Gary Hudson, Chair Deeds of Restriction & Architectural Review Committee
When a deeds of restriction (DOR) violation is either noticed or brought to a board member/street directors’ attention, the chair of the Deeds of Restriction Committee (which also handles architectural review) asks the Executive Secretary of the association to send a certified letter to the owner of record. The association uses the legal address as found at the Lee County Property Appraisers web site. The legal address may be another address in Lee County, or Florida, or out of state (or even out of country). After “x” number of tries, if the addressee is still not available to sign for the certified letter, a note is left by the postal carrier to come to a designated post office, sign, and claim the certified letter. If this doesn’t work or if the addressed has refused to sign, the envelope is returned to the association with a yellow USPS sticker with the words in the title of this article. What then? The answer involves a time-consuming effort by a volunteer member of the board (usually the chair of the DOR Committee) to follow-up on returned correspondence. This may involve knocking on the door of the violator’s home hoping someone’s there or resending a letter to the Town & River home address or talking to a neighbor.
Examples of returned “unclaimed” envelopes include:
- Trash cans left out in front of garage door (quite visible from adjoining properties)
- A dock and boat lift (permitted but not approved by the association)
- A swimming pool and deck (permitted but not approved by the association). The unclaimed letter mailed to a Rhode Island address was even personally given to the contractor on site, who was asked to bring it to the attention of the owner. No response from either the contractor or owner.
- Vehicle regularly parked overnight on street
- Overgrown, unedged, yard and plant beds
- Commercial vehicle regularly parked in driveway
- Commercial vehicle regularly parked on street (this is not allowed by ARCDOR but the Unit 6 and 11 deeds of restriction do not prohibit it)
The purpose of this article is to communicate to Town & River homeowners that violations are being enforced to the extent volunteer human resources allow and share how frustrating it often is to try to do so. The three deeds of restriction in Town & River may be found at https://townandriverfl.com/deeds-of-restriction/