Chevy Chase resident Deborah Vollmer owes her neighbors another $6,250 stemming from a dispute over a driveway, a judge ruled today. That is in addition to nearly $30,000 from a previous ruling. And even though the project is already completed, Vollmer is still appealing the judge’s original decision to allow the work to be done, Bethesda Now reports.

But those are only the latest details in an absurd, seven-year odyssey.

Here is the tale of the feud between the 67-year-old Vollmer, who has run for office a number of times and also made headlines for refusing to pay Pepco, and her next-door neighbors, Arthur and Linda Schwartz.

2008: Vollmer threatens to sue the Schwartzes, who plan to tear down their original house and build a larger home on their lot at 7200 44th St. Vollmer claims the new building will change the character of the neighborhood, among other things, but loses the battle in court. The Schwartzes’ house is built and the neighbors live happily ever after it is just the beginning of the legal fights.

2012: Vollmer is found guilty of two counts of malicious destruction after she wrote “No justice, no peace” on the wet cement on the Schwartzes’ property and threw pavers that were being used to build a walkway. A judge sentenced her to three years of probation and forbade her from having contact with the family.

February, 2014: The Schwartzes want to upgrade the two houses’ shared driveway, which they say is in a state of disrepair, and seek Vollmer’s input; Vollmer shocks no one by refusing to get on board. The Schwartzes sue to get the work done and win after a two-day trial. Circuit Court Judge Joseph Dugan Jr. orders Vollmer to pay $9,100 for her half of the driveway paving, plus $28,140 in attorney fees. Schwartz appeals the decision.

March 25, 2015: Vollmer physically prevents workers from installing a fence along the shared driveway that they put up in preparation for paving. The following week she makes a failed appeal to the Town Council to try to get the project stopped.

April 10, 2015: Workers begin to pave over the driveway. Vollmer shows up and demands they stop.

She tells WTOP: “I don’t think we can live in peace. I think we’ll have problems down the way because of this poor design.”

In a statement to WTOP, the Schwartz family said:
“She has cost her neighbors in the Town of Chevy Chase more than $50,000 in legal fees. Unfortunately, we have had to spend much more than that. We love the neighborhood, (and) the house, and we hope that reason will prevail in the future and that we can live in peace as good neighbors,”

April 13, 2015: Montgomery County police take Vollmer to jail for violating the terms of her probation in the March 25 incident. She spends the night and much of Tuesday at the county lockup.

The week of April 20, 2015: The work on the driveway is completed, WTOP reports. “I would be in shock if the judges ruled in her favor and had any of the work removed,” contractor Jose Rodriguez says. “It looks beautiful and enhances the beauty of (Vollmer’s) forgotten yard.”

Vollmer writes to the Town Council: “The new driveway, which I, as a co-owner of the driveway, never consented to, is an insult to me personally and an assault to my senses, and to my home environment. I am deeply offended by the forceful imposition of the reconstruction and redesign of what had been a historic shared driveway, with a visually pleasing and environmentally beneficial grassy median strip down its center. I want my grassy median strip back.”

April 28, 2015: A judge rules that Vollmer owes the Schwartzes another $750 for delaying the project when she refused to let workers put up the fence and another $5,500 in legal fees. Schwartz, who is awaiting a ruling on her appeal of the original decision, says she plans to continue the fight. She tells the Gazette that if she wins the appeal, she will request a court order to tear up the now-completed driveway and redo it with her input.

In a statement issued over weekend, she said: “Vollmer is aware of the criticism of her on social media that this is a rich people’s fight of no real consequence in a world where there are people going hungry with no place even to call home … But Vollmer contends that there is no contradiction between trying to make conditions better for people living with such hardship, and asserting one’s own rights with respect to one’s own situation,” Bethesda Now reported.

And there you have it. Give your neighbor a hug next time you see them.

Filed Under: chevy chase, driveway, meanwhile in maryland, nimby,