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With bulldozers rumbling and chainsaws buzzing, Montgomery County NAACP leaders, residents and lawyers took matters into their own hands Friday morning by clearing debris from a farm road that is the only access to their land-locked properties in Sandy Spring.

Felled trees, piles of rubble, brush and decomposing automobiles were strewn across the dirt-and-gravel, tree-lined passageway known as Farm Road, which runs between the Sandy Spring Slave Museum and 18532 Brooke Road.

Residents of the historically black enclave who own property along the road say the county Planning Board has denied them building permits since 2006. Planners have said the road does not appear in county road records and that road access for emergency vehicles is required before addresses can be issued.

At a court hearing in August, U.S. District Judge Roger W. Titus urged the plaintiffs to consider mediation to settle the dispute with the county planning agency, neighbor Christine Hill-Wilson and an engineering and surveying firm accused by the plaintiffs of fraudulently submitting documents to remove the road from records.

"We agree with the U.S. District Court's characterization of the lawsuit that it doesn't amount to civil rights dispute," Valerie Berton, communications manager for the county planning agency, wrote in an e-mail to The Gazette. "We have constantly maintained that this is a neighborhood dispute. We thought the court was supervising a mediation of the case and we're cooperating fully."

An attempt to reach Hill-Wilson was unsuccessful.

Residents and others on site Friday said they had the right to move the items blocking the roadway.

"There was a judgment that the wording says we can move the debris that was put there on purpose," Montgomery County NAACP President Henry Hailstock said as he stood at the entrance to the road.

As the chainsaws roared, Robert Awkard, 86, of Sandy Spring looked on. He walked the road as a child.

"This was the only road we had to get to my house," he said. "My grandfather worked on a farm back there. I've travelled this road since 1923. Not only did I walk to school on this road, I rode a wagon down it."

He said he was happy to see it finally being reopened because he owns a property that he could not access.

"I'm tired of throwing money away paying taxes on that property I can't get to," he said.

Police were called as peace-keepers after those gathered for the event observed Hill-Wilson's husband, William R. Wilson, wearing a bright orange hunting cap and carrying a shotgun from his vehicle into his house.

"He saw people here and made sure the people knew he had a shotgun," said Roy L. Austin Jr., an attorney for one of the property owners.

Wilson told a Gazette reporter at the press conference that he did not want to comment.

Kelly Dutton's family, the Gaither family, owns property on Farm Road, so she was there to support the clearing effort.

"It's very satisfying" to see the road cleared, she said. "Those involved are working very diligently. To be denied access to build your home in 2008 is just unreasonable."

She added, "I'm not against anything — I'm for the road."

At one time the road extended all the way to Gold Mine Road, but a development now blocks the road some 2,000 feet from Brooke Road.

Richard Long, a permitting services Inspector for the county, said the county called him out to check out the right of way. "At this time I see no issue," he said.