The lawyer advocating a group home in a Fargo neighborhood for convicts on probation and sex offenders wants police protection at a meeting Monday when he asks for the proposal to be reconsidered.
Craig Ritchie will ask the Fargo City Commission to overturn the Planning Commission's denial of a permit for Heaven House at 106 16th St. N. The hearing is set to begin at 5:15 p.m.
Neighbors have been outspoken opponents of the group home, which would house up to a dozen residents, arguing children would be at risk and property values would drop.
"It's just not what the risk is," resident Jamie Kreider, who opposes the group home, said Friday. "It's what it does to the whole neighborhood."
A local sex offender who fled home monitoring after cutting off a tracking device on his ankle serves as a fresh reminder of the dangers a group home would pose, she said.
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"That doesn't make me feel safe at all," said Krieder, who has a middle-school-aged daughter and lives a block from the proposed group home.
Ritchie was traveling Friday and could not be reached for comment. In a letter he wrote appealing the denied permit, he asked for police protection at Monday's City Commission meeting.
"We make this request because those present used rhetoric relating to people having guns and words to the effect that there would be 'people shooting first and asking questions late, and sure as h--- someone was going to get killed ...," Ritchie wrote, referring to comments last month before the Planning Commission.
Capt. Tod Dahle of the Fargo Police Department said Police Chief Keith Ternes will decide whether to have an official police presence at the meeting.
"We regularly have police officers attend the meetings for one reason or another, so that wouldn't be unusual," he said.
City commissioners also will decide Monday whether to endorse the large North Dakota diversion that a work group of local officials is recommending to protect Fargo-Moorhead against a 500-year flood.
Readers can reach Forum reporter Patrick Springer at (701) 241-5522
