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Posted by David Sherman on Thursday, January 08, 2009 at 18:57:54 :
In Reply to: O.T. Zoning---Zero Tollerance posted by Leon in PA on Thursday, January 08, 2009 at 17:10:29 :
I'm not real clear what's going on here, but with that kind of money on the table, I'd be getting at least a 1/2 hour initial consultation with a good aggressive lawyer to see what the city or county can really do. You may have already complied with the letter of the law, or you may be able to do something really simple to comply. I had a neighbor in Everett who got cited by "code compliance" for having an unlicensed car in her yard that was visible from the street ("visible from the street") is part of the Everett code. The yard was surrounded by a board fence except for a chain-link gate. She hung a blue tarp on the gate, and there was nothing more that "code compliance" could do. The tarp looked a lot worse than the car, but it satisfied the law.
Of course if you're really in a place that's that picky, the writing may be on the wall, and you may have to eventually move out. The trouble is, most places have blight ordinances that they rarely enforce, but they can use it when they want to. On the other hand, many of these ordinances are too vague and are unenforceable (so a lawyer told me). "Unregistered vehicle", for example, is pretty clear, but "unsightly debris" or "overgrown shrubbery" is not.