Posted on 04/18/2018 5:20:32 AM PDT by SandRat
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Cochise County Supervisors have an interesting decision to make on whether to allow recreational vehicles as residential structures under the zoning code.
During a work session last week, county officials asked supervisors for direction on amending an ordinance governing the allowable circumstances that would permit people to live in their recreational vehicle as their primary residence.
This is Pandora’s box for Cochise County.
Recreational vehicles are exactly what their name states: mobile modes of transportation for recreation.
Campgrounds are well-suited for these vehicles, usually providing temporary hookups for sewerage disposal, electricity and water. Some even offer cable television connections.
Classifying these vehicles as residential structures misses the mark for a few obvious reasons.
Property owners and people who rent contribute to local tax revenues. The levy passed each year by county supervisors collects a property tax that pays for road maintenance and other vital county services.
No such tax is collected on recreational vehicles, unless they are parked at a campground, in which case the property owner pays the bill.
Sanitation is also a concern. Homeowners pay for garbage pickup and they contribute to the cost of wastewater treatment, assuring the proper disposal of waste products. Recreational vehicles are designed for the temporary handling of waste, with limited capacity for sanitation and no expectation on the cost of refuse disposal.
Supervisors are still at least two meetings away from making a final decision on whether to accommodate this change, and it’s clear they have plenty to ponder on the issues involved. powered by
If this amendment is approved, we support the recommendations put forth by Supervisor Pat Call, which limit the designation of recreational vehicles as residential structures in several important ways.
Applicants seeking this approval would need a special use permit from the county specifying compliance with sewerage disposal and limiting the length of time that a recreational vehicle can be considered a residence.
It may also be helpful for county officials to take a look at the requirements established in cities and counties where marinas are occupied by boats with many of the same amenities offered by recreational vehicles. In both cases, zoning ordinances have to assure that owners are paying their fair share of the tax burden and that issues of public health are addressed.
To some people they are, and there is going to be trouble when counties decide otherwise. This county seems to be et up with tax and spend and to be fair, at everyone’s expense.
Some probably have more square footage and storage space than a “tiny home”.
Nobody is really free unless property taxes are done away with.
I commute through the back roads of a poor county in Florida. It is obvious that many recreational vehicles are set up for full time occupancy in back and side yards. They have running air conditioners, plumbing connections, electric wires strung to boxes or the house and permanently deployed canopies and box units.
I am a low end landlord in that county and low end in a relatively safe neighborhood for kids is $875-900 per month. Retired people with little income can’t afford that much. I even had three non-related people who pooled their Social Security to rent a small house from me. They hated each other and still managed it for two and a half years. The “affordable” housing problem is real and it’s everywhere.
Here is that problem in a nutshell. As a landlord it is against the law for me to do any of my own repairs. I can’t legally so much as change a sink faucet by myself. I got caught doing my own siding by a code enforcement guy. It added $4500 to the turnaround of a rental as a contractor can charge anything he wants. It upped the rent from $825 to $875 and changed the payout period by two additional years. I am on a low margin. On top of that, the contractor told me that the inspector ordered him to do ridiculous things, adding nearly 1,000 screws to the roof and thus increasing the risk. The contractor had to seal all the lap joints, despite the code which said we didn’t need it for that pitch. It makes the roof very expensive to repair if there is a problem as it makes the panels essentially one piece of metal. This is well in excess of code and, I suspect, punishment for trying to do it without paying them their $500 for a permit.
If you want to know why rentals are unaffordable, look no farther than the local code enforcement Nazis.
It’s all about the taxes: “How can we tax it if it moves?”
Aren’t recreational vehicles licensed? I realize that license revenue goes to the state, but if an RV owner also owns a piece of land on, say, Hereford Road or in Stump Canyon, and “lives” there for a few months out of the year, what’s the problem? He or she will have water, electricity, sewer, sanitation, etc., the revenue for which goes to local services. How do the county supervisors propose to regulate that? Clearly, the only issue/dilemma remains, “How can we tax it?” Government - at any level - will be government after all; “There’s way too much freedom going on around here...”
It isn’t a house, but you can make a home just about anywhere...
I think in this case (having lived in AZ for a couple of years)...you’ve got probably 400,000 people who travel down to the state from Oct to Mar in their RVs and then head back to the NE of the country as summer approaches. The RV crowd has their home-state plates on the vehicle, and the state/local authorities are beginning to realize the true impact on their state.
Just around Tucson, I would take a guess that 100,000 folks are part of the RV crowd.
I remember reading a long post here about a similar thing regarding housing in Detroit. Part of the reason there were so many abandoned houses was because to the code and code enforcement environment, you could effectively only use union contractors for improvements, which was ridiculously expensive. So no one could economically rehab those houses.
May I ask what county?
I knew Florida had very difficult building codes but I didn’t realize you couldn’t do any of your own work.
Strict codes for roofs makes sense in hurricane zones and maybe the whole state. Sinks and siding makes zero sense.
WOW! Are you telling me as the owner of that property you can not do your own repairs? Maybe you should look into getting your own contractors license and hiring yourself to do the work.
Is that a state law or a local ordinance in your area?
I hate it when they try to micromanage the way people live.
If they are telling you every last thing you can and can’t do, you are not free.
Years ago I was talking to someone from outside the US, and made the silly comment, how does it feel to live in a free country? He laughed and said, you have no idea how it feels to live in a free country. This isn’t one. I have come to recognize that, while there is a lot of good here, there isn’t much freedom anymore. Indeed there aren’t many people that believe in it or want it or know what to do with it if they had it.
Seems more and more people are “Nomading” these days and many have youtube channels. Nomading is living off the grid, your car, Van, Campervan, RV, pick up....whatever. They make it work for them. I follow Caravan Carolyn. She’s a former cop who decided to go full time Nomad a couple of years ago and loves it. She makes half her money from her youtube channel, daily updates and thousands of subscribers. A very nice lady. They make friends on the road, often travel together.
South in the winter, north in the summer.......they make it work. Meet Caravan Carolyn. Right now she’s at Lake Mead I think. Her full time home is her Van:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Srg4O89bZ_o
She use her turn signal in the middle of the desert!
“May I ask what county?”
Wakulla.
If a person owns (or rents) a parcel of land, installs a suitable pad upon which to park his RV and has adequate electric service, water service & sanitary sewer services installed, and keeps his bills up to date, why shouldn’t he be able to occupy an RV as his permanent residence?
Florida is particularly bad on this issue.
>>She use her turn signal in the middle of the desert!>>
i got pulled over for not using my turn signals here in town a couple of months ago. There was nobody around and the cop was way back. When I told him there was nobody around, he said doesn’t matter. You must ALWAYS signal. He gave me a warning. So yeah...I use em in the desert too. LOL.....:)
I have a friend who lives in his. It is also 55ft long and he pulls it with a Semi. He told me it has 700sq.feet in it. Lives in it here in Central Mo. and pulls it to Texas in the winter.
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