Editor’s note: Read Shannon Ellis’s letter in response to this story here.

It began with what seemed like a minor misunderstanding — a bark mistaken for a bite. 

“It was just a little bark. My cameras caught it,” said Julia Hunt Alvarez, a resident of The Villages at Rancho El Dorado. “A lady that had been running down the street claimed my dog had bit her dog and she was threatening me as she was walking away.” 

Maricopa Animal Control got involved. The neighbor, Shannon Ellis, tried to press charges, Alvarez said. Though Alvarez attempted to apologize several times, Ellis — a massage therapist who has operated Hands of Silk from her home for roughly 15 years — eventually filed an order of protection against her. 

Ellis declined to detail her side of the story, but her perspective is documented in a series of emails obtained via public records request. 

“Ms. Alvarez used her knowledge as a city employee to attempt to shut down a local business owner’s livelihood. This is unethical and disturbing. Especially since she represents our city,” Ellis wrote in an email to Alvarez’s supervisor in August 2024. 

Two sides to this story 

Alvarez, who works as an administrative assistant for the City of Maricopa’s Development Services Department, said she discovered her neighbor’s business unintentionally. 

“I was looking through Facebook one day a couple weeks later and she showed up on my suggested friends list. I go, ‘Oh my God, that’s her,’” she said. “But, you know, natural curiosity — I clicked on her profile. I was like, ‘Oh, she has a massage business out of her home.’” 

She said she inquired with her department about Ellis’s licensing status out of safety concerns, not revenge. 

“People have to travel down my street to get to hers. I have daughters,” Alvarez said. “I have a legitimate reason for feeling unsafe that she has a massage business down my street.” 

From there, the situation escalated. Ellis began sending weekly emails to the city, requesting updates on what she described as “unethical and disturbing” behavior. She was eventually told “appropriate actions were taken.” 

Eight months later, Ellis resumed her complaints, accusing Alvarez of harassment. 

“[Alvarez] is using her job to directly investigate me and attack my business,” Ellis wrote. “Today (on my birthday), she had my business investigated to try and maliciously attack me.” 

She continued: “I have had no issues with my home-based business for 15 years until Julie Alvarez developed a personal grudge against me. [She’ll] find any reason to be able to report complaints as if she were a neighbor (even though she does not even live on my street).”  

Alvarez lives less than 500 feet away. 

While Ellis is a licensed massage therapist, she lacked the required city permit to operate her business from home. Maricopa City Code has required licenses for regulated businesses — including massage establishments — since 2004. 

Public records show Ellis started, but did not complete, a license application last year. She finalized the process and paid the necessary fees in May. 

Ellis told InMaricopa the situation was “extremely stressful.” She would not answer how long she had been operating unlicensed. 

Another backyard battle 

A similar — though more public — conflict played out in Thunderbird Farms, where Shell Abbott faced mounting resistance to her home-based German Shepherd breeding business. 

Abbott said the fate of her business had been uncertain for months. Though many neighbors and past clients voiced support, her next-door neighbors, Chad and Katie Buhr, strongly opposed it. 

In letters, public meetings, and filings with Pinal County, the Buhrs aired concerns about noise, safety and what they called a decline in their quality of life. They also called Abbott and her husband, Russ Byers, liars.  

“There’s been a lot of lies said today, I can’t hit them all … Please know that there’s been a lot of deception,” Chad Buhr said during a June 19 zoning meeting. 

Depending on who you ask, the dispute began either with a tree trimming seven years ago or with dogs escaping the property. 

The Buhrs declined to comment for this story but submitted a letter to the editor ahead of a final vote by the county supervisors. 

“I would like to make it known that we, Chad and Katie Buhr, do not have a personal grievance or vendetta against Abbott’s German Shepherds, or the owners of the properties. We don’t hate their guts,” they wrote in the letter, which was published to InMaricopa.com June 29. 

After months of hearings bouncing between the Pinal County Planning and Zoning Commission and the Board of Supervisors, Abbott’s business was granted one of two special use permits July 2. The permit covers the location near Val Vista and Ralston Roads. A second permit for her home near Jean Drive and White Road was denied in a contentious 3-2 vote. 

While Abbott operated with a mix of commercial and non-commercial kennel permits — allowed for homes with five or more dogs — her 3½-acre property fell short of the 5-acre minimum required by county zoning laws for kennels in suburban ranching areas. 

“My building permits were allowed by the county already, so I can’t be knocked on what the county has allowed me to do,” Abbott said in an interview.  

Supervisor Rich Vitiello (R-Maricopa) disagreed. Vitiello, who cast the deciding vote against the Jean Drive kennel and the lone vote against the Val Vista site, said the Abbott family had “never done anything correct from the beginning.” 

“I denied both because if you haven’t been doing things right over the past 30 years, what makes me think you’re going to be doing things right after?” said the supervisor, who lives in Cobblestone Farms. 

No gray area 

To Alvarez, the matter comes down to one simple principle. 

“For me, that is a must. You have to follow rules,” she said. “It’s right or wrong. That’s the way I was raised, that’s the way I was taught and that’s the way the law is written.” 

She defended her decision to report Hands of Silk, saying that as a city employee she sees people try to skirt the rules “all the time.” 

Vitiello shared a similar stance after voting against Abbott’s special use permits. 

“Throughout the county, the issue is: Do something wrong, get caught and then ask for forgiveness,” Vitiello said. “Is that how we’re supposed to run a government? Would you run your business that way?” 

For him, the answer is clear. 

“You don’t run a business that way. You don’t do things illegally and then, when you get caught, then fix it. What ramifications did we give them if they do things wrong? Technically none.”