The lack of county ordinances is bugging some mid-Missouri property owners.

Sue Gerding and Sherry Sanford are neighbors. Sanford calls her home in New Franklin peaceful. She says it's just far enough from the bustle of town. Gerding calls hers a retreat after years of raising children. It's quiet, beautiful and safe. But both say when people come to visit, it isn't these observations that come to mind, the focus is on the trash.

"You go up there and then the next day you go up there and there's like two more tons. It looks like someone pulled up their truck and shoved off a bunch of garbage," explained Gerding.

The place they're referring to is an abandoned home right by the turnoff into their subdivision. They say it's the first thing visitors notice.

While Sanford and Gerding live in Howard county, they are still outside the city limits.

"There's no laws, there's no zoning, there's no ordinances," said Sanford.

The house is a problem six years in the making. The Howard County Prosecutor and a sheriff visited the property in 2004. Prosecutor Mason Gebhardt returned to the commissioner's office with an ordinance proposal, but he says they decided not to take any action.

"They have the right to say yay or nay without giving an explanation," explained Gebhardt.

Without their approval, he says there isn't a whole lot he can do.

"You have littering laws for littering on county roads, but you don't necessarily have littering laws for littering on your own property," explained Sanford.

The Howard County Commissioner spoke with KOMU 8 on the phone but refused to go on camera. He says other counties have similar problems, so there is no need to sign an ordinance. But when KOMU 8 looked into it, we found something different. Chariton County does not have an ordinance, but the county clerk says they do investigate private dumping complaints and can put up 'no dumping' signs. She says they also pay for a public dump site.

Howard County Commissioner Howard Black did send KOMU 8 an e-mail response which says the county did look into the problem, "Upon inspection they found no violations due to no county zoning and being on private land. We exhausted all statutes and the county had no legal enforcement," explained Black.

No legal enforcement was made because they haven't signed an ordinance.

"I'll go up there and talk to them. I got nowhere and it was just kind of a joke like, 'why do we need to deal with you? They're an elected official to begin with and these are the kind of issues they should be dealing with," said Gerding.

Sanford says if the commission doesn't act, it may be stuck.

"Where are we going to be a few years down the line when we want to retire and move? Who's going to want to buy my house? Nobody. Nobody's going to want to live by that," explained Sanford.

And that 'nobody' includes Sanford and Gerding. KOMU 8 also tried to contact the property owner, but he did not return our phone calls. Nneighbors plan to travel to Jefferson City on July 14 to protest to state legislatures. They want to find out how to legally withhold taxes until the problem is addressed.