Page 54 - Discover Fall 2020
P. 54
What’s Up Doc? CONTINUED
of managing the lake and facilitating their At around that time, the country was
license renewal. And like many others, they in the throes of a recession, and between the
made the decision to clear the trees from their economic downturn and the legal fees, the
waterfront in order to have a nice view of the couple lost their home to foreclosure. Next
lake. on the scene were a dentist and his wife, who
wanted to buy the house, and the bank holding
It turns out that the new SMP required the title worked very hard to try to reach an
prior approval and permission to remove agreement with AEP to grant a renewal of the
any vegetation below the 800 foot contour, dock permit. Negotiations eventually stalled,
which is subject to a flowage easement that and the couple walked away from the deal.
was granted to AEP. This easement permits The house stood empty for the following 18
the company to flood the lake up to that months.
mark. Since the property owners had not
sought such permission, they were cited by Rick Pressl had just retired from his job
AEP and their dock permit was pulled. At this as a Fire Chief in New Jersey. His sister lives
point, the dock had been on the lake, and he had visited
partially constructed, but here. So on a lark, he did a web
not completed. An employee search for Smith Mountain
of AEP informed them that Lake real estate, and the first
she was going to “make an result was this very same
example” of them, and told house with the checkered past.
them that they would have The asking price immediately
to plant 1232 trees on their raised his eyebrows.
shoreline. In lieu of that,
they were given the option of “I said something’s not
planting 2300 shrubs. right here,” he recalls. “It was
too much house for the asking
The cost of such an price, so I asked my sister to
undertaking would have go look at it… next day, she
been around $250,000 – and called me from the property,
resulted in a tree planted and said ‘You need to get down
every 12 inches. It was here and see this place.’ Two
eventually agreed that this days later, I was down here,
was more than somewhat and bought it.”
excessive, and so a more realistic plan was
formulated that specified the varieties of The roller coaster ride had begun. What
trees that were to be planted. In the course had been casually described to him by the
of executing the plan, some substitutions realtor as “an issue with the dock and AEP”
were made since none of the local nurseries reared its ugly head soon after.
had some of the specified trees in stock. AEP “I didn’t know anything about living on
objected to that, and the property owners the waterfront, or docks, or codes… I felt a
found that no matter what they proposed, little bit misled.”
AEP would object to it. So began a years-long
battle, which eventually bankrupted these The Pressls reached out to AEP in order
people. to clear the way to having their dock. Thus
began a three-and-a-half year long struggle
52 Discover Smith Mountain Lake FALL 2020
