FREDERICKTOWN — Enforcement of encroachment rules by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources has some Knox Lake homeowners unhappy. Homeowners had a chance to have their questions and concerns answered at an informational meeting Thursday night with ODNR officials.
“There’s been a long history of encroachment on public property,” said Ken Fitz, law enforcement administrator with ODNR. “Folks that live around the lake have encroached on us. As a state agency, it’s kind of irresponsible of us to allow that.”
According to ODNR, encroachment issues were first noted in 1990. ODNR conducted a survey of boundary lines in 2000, and sent letters to homeowners notifying them of possible violations. The boundaries were re-inspected in 2001, and again in October 2007. ODNR began issuing citations this year.
Encroachment issues involve homeowners mowing past their property line onto state property, anywhere from a few feet to a couple of hundred feet, said Dan Huss, district office manager for ODNR, Division of Wildlife. In addition, there have been campsites, fire rings and yard waste, even garages and boat docks built.
“We’ve had people remove trees and plant lawns,” said Huss. “One homeowner even brought in a backhoe, dug out the lake back to his property, and built a boat dock.”
Huss said one homeowner did not have lake view property, but cut down the trees to make it a lake view.
“We had two people cut down the trees and sell them,” he said.
William Swaim of Circle Drive is one of the homeowners cited for disposal of trash and debris on state property, and also for his personal property encroaching onto state land. Swaim moved into his home in 1999.
“I’ve got an old picnic table that’s on state property,” he said. “I was cited for it, but it was there when I bought the property.”
Another issue is a swing erected between two trees that is about three feet on state property.
“The physical boundary lines are inaccurate,” said Swaim. “I show one boundary line, ODNR shows another.”
Part of the debris citation is brush falling out of trees on state property onto Swaim’s property. Swaim said he piles it up into a wildlife habitat.
“What do I do with it when it falls on my property?” he asked. “One officer tells me to throw it in the lake, another officer says you can’t do that.”
In addition, he said, while he was cited for trash and debris, he has pictures which show tires, trash and trees on ODNR property that has not been cleaned up.
“For 40 years they have not been doing anything about it. Now all of a sudden they’re saying we are going to do this and do that,” he said. “We’re trying to be good neighbors, but the state’s not been a good neighbor.”
“Our main thing is how they’ve treated us,” said Swaim’s wife, Irene. “They’ve treated us like the enemy.
“The people that are violating the lake are the ones using the lake — the boaters, teenagers.”
In addition, she said, the state doesn’t empty its trash cans; trash piles up several feet above the container, and the trash gets blown around by the wind.
At the meeting, Swaim spoke with the ODNR officer who issued him the citation.
“I won’t be happy until [ODNR] talks to the prosecutor and tries to get the violations reduced or resolved out of court,” he said.
Jason Dirst, also of Circle Drive, came to the meeting with a list of questions, and said he appreciated the chance to establish better communications between the homeowners and ODNR.
“I’ve had my property three years, and have heard a lot of different things from my neighbors. I think part of the problem is everybody has their own idea [of what they’re supposed to do]. People who have lived here a long time have been told different things.”
Although Dirst knows his property line extends all the way to the lake, he said he thinks some confusion has arisen over the boundary lines because they’re irregular. On some properties, he said, the boundary line is 10 to 15 yards back from the lake, while in other places it’s 200 to 300 yards wide.
Regarding his list of questions, Dirst said he had previously gotten a lot of answers, but was never 100 percent sure they were right.
“Now I know,” he said.
