Just days after a vacant 62nd Terrace home played host to yet another yard sale of goods from a purchased storage unit, the Fairway City Council on Monday passed an ordinance intended to curb potential nuisances from garage and yard sales.
Under the new ordinance, Fairway homeowners will be limited to holding two garage and/or yard sales per year. The sales must be at least 30 days apart and each can last no longer than five consecutive days. The ordinance also requires that at least one person conducting the sale must reside on the premises.
Previously, Fairway statutes limited the number of times a resident could display signs promoting a garage sale, but did nothing to restrict the sales themselves. Prairie Village, Mission Hills, Mission, Roeland Park and Westwood all have ordinances on the books restricting the number of garage sales residents can host each year.
Fairway residents who live in the vicinity of 62nd Terrace and Delmar Street had been frustrated this summer by a woman who has held large sales on the yard of a vacant property owned by her niece. The woman would leave the items out on the yard overnight, creating an unappealing view for neighbors — and an attractive target for thieves.
Neighbors say the woman had been purchasing the contents of unclaimed storage units and selling them.
The woman held two sales earlier this summer before telling Fairway police she wouldn’t be pulling the maneuver again. But this past weekend, neighbors woke to find the yard strewn with sales items yet again.