OLDS — A garage that was built too close to the property line sparked a discussion by municipal planning commission (MPC) members on possible rule changes to prevent that from happening in the future.
The matter came up during the July MPC meeting.
Commissioners were asked to approve a garage that was constructed too close to the property line when a marker in the ground was wrongly assumed to be a corner marker for the property.
“They measured one metre from that marker and built the garage there,” development officer Kyle Sloan said, adding that after the project was inspected it was discovered that the building was 34 centimetres too close to the neighbouring property.
In the end, the MPC OK’d a variance allowing the building to stand if a soffit for the garage is cut to increase the distance between the garage and a neighbouring building and if fire and building inspectors inspect and sign off on the structure.
However, the entire matter prompted some advice from MPC members.
“I would suggest this is a service level – that council needs to provide instructions to planning department and inspectors that once footings have been poured, or when the forms are laid, that a building inspector goes out to ensure that it meets the building code development permit,” Coun. Mary Jane Harper said.
Coun. Mary Anne Overwater conceded the variance applied for is only 34 centimetres, but said problems or mistakes such as that seem to crop up all too often.
“They're supposed to be inspected, they’re supposed to have some sort of guidance when they’re building them and then it always seems to come back quite often that ‘oh, we built too close,’ or ‘we built too close to the end of the driveway’ or ‘we built too close to the other building’ or something like that,” Overwater said.
“I’m not saying I’m going to have this guy move his garage, but you know what? I think we need to start being more on top of things so this doesn’t come back to us.”
Commissioner Dan Peters voiced a similar sentiment.
“I guess we’re wondering, ‘how can we avoid these, right? You know, whose fault really was it,” Peters said.
“And not trying to find out whose fault it is, but how can we develop, (a system) I guess that eliminates these kinds of things?”
