The pace was slow at the start as a group of neighbors complaining about beach egress and legal property fences on the beach occupied the work session.
The discussion of Non disturbance and non turf buffer took the next hour as an applicant who was the last one to buy into a canal front neighborhood ACCEPTED A RESTRICTION of a non disturbance buffer behind his bulkhead, as a part of his permit to build. The rest of the neighbors have non turf buffers. So everyone’s back yard is neat and pretty except one which looks like a tangle of poison ivy and weeds…a problem for the owner and the neighbors. When the applicant comes back next month I hope that the board decides to allow a non turf buffer at the bulkhead, bringing him into conformity in the neighborhood and also achieves the same result: to stop lawn runoff from entering the canal. The desired end result should be the focus of the discussion. (refresher: non turf=no grass; non disturbance= do not touch anything that grows there)
This theme of ACCEPTING RESTRICTIONS/CONDITIONS/STIPULATIONS on a permit, is replayed later when an applicant who, prior to property purchase, transferred the dock permit into his name, but ACCEPTED THE CONDITION, that if he replaced or maintained it, he had to do that in accordance with the standards of Chapter 275. He thought that meant not using treated lumber on the deck, things like that…afterall, he transferred the permit and had a permitted structure, he thought…. The Trustees thought the condition on his permit means that if he has to maintain or replace his dock he must make it conform in SIZE to that which they approve today:4′ wide, not 6′ or 8′ wide! They want him to reduce the size of his permitted dock! This has terrible implications for those of us with a permitted structure that exceeds the size of what is being allowed on new applications which is a big decrease in resale value of your property! The lesson? Completely understand the language and all the implications of a condition or restriction by having the Trustees detail what they understand, and having your professional detail what he/she understands and resolving any ambiguity IN WRITING!
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