Finally, a date is set for a 2013 case.
Judge Edward Nicholas decided Nov. 4 the next treehouse hearing — set for 10 a.m. Friday, Nov. 15 — will address a motion to dismiss filed by the city of Holmes Beach in a 2013 case from the treehouse owners’ attorney.
Sarasota attorney David Levin of Icard Merrill filed the case seeking a declaratory judgment for treehouse owners Lynn Tran and Richard Hazen.
Levin’s case seeks to declare city ordinances unconstitutional, claiming the ordinance that created a 50-foot setback from the erosion control line on the beachfront took the owners’ property without proper notice and just compensation.
The two-story 400-foot structure built in 2011 in an Australian pine tree by Hazen and Tran, where they live and operate four rental units, next to the 29th Street beach access in Holmes Beach.
An anonymous complaint to the city code enforcement officer led to six years of litigation between the owners, city and Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
CHAPTER 62B-33 of the FLORIDA ADMINISTRATIVE CODE –
RULES AND PROCEDURES FOR COASTAL CONSTRUCTION AND EXCAVATION (PERMITS FOR CONSTRUCTION SEAWARD OF THE COASTAL CONSTRUCTION CONTROL LINE AND FIFTY-FOOT SETBACK)
62B-33.002 Definitions.
(17) “Fifty (50)-foot Setback” or “Setback Line” is the line of jurisdiction established pursuant to the provisions of section 161.052, F.S., in which construction is prohibited within 50 feet of the line of mean high water at any riparian coastal location fronting the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic coast shoreline.
FLORIDA STATUTES CHAPTER 177, PART II COASTAL MAPPING ACT
177.26 Declaration of policy.–The Legislature recognizes the desirability of confirmation of the mean high-water line, as recognized in the State Constitution and defined in s. 177.27(15) as the boundary between state sovereignty land and uplands subject to private ownership, as well as the necessity for uniform standards and procedures with respect to the establishment of local tidal datums and the determination of the mean high-water and mean low-water lines, and therefore directs that uniform standards and procedures be developed. History.–s. 2, ch. 74-56; s. 2, ch. 91-56.
Adopted in 1974.
Therefore the 50′ setback is Florida Statute, Law. Setback from property line fronting beach.
Read 62B-33 – Treehouse Structure is not legal, built in required setback, as deemed by State of Florida. Period.
The setback line in this case is the erosion control line (not the CCCL) and it goes back to the 1992 beach renourishment project, when the state established a permanent ECL on AMI. — Bonner