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A father in Maryland is attempting to keep his 10-year-old son’s go-kart track, despite neighbors complaining about the noise.
Charles Siperko, CEO of KCS Roofing, explained in a Change.org petition that his son dreams of becoming a professional race car driver, so to regularly practice he often travels to Florida. Recently Siperko and his family decided to build a track at their home in Maryland so he is able to stay home during the warmer months.
“My 10-year-old son eats, breathes, and sleeps motorsports. His passion holds the seeds of a future professional car-racing career, but it’s not an easy journey,” the petition began.
“Every single weekend, he makes sacrifices that children of his age aren’t usually asked to – traveling all the way to Florida to practice. Playground time with friends, birthday parties, socializing at family events – he misses it all for his single-minded pursuit of becoming a professional racer.”
Siperko has reportedly invested over $100,000 into the asphalt track on his 11-acre property complete with a straightway and various turns. However, with construction being completed in the spring, complaints from neighbors started in December, which led to the state interfering.
The Maryland Department of the Environment has claimed that nontidal wetlands were disturbed throughout the building process. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, nontidal wetlands serve the purpose of not only providing a habitat for plants and animals but also mitigating flood damage and filtering excess nutrients from surface runoff.
The petition has addressed all of the possible critiques of the track as Siperko writes, “If granted the conditional use we will rectify any wetlands issues if it is determined that there are any in the first place as well as any setback issues.”
However, the petition also states that they received an environmental study when first moving into their current home, claiming there are no wetlands on the property.
The family was “naively or stupidly” not aware of any permits that might have been required to build the track because the asphalt company told them that any paving that isn’t connected to a public road doesn’t require a permit.
“We have stated that we will limit use to electric motors, certain reasonable times, etc to mitigate any noise objections. We have an 11-acre property so I don’t see noise being an issue anyway,” the petition continued.
“BUT they don’t care about that, even if we fix any setback issues or wetlands issues, and generate less noise than a bunch of kids playing in a pool, they want the whole track ripped out simply because they don’t want to look at it or have it in ‘their neighborhood!’” the petition concluded, asking for anyone who does sign to also reach out to their state representative to voice their support for the track remaining.
As of October 31, the petition has received over 1,400 signatures.
“If my son wanted to swim, I could build a pool. If he wanted to play soccer, we could build a soccer stadium. Lacrosse, they could do lacrosse, any sport he wanted to do, but I can’t build a racetrack so he can become a professional driver,” Siperko said in an interview with the Baltimore Sun. “It’s just kind of discouraging.”
