guy left me two or three voicemails per night, updating me the situation—most of which insisted of “the sidewalk still hasn’t been shoveled.” But there were also bits of adventure and intrigue. Once, he discovered the property in question had been listed for sale in the recent past, and he called the realtor to get more information. He said the realtor wasn’t interested in talking to him about the snow. Another time, he told me he heard “from a pretty good source” that the township owned the property. (It doesn’t.)
Guy spent so much time obsessing to me about unshoveled sidewalks that I soon caught the bug. I drove by the property at least once a day. I researched who occupied the building. I found the same online real estate listing I assume Guy found—he never said anything about not having a computer.
And, finally fed up, I contacted Hamilton Township.
The township, it turns out, had received calls from a Guy Without A Phone. A lot of them. This Guy operated the same way mine did—no name and no phone number, left only voicemails, called after-hours, only talked about snow.
The township heard this Guy loud and clear, and issued a violation notice to the building owner Feb. 18, weeks before my Guy started leaving me nightly updates. The township just had no way of updating either Guy, since they only left voicemails and provided no contact information.
The township representative I spoke with said every time someone contacts the township about an issue—usually through the HamStat call center—they receive a case ID number. That ID number allows the resident and the township to keep track of the progress on a given issue. And, in the case of an unshoveled sidewalk, updates could be important since the issue isn’t closed after the township issues a violation.
The property owner first has a grace period to rectify the violation. Should the property owner ignore the notice or fail to comply before the grace period expires, he may wind up in court or dealing with the township in some other way. In this scenario, Guy—and everyone else—had no way to see these behind-the-scenes twists and turns. All we saw was sidewalk that needed clearing.
And, really, that’s all most residents care about. They don’t care how the sausage gets made, as long as someone makes it. Guy noticed someone violating a law and creating a safety hazard—and he wanted someone to take care of it.
On March 9—a couple days after my chat with the township—I drove by the property during my evening commute, and saw a pair of men lazily shoveling a narrow, winding path through the melting snow pile. By March 11, all the snow had disappeared, either shoveled or melted away.
I’ll never know if it was my call or just sheer coincidence, but Guy received his wish. I haven’t heard from him since.
On March 20—the first day of spring—it snowed. And as this edition of the Hamilton Post went to press, I eagerly waited to receive a call. A phone call from someone who doesn’t have a phone.
