It was, he said, just the first time that the issue had come before the building department.

Get details from the building department in your community or county.

Then the civic association reported him to the building department.

A call to the building department on Monday was not immediately returned.

The building department would have to be out there every night.

It would have been nearly impossible to engineer, the building department said.

No permit from the building department, they argued, was needed.

"But I think a lot of towns will look at their building departments with a little different view about how important they are."

But he was running out of time and afraid the buildings department would tear down his home.

"It's been sort of an explosion in our building department," she said.