Agenda - Council - 05/11/2021 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Dear Planning Committee, We are writing to you today based on the letter we received about the Seaman's wall and Easement. VVewanted tolet you know that vveare (nagreement with our neighbors puttingintheretaining wall and hope that it can stay in place for many various reasons. One reason, we are happy that they spent the time., effort, and money by putting this wall in as it has decreased the erosion issues we have been experiencing since move in between our two yards. We have both had to bring in dirt and new sod over the past 3 years to fix the issue of the grading that the city approved of and gave the final stamp to the builder. We had contacted the builder and city multiple times to get assistance and never did. We have continued to try and deal with this personally between the two families. Second,, Trees have fallen in our yards, on the path and one on our house due to this erosion and rotting. Requests were put into the city to remove the trees, but the city declined removal resulting in the falls and damage to our home. This resulted in both of us spending hours cleaning it up ourselves and paying a company to come out to help with removal. If we had known this was the cities problem, we could have saved ourselves hundreds of dollars. Does the city plan on paying us back since it is in the easement and we could have gotten in trouble for removing? All we have been trying to do is keep it safe for those walking, riding etc. on the path. Third, with the yard erosion so bad due to the way the city checked off the grading and basically set us up as home owners for failure we have had to put thousands extra into multiple areas to get our deck built tocode and had tohave things built upway more than the -uUderexpected because he couldn't see all the erosion when he first came out. Fourth, We run a home for adults with disabilities and we walk the path daily and have done so since moving in, there is continuous dirt, debris, sticks, holes and more on the path up and down. Which is overly concerning to us and is a safety Hazard. The one thing that has been great ever since our neighbors put up the wall is it looks cleaner and the pathway iawell taken care of, sovvedonot worry about t4kafetyinthat area. The dirt continues to slide in our yard and onto the path that we must clean but we have noticed the neighbors has stopped due to the wall. So, we ask the city what are you going to do with this since it is an easement that we know we cannot touch but we continue to struggle with the same problems? Fifth, we also ask and question why up and down the path trees have been taken down, sheds that touch the path, spots on the north side of the path being cleared and have a fire pit, chairs and more. All for look and enjoyment. All while we as neighbors are truly trying to solve a problem. Sixth, being their neighbor, we love how clean their yard and the path looks since trying to fix these issues. Plus, it is not even finished, we know more trees and other like agriculture going in. Not tomention, ithas helped the other trees from FeUing.It's odd that asyou vva|kthepatharound the neighborhood you will see several homes with retaining walls up and the easement being used in all sorts of ways but yet our neighbors are not able to keep their wall? Why has the city allowed all of this and all of a sudden they come to reprimand home owners on our street? Seventh., I find it interesting that We do not recall a conversation being had with Capstone about the easement and the fact we would be unable to do anything we wanted with the land. In fact, we were sold on how our property line went all the way back to the water as if we had all this land we could utilize. Being one of the highest paying taxpayers in the city I find it absurd we are unable to actually use the land. Not to mention we are paying taxes on a school across from our neighborhood that our children are unable toutilize. Mysolution would be and hope that vveastax payers and the city can resolve this as it has gone on far too long: since we are unable to touch the easement the city either use our tax money instead oftaking more $ from ustobuild usall retaining walls along 168th circle and correct the issues they approved of and to pay to take care of our trees as the erosion is causing them to fall on our homes and are all dying. Or we would like to seethe easement moved to the north side so we can clean and fix up these issues on our own without the city hounding those that they work for. All we are and have been trying to do is keep our yards clean, intact and from harming those that walk this path daily. Copy Previous—'�` Council Case