TULSA, Okla. — A new construction at the back of a residential lot in midtown Tulsa is causing a rift between neighbors.
The City of Tulsa refers to the building as an "auxiliary dwelling unit."
"We have a neighbor who built an illegal structure on our property," said Chariny Herring.
She says it sits about a foot and a half onto her property next door.
She contacted 2 News, frustrated that she couldn't get anyone in the city government to listen to her concerns and take action. We listened.
"We've been working with the city because the structure is out of bounds with the ordinances of the City of Tulsa," said Herring. "Unfortunately, the City of Tulsa has not followed through on enforcing their ordinances, and so now our neighbor has been emboldened to bring a civil lawsuit against us to actually assume the property of ours."
City records show the structure is out of compliance with ordinances because it is:
- too tall
- sitting over a sanitary sewer
- sitting 1.5 feet over the property line
Herring's neighbor sought a variance from the Board of Adjustment to keep the building where it is.
"A request for a variances to be allowed to be okay with continuing to leave the structure there, said Herring. "That is when it was discovered that he had actually built over onto our property line, and that's when the board of adjustments decided that they could not go any further in granting any sort of a variance. And then the next thing that happened is that we received a civil lawsuit stating that he should be able to acquiesce the property, that it should go to him, his ownership. So it's a land grab in the middle of Midtown Tulsa."
2 News reached out to the structure's owner, Tim Duray. He referred us to his attorney. She declined an interview because of the ongoing litigation.
Herring said, "We want people to be aware that if this can happen to us, this can happen to others."
When 2 News asked the City for an interview about the situation. Carson Colvin responded by email with this statement:
Because there is a private lawsuit involved, the City must wait for the outcome of that suit to determine the parameters of enforcement action as well as any requested relief of the other violations.
The City did not explain why there was not enforcement of its ordinances prior to the litigation.
2 News asked Herring for her reaction to the City's response to our interview request.
"I'm very disappointed in the city's response because if the city would have enforced its own ordinances to begin with, there would be no lawsuit, " said Herring. "The city not enforcing its ordinances, it has cost me thousands of dollars to try to defend my own land."
Contact the Problem Solvers:
- 918-748-1502
- problemsolvers@kjrh.com
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