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Shabby Home Bugs Neighbors

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By KEVIN WIATROWSKI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 25, 2007

Updated: 11/24/2007 04:33 pm

WESLEY CHAPEL - The house at 1444 Bent Tree Drive in Meadow Pointe has a long history as the neighborhood eyesore.

Twice in the past six years, crews in protective clothing have cleaned the house of accumulated filth, including animal feces and flea-infested furnishings.

Two years after the last cleaning, neighbors complain that the house owned by Linda and Nicole Jackson is reverting to its previous state of disrepair.

The yard is overgrown, and sheets hang over the windows and glass-paned front door. Weeds a foot tall stand in the cracks in the driveway.

Two vehicles - a four-door sedan and a small pickup with a camper top - are filled with trash. A full-size tire is visible in the sedan's back seat. Paperback novels fill the truck's unused driver's seat.

Recently, the owners' dogs escaped the house and roamed the neighborhood, prompting a new round of recriminations, calls to county officials and e-mail debates about declining property values.

"From the street, you can smell the odor coming from the house," said Dennis Costa, who lives around the corner from the Jacksons. Costa also sits on the Meadow Pointe Community Council and Deed Restriction Violation Board.

The situation on Bent Tree shows what can happen when homeowners' lifestyles collide with community standards aimed at protecting property values.

"Technically, we can't tell people how to live inside their house," Costa said.

Pasco County officials say there's little they can do to force change. Community officials can take the Jacksons to court or put a lien against their property to force them to meet the deed restrictions, but so far that hasn't happened.

No one answered the door at the Jacksons' home during recent visits. A single dog barked from inside in response to knocks at the door. A smoke detector with a failing battery could be heard chirping steadily near the front door. The mother and daughter didn't respond to other attempts to contact them for comment.

Neighbors describe the Jacksons as reclusive.

Lee Burstiner's family has lived next door for nine years, but has little contact with the Jacksons.

"I don't mean them any harm," Burstiner said. "I'd just like them to get their act together."

Community members say the Jacksons haven't responded to previous letters from the community development district, which enforces deed restrictions for the segment of the neighborhood known as Meadow Pointe I.

County code enforcers say there's little they can do. The house is structurally safe, and the animals appear healthy and well-fed, said enforcement officer Charlie Congelosi.

The Jacksons have received many warnings over the years to mow their grass when it got more than a foot high. Every time, they've eventually cut the grass, Congelosi said.

"You have to babysit them, but I've gotten compliance from them without having to cite them," Congelosi said. "I know there's some odor coming from the house, but we can't do anything about that."

Costa said the community council will discuss the Jacksons' home and deed violations when it meets Monday. Community officials say that, by having more than a half-dozen dogs in their home, the Jacksons have broken rules limiting them to four animals.

Neighbors have cut the Jacksons' grass and pruned the live oak tree in their front yard - but that was in the past, Burstiner said.

"Now we're kind of fed up with it," he said.

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