Court sides with Eau Claire County in case over Amish family’s home

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A circuit court properly held an Amish family in contempt for failing to obtain building and sanitary permits before building their house, a judge has ruled in an appeals case.

Eau Claire County sued five Amish families in 2013 over allegations that they had failed to obtain permits before building houses that they then went on to live in. Among the defendants were the Borntregers, who are members of one of the most conservative Amish sects, the Old Order.

The Borntregers’ case stems from a complaint that Eau Claire County officials say they received in 2010 alleging that an Amish family was building a house and outhouse in the village of Fairchild without first acquiring the required permit.

The county told the family twice in 2011 that it must obtain building and sanitary permits before continuing with the project and later issued citations. Despite the warning, the family continued living in the house and took few if any steps to bring it into compliance with county ordinances.

The Borntregers responded by arguing that they could not sign the building permits without violating their religious beliefs, which are protected by the Wisconsin Constitution.

The local circuit court sided in 2014 with Eau Claire County, instructing the five families in the case to obtain building and sanitary permits within a year. If they failed to comply, the court warned, they would be evicted and their houses would be condemned.

Four of the families reached agreements with the county. In those deals, three families consented to obtain building permits, while the fourth decided to turn its house into a barn.

However, the Borntregers only partially followed the court’s orders, signing an application for a building permit but never pursuing a sanitary permit, according to the county. The Borntregers’ house was condemned in January 2015, yet two members of the family continued living in it.

The court in February ordered the family members to leave the house. When they did not comply, they were held in contempt the following month.

The family appealed the contempt order in April, contending that it had violated their religious rights as guaranteed by the state constitution. The position failed to sway the District 3 Court of Appeals.

The court stated Tuesday that, in order to pursue such a line of argument, the family should have appealed the original order to obtain building and sanitary permits rather than the subsequent contempt order. The court found that, because of the matters presented to it on appeal, it could only examine whether the trial court had acted properly when deciding that the Borntregers were in contempt.

The contempt order was correct, according to the appeals court, because the Borntregers had never abided by the previous order to obtain a sanitary permit. Follow @erikastrebel