Approvals Received -- Week 7

There weren't any pretty pictures for this week, but the activities were significant. One of the Pima County problems we encountered was that because we were grading more than 14,000 square feet, we had to designate a Natural Open Space (NOS) equal to at least 30% of the property. We had done that, but it turned out, unbeknownst to us, our builders or the architects, that you can't do anything to or in the NOS. A water line from the street to the house had to go through it & the 2nd driveway was also planned to although it wasn't on the site plan.

So we had to reconfigure the NOS, allowing for the water line & the driveway. The NOS had to be moved closer to the house and split into 2 sections, but that was okay with us. At first we thought we could do some debris & mistletoe removal as well as some minimal pruning in the NOS, but it turns out that we can do NOTHING. That's okay with us so long as the fire department can get to us in time.

The weird thing about this requirement is that if you don't grade that much, the assumption is that you will leave the rest wild. Most folks in Diamond Bell Ranch don't. They clear out deadfalls & brush to keep down the packrats, rattlesnakes & fire hazard. Ask me about the buffelgrass...

The other issue the builders hit was that since last year, a signoff from the county floodplain office became required. The land isn't in the FEMA 100-year floodplain. I made sure of that. Our lot is even one that slopes very gently & perfectly we thought. There are some washes in the area that can cause problems, but we're not anywhere close to any.

We have heard many reasons why this is now a requirement. They include the following: people have complained to the county for approving permits when there were issues of water crossing their land in heavy rain, one of the county engineers bought a house in the area & got water in his garage during one rainstorm, some people didn't bother with permitting at all, stripped their land bare & installed manufactured homes (all no-nos for the area), etc.

So we were required to agree to raise our pad up enough that the foundation will be 1 foot above the highest natural grade adjacent to the front (east) side of the house in order to get the approvals shown below. Because our builders started this process early enough, we do not have to have an inspection that proves that we did it. We missed this requirement by just a couple of days.

So these are all the final stamps & signatures on the site plan which is also the front page of our plans.

And this is the front page of the printed permit -- so few words for so much time & work!