One way to get it done

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A Bay area community has come up with a very visible way to deal with folks with serious property code violations.

Winter Haven owners who don't respond to letters from code enforcement are finding bright yellow signs in their yards for the whole neighborhood so see.

The bright yellow signs are pretty hard to miss, and are causing homeowners to take action.

David Turner's neighbors noticed the sign in his yard before he did. The city says it put up the sign because Turner didn't respond to its letters about untagged cars in his yard and overgrown weeds.

"It's eye catching, I'll say that," Turner said. "My neighbors noticed it right away when the sun came up. It's bright yellow, and it's big."

Turner is now making plans to clean up his old cars.

David Turner says he clean up these old cars in his yard.

"I'm going to make an effort to get things all cleaned up," he said. "We've got one of the Cougars stripped out and ready to haul to the scrap yard."

The embarrassing signs are motivating other people clean up code violations too.

"We've had a couple of people call and say say, 'I have taken care of the problem. When will you come and remove this sign,'" said code enforcement officer Sherry Tillis.

Not all code violations are easy to fix with a sign.

In some cases the signs may have little effect except to let neighbors know the city is on top of the issue. But even if it's only neighbors who notice a sign on a vacant lot, that can lead to contact from the owners.

"Because they have been neighbors, they know who owns the property and they call them and say, 'There is a sign in your yard' and then we'll get the call from the person."

So far, Winter Haven says it's put up about 50 of the signs, and it's gotten calls from other Bay area cities interested in developing similar programs.

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