The Evening Sun
By MEG BERNHARDT
Evening Sun Reporter
Ghost tours are haunting Gettysburg's Baltimore Street homes with noise and litter, two residents told the Gettysburg Borough Public Safety Committee on Monday.
Gettysburg officials, who don't have any regulatory ordinances in place to control the ghoulish guides, are struggling to ensure a growing number of companies follow a voluntary compliance policy.
Many ghost tour companies are also complaining that their competition is giving them all a bad name.
Larry Weikert, who lives at 328 Baltimore St., told the committee he can't pull his car into the alley behind his home when large groups of tourists are gathered to listen to the guides.
"They look like deer in headlights," he said about the groups of 20 to 30 people who gather near his home two or three times an evening.
The loud voices keep his grandchildren up at night and make it impossible to watch television or leave the door open, he said.
And the tourists often litter, leaving behind soda cans, paper trash and dropped ice cream. He wasn't sure which tours go by, though. He said when he asked, the guides were rude to him.
A Baltimore Street neighbor sat quietly next to him at the meeting, nodding. And the committee also read a letter from a church asking the police to enforce trespassing laws when ghost tours go onto church property.
Public safety chairwoman Holly Giles said some companies work with the borough and wear safety vests and identifying name tags. They don't trespass and try not to disturb their neighbors, she said.
But the borough now has 14 different companies operating ghost tours in the streets, and complaints haven't stopped since the policy was agreed upon.
The borough is also worried about guides walking around in dark outfits with small candles, making them almost impossible for cars on the road to see.
"Somebody's going to get hit, and it's going to be a pedestrian struck," said interim Borough Manager John Lawver. "It's going to be ugly because they're going to come back and say (the borough) allowed this. We haven't regulated it but we've allowed it."
The ghost tour owners aren't jumping for regulations, but they do wish they weren't plagued by a few bad apples, some said Monday.
Cindy Codori Schultz, owner of Sleepy Hollow of Gettysburg, has been overseeing tours for 10 years.
"I'm as concerned as anybody because they told us that if everybody voluntarily complied, they wouldn't have to pass a bunch of ordinances," Schultz said.
Her guides all wear nametags identifying themselves and she tells them to be respectful of people's homes.
"I don't have to know everyone on the route to know they are my neighbors," Schultz said.
When she hears a complaint, she said, she responds personally, even if it's not her tour company.
She said she hopes people will realize that 10 percent of ticket sales go directly to the local government through an amusement tax. And, she said, the tours bring jobs and money to the town.
Mark Nesbitt, owner of Ghosts of Gettysburg Candlelight Walking Tours on the corner of Baltimore and Breckenridge streets, has worked with borough officials in the past to try to improve neighborhood relations.
"There's no real control over any of that and I really don't know how to solve the problem," Nesbitt said.
He's owned the business since 1994 and says it's the oldest ghost tour company in Gettysburg. He's written six books on ghosts and describes his business as well-established and legitimate.
Over the years, he said, he's worked hard to reduce complaints, but he's been frustrated as other, smaller companies come in and disregard policies. Lately, he said, companies have been setting up on card tables. He doesn't know where they get their stories or whether they follow the policies.
He tries to make it as obvious as possible who's with his group. Everyone wears a bright orange sticker.
"Most of our guides warn our customers don't come back here at night and peek in the windows," Nesbitt said. "People live in these houses; they're our neighbors."
Although the guides stay off private property, the sidewalks are public property and the guides are allowed there, he said. And he acknowledged the motorcycles and trucks on Baltimore Street makes it necessary for the guides to speak loudly in order to be heard.
Schultz said as more companies pop up, turf wars start to form between the supernatural specialists. Her tour has already had to change course a few times so they wouldn't be overlapping with other businesses.
"We're just trying to do the best we can," she said.
Source: http://www.eveningsun.com/localnews/ci_3959314
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