Action: Replace Linda Streithguth at the polls in the current election. Ed Wolfe strongly opposes Title V and may be able to convince one other commissioner of Title V’s insanity.

Your three sitting Kitsap County Commissioners, including Linda Streithguth, are pursuing this new Code Compliance Administrative Law.

County Code Title V, once enacted, will require buyers of any property to bring up to current County Code any improvements made without a County permit. This applies to improvements made by the seller or any previous owner. Included are building construction and land improvements, including critical areas violations (90 percent of all properties average five critical area categories).

Violations will be criminalized and fines will be $1,000 per day. Grandfathering will be eliminated and all properties built prior to Kitsap’s first building Code in 1975 would be included.

Under Title V, the buyer, to be made “whole”, could sue all the previous owners, their suppliers, contractors or installers for damages to correct any disclosures the seller might provide and any discrepancies found by the buyer.

County inspectors could enter your property without a warrant.

Cases would now be heard by the Department of Community Development’s employee the Hearing Examiner vs. an impartial District Court judge. You pay County’s expenses and must prove your innocence.

Browse “Kitsap.co.wa.us/Title V.” One young military home owner stated bringing his recently purchased $150,000 home into compliance would cost over $500,000. If he had known that, he would not have bought in Kitsap County.

Michael Gustavson

Southworth