Article
and Video Courtesy of WINK NEWS
By Morgan Frances
Published
June 18, 2015
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Watch
VIDEO
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FORT MYERS, Fla.- The owner of a condo at
Banyan Tree Condominium is devastated. He says his $40,000
investment he made 37 years ago is now worthless. Not only
that, but code enforcement wanted to slap him with a fine
for not maintaining his building.
“I lost my total $40,000 investment,”
Donald Miller told WINK News. “There is no recovering
unless somebody wants to take it off my hands.”
Code enforcement officials say his
place is unlivable. There are holes in the ceiling, his
bathroom is a mess and vandals took everything.
Miller went to a code board
meeting Thursday.
"I can’t pay it,” he said. “We’re
retired, we’re in our 70s, we’re on social security.
There’s just no way we can maintain this.” |
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Miller says he pays his monthly association fees,
but nothing gets fixed. Other people who live at Banyan Tree agree.
“The walls inside, the toilet, half of this stuff
doesn’t work,” listed one resident.
Miller said he doesn’t have the money
to fix everything. Even if he did, he doesn’t want to make
repairs if the complex, as a whole, is falling apart.
“Well, if they want to condemn the whole
building it would be better for me,” he told WINK News.
That’s what code enforcement might
decide.
“If we don’t get any kind of activity
throughout the entire complex, I will be back and I will be
unsafing the entire complex; all 30 units,” said Rick Scott,
a code enforcement officer. |
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For now, Miller doesn’t have to worry about those
fines. He will likely have to return to code board, however, in January
for the next hearing.
WINK News left messages and sent emails to the
Banyan Tree Condo Association for comment. They have not responded. |