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Woman says fine came with no warning
Sugarmill Woods resident must pay $100 for county lawn watering violation
HOMOSASSA — Janice Windreich was more than a little upset when she received a Notice of Irrigation Violation from the Citrus County Board of County Commissioners Water Resources Department with a $100 citation attached.
Apparently she unintentionally and unknowingly watered her lawn at her Sugarmill Woods home on the wrong day due to a sprinkling system timer error.
That mistake comes with a $100 fine for the first offense, a $250 fine for the second offense and a $500 fine for the third offense. As of Jan. 2, the department stopped handing out irrigation violation warnings.
“No warning notice,” she said. “If they want to fine me I can understand it, but I think it’s exorbitant. One-hundred dollars is absolutely fleecing the people.”
Lindsay Ubinas, public information officer for the county, said the enforcement is per a court ordinance that was decided Oct. 25, 2011 at a public hearing.
“We’re enforcing the consent agreement, which clearly states no more warnings,” Ubinas said. “Now people are taking it more seriously because they know they’re not getting a warning anymore.
“The reason this happened is people are using too much water. The county is over pumping from our water utilities.”
She said the county increased its enforcement staff adding an extra two officers in October 2011 in
response to the consent order with their main focus primarily on enforcing the consent agreement.
Windreich said she called the director of water resources’ office and the Board of County Commissioners’ office to explain her mistake and try to get her ticket rectified.
“Both said there’s nothing they can do but told me I could appeal it,” she said.
Appealing the ticket could cost her as much as $500 in fines if she didn’t win.
“I don’t think I’d be very wise doing that,” she said. “Some of the judges are very unsympathetic, and you’re at their mercy. You hardly win.”
Windreich said Deborah Hooper, the department’s water conservation specialist, came out to Windreich’s home to reset her timer for her. She said she was pleased with that, and plans to pay the fine within the 30-day allotted time period.
Chronicle reporter Cathy Kapulka can be reached at 352-564-2922 or ckapulka@chronicleonline.com.
Irrigation violations from October 2011 through Jan 2012
October 2011
Warnings: 114
First violations: 23
Second violations: 3
November 2011
Warnings: 80
First violations: 20
Second violations: 6
December 2011
Warnings: 67
First violations: 14
Second violations: 1
January 2012
No warnings
First violations: 60
Second violations: 0
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Water....
Pay the ticket, turn off your sprinklers and 'don't worry, be happy.'
Waste of water
Sprinkler systems are really unnecessary if the lawn is native grass. Get rid of the St. Augustine grass and plant bahia, quit fertilizing and watering. Use rain barrels to collect rain runoff and irrigate with that. There are many common sense methods but we would rather decimate the resources for a fancy lawn.
Good Points
Those are some valid points Kurt. Swiftmud offers some great literature on native plants that require no upkeep and its all free for download on their web site.
But still yet, with the tax rate home owners get hit with in this county, the waste-water option would be a happy medium. So much of this county is still without sanitary sewer or even fire hydrants yet they insist on spending our tax dollars on projects that solely benefit our commissioners and their circle of friends. They are out of control with their spending of our money for their personal profit. Citrus county residents are the victims of our commissioners actions and these fines are just the old adage of blaming the victims for the counties short comings.
JeffJ
water Nazis
The water nazis assaulted citrus hills a while back and warned no one, 200 or more homes were hit and you do not dare appeal this or you will pay 500.00. In my case i was adjusting and replacing sprinkler heads from idiots running over them and speeding ( of course on Olympia st, the speedway) You are allowed to adjust them as required, but i forgot to turn the timer off at dark and of course the water nazi drove by with yellow flashing lights and gave me the ticket and he was to stupid to understand my explanation of what had happened, i was not trying to water my lawn on an off day. I went down to Lecanto complex and was told it is better to pay the fine verses going before a judge.Of course the golf course in citrus Hills uses more water than the whole neighrborhood, Terra vista entrances and lawns are always green ????? And lets not forget the citrus Hills nazis will drive by and tell you your lawn is brown and your driveway is not pressure cleaned. IN NOVEMBER VOTE OUT EVERY BOCC INCLUDING THE NEW ONES AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, VOTE OUT EVERY JUDGE THAT IS UP FOR RE-ELECTION
Un Justifiably Insane
You claim not to be watering on an off day and just made a mistake, right? So you shouldn't get a ticket is your logic.
Okay, so your just trying to pass a car going under the speed limit and you get stopped for going over the limit in the processes. You don't deserve a ticket because it was accidental?
You "just barely" get to an intersection as the light turns red and run the light because you feel you couldn't sop safely. You don't deserve the ticket, because it wasn't your fault for driving too fast and not seeing the yellow light in time, right?
Grow up, be responsible, and stop making excuses like a 6 year old child. It is your fault, whether you intentionally used a loophole or were just too damn stupid to turn them off when you were done. But you expect the rules to fit your behavior?? Bull.
The answer to your stupidity which resulted in the fine is not to "vote out" everyone. The solution to ALL fines and penalties is to use common sense and quit making excuses so that everyone else has to pay the burden of your asinine behavior.
JustAmazed
you must have graduated from
you must have graduated from a citrus county school if at all and/or you work for the county you idiot.your allowed to adjust sprinklers and test them. What does a speeding ticket/running a red light have to do with sprinkler adjustment. It is just a way to take money from citizens and let others water all they want, can't you read and understand you idiot. I usually do not comment on stupid things in this county because of the overabundance of stupid people like you. I will make sure when i leave the lawn will be dirt and look like something you are use to. someone else can pay the high property taxes on devalued homes to your corrupt politicians so you can always remain stupid.
REALLY?!!
Really?!! You feel "sucked dry" by having to pay a $100 fine? What about all the water you're "sucking" out of the aquifer to water your stupid lawns? I'm pretty sure that come judgement day we won't be judged on how green our lawns were! You can always tell who wastes water on their lawn, their grass is always green in the middle of a drought!
Soldiers have fought and died for this country and it's freedoms. And yet you CHOOSE to live in a neighborhood where somebody TELLS you that you have to have a green lawn, or you house can only be a certain color or style?
How important is that grass in the long run?
Florida Cracker
Yeah Cracker
No doubt a couple of junk cars and oil soaked sand would be much more to your liking.
JeffJ
Where is our Treated Waste-water?
Many Florida communities have overcome these high water demand times by making waste water from their sewage treatment plants available for their residents outdoor needs instead of hitting them with exorbitant fines. Come on, the investments many of us have made in our lawns and landscaping is a considerable amount of the value in our homes and quality of our community.
Our current board of commissioners recently chose to spend our hard earned tax dollars building a pipeline that will send our treated waste-water to the northwest corner of the county and give it to Progress Energy Corporation for their needs. How Ironic that we get fined for not having the waste-water for our outdoor needs while we pay for the construction of a waste-water pipeline so Progress Energy can have it. Remember that when your paying those big summer electric bills to Progress Energy along with that fine for buying too much water from the county.
That tiny, sparsely populated northwest corner of Citrus County is sure becoming a whirlpool for flushing our tax dollars down.
First, we had to pay to run a sewer line all the way up US 19 and across the barge canal to that old RV park Dennis Damato is trying to resurrect, After that we decided to pay to build a pipeline so we can give our waster-water away to a non-functioning nuclear plant and of course now they want to drain our last tax dollar dime to build Dixie Holland a shipping port...right across the street from that RV Park Dennis Damato is in bed with......don't look to closely and move along folks there is nothing wrong with this picture, our county commissioners take our best interests to heart.....HA, HA, HA.
JeffJ