Fairfax County gives reprieve to family’s tree house

[The Northerner]

A Fairfax County zoning board has granted a reprieve allowing two boys to keep the tree house their father built for them.

The Board of Zoning Appeals, reversing an earlier decision, agreed unanimously on Wednesday to grant a a variance to the tree house that Mark W. Grapin built earlier this year for his two sons before he had to leave on another tour to Iraq.

Wednesday’s decision was a victory for Grapin, who spent more money defending the tree house in an administrative battle than he did building it. The county’s action against the tree house also led to national media coverage and an online petition defending the Grapins, while county officials said they had no choice but to enforce a law that keeps everyone’s neighborhood safe and orderly.

Grapin, 51, who is with the Army National Guard, constructed a red, 58-square-foot tree house last spring around the only sturdy tree on their Falls Church property.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/virginia-politics/post/fairfax-county-gives-reprieve-to-familys-tree-house/2011/11/30/gIQAYzB8CO_blog.html

[Ian David]

1. The thing's like four feet off the ground. Heaven forbid it should fall.

Someone might break a toe.

[MADem]

2. What good news. They were assholes to even get all up in arms about the thing.

Particularly when they're FAMOUS for ignoring some varieties of code violation, particularly when they involve small businessmen who cross palms with silver...

[11 Bravo]

3. What do you know about Fairfax County that I don't (after living here for the last 38 years)?

To my knowledge Fairfax has always been fastidious, to the point of assholery, about rigidly enforcing building codes. (I won't even get into the hoops through which I had to jump in order to erect a shed on my property.) I also had no idea we were "FAMOUS" for having code inspectors and supervisors being bought off. Funny, in all those 38 years you'd think I would have heard a little bit about that as well.
Or ... maybe ... you don't know what the fuck you're talking about?

[MADem]

4. I used to live there. I had a "neighbor" who was running a family business out of his home.

He had dozens of Guatemalans living in his basement (hint--he wasn't Guatemalan) and shitting in portapotties in the back yard and bathing using the garden hose. He cooked dogs on the barbecue until the dog officer got on his case. He fenced his backyard with six foot fencing, paved over his front yard, built wall to wall sheds in the back, and parked large construction vehicles in the front yard every night, that would leave at five in the morning, waking everyone up with their BEEPBEEPBEEP backup noises.

No, the neighborhood was not zoned "dual use." It was residential with half acre (minimum) lawns.

Yes, every neighbor around him complained.

No, the inspectors didn't do shit. He'd get a warning from someone, the undocumented guys would get into a van and be driven off, the vehicles would drive away, and the inspector would show up quite ostentatiously, shake hands with the drunken bastard, and do a walk-around. "Nothing to see here!" Video, photos....it did no good. This went on for over a year until the guy finally relocated most, but not all, of his "business" to other homes he had purchased.

So, despite your assertions, I DO "know what the fuck" I am talking about--I lived across the street from that shit for way too long and I and my neighbors lodged DOZENS of complaints and were told, over and over, that they didn't have sufficient enforcement personnel to investigate every complaint. About the only time we could get satisfaction is when we called the police on the asshole for beating his wife and daughter on the front "lawn" (concrete). Then, the police would come, and he'd run off into the woods, and the wife/daughter would deny that there was any problem. At least it would shut him up for the night.

But hey, whatever. I was never so glad to move out of a neighborhood in my life.