answer: angry homeowners with poorly engineered and constructed new houses.
bad science
1. ground that slopes towards the house, instead of away from the house, as the virginia building code and the approved grading plan require. result: flooded crawl space.
https://www.prettypurpledoor.com/yard-grading-how-to-grade-a-yard/
Amy knows this! How come a virginia builder and shenandoah county's building official, shenandoah county building inspectors, and shenandoah county's attorney, who handles building code violations, don't?!? bad science.
2. level roof gutters that overflow and add to the crawl space flooding. how come builder toothman doesn't know Why Gutter Slope is Essential to Your Home? when I asked toothman why all of the roof gutters are level, she said "they're all that way." great!!! all of the roof gutters on toothman's new houses are level!!! bad science.
3. flexible plastic pipes connected to downspouts with high and low points and buried outlet ends. how dumb is that?!?
our house came with level roof gutters and 5 downspouts--3 with flexible plastic pipe attached to them and 2 with splash blocks. the outlet ends of 2 of the 3 downspouts with flexible plastic pipe attached were buried.
I notified the builder when rain from one of the downspouts with splash blocks missed the splash block and went into the below ground access well to the crawl space. the builder replaced the splash block with a buried flexible pipe and extended the buried flexible pipe on one of the buried plastic pipes.
later, after a heavy rain, water from the roof backed up in the other pipe with the buried outlet end, backed up in the downspout, and backed up in the level roof gutter such that all of the runoff coming from that section of the roof was overflowing the level roof gutter. it washed out a slope onto my neighbor's driveway. when I told toothman, she said "we would never bury the outlet end". this after toothman had already unburied 1 of the 2 buried outlet ends on our property! talk about dishonest!
roof drainage should flow by gravity, which requires a straight grade--no dips or high points and open outlet ends. water and air trapped in flexible plastic pipes by low and high spots require pressure to flow. when water backs up in downspouts, they leak, and the weight of the stored water can cause downspouts to break away from the house. bad science.
4. holes in the foundation wall: MINDS OF MUSH: alan toothman construction, inc.: BIG hole in the wall, BIG hole in the head. what?!? bad science.
5. a room where the temperature is ten degrees colder than the thermostat temperature. (the thermostat is located in the hallway 10 ft. from the cold room.) bad science.
poor construction
1. floors with low spots that go BANG! when you walk on them.
2. gutters that leak and a downspout that empties into the below ground, crawl space access door well.
3. a foul odor coming from the bathroom sink.
4. sloppy trim.
shenandoah county, virginia's poor inspection and followup failures
1. during and following construction shenandoah county's building inspectors failed to identify that the ground sloped towards the house instead of away from the house. this is a clear violation of virginia's building code. also, the approved grading plan shows the ground sloping away from the house. in addition to not knowing what the building code requires, apparently the inspectors can't read plans. even so, how can one not see the difference between a hill and a swale?
2. even though shenandoah county's building official told me that the county was going to cite toothman for violating the buiding code, shenandoah county did not. when asked to explain why the county wasn't citing the builder for a building code violation, the building official told me that he chose instead to "reach out" (his words) to toothman. what?!?
3. shenandoah county's attorney, who works for a private law firm in the neighboring county, wrote us threatening letters.
http://mindsofmush.blogspot.com/2018/08/how-shenandoah-co-va-mishandled-clear.html
https://mindsofmush.blogspot.com/2018/09/another-letter-from-jordan-bowman-sigh.html
what?!?
4. it doesn't pass the smell test.
citizens of shenandoah county, virginia and elsewhere:
- you deserve to be protected from construction that doesn't meet the state building code
- you deserve competent building inspection and code enforcement
- you deserve county and state government that defends you--not lawbreaking builders
➤ SPEAK OUT
➤ SPREAD THE WORD
➤ VOTE alan toothman construction, inc.
woodstock
virginia
shenandoah county
building official
mark griffey
attorney
jordan bowman
strasburg
conrad helsley
stony pointe
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