A Michigan Department of Environmental Quality official hopes a Lansing area couple will comply with her request to remove a storage building and attached deck built in an environmentally sensitive area in Leelanau Township.

The couple, in turn, hopes to work out an arrangement that will allow them to keep the building and deck.

Robyn Schmidt, of the DEQ’s Cadillac office, said Tuesday she has been working with Joel and Linda Zylstra of Lansing after the couple built a 10-by-10-foot storage building and attached 16-by 8-foot deck on property they own at 7011 N. Manitou Trail. The property includes frontage on Lake Michigan, and the building and deck were constructed in a critical dunes area without a permit from the DEQ or a land use permit from Leelanau Township.

Schmidt said she received a complaint from neighboring property owners in the fall of 2006 about the building. The couple is allegedly in violation of Part 353 of the state Sand Dunes Protection and Management Act of 1989, as amended in 1994. After the complaint was filed, Schmidt sent the Zylstras a letter notifying them they were in violation of state regulations.

“They have 30 days to respond once they receive the letter. Once we have received their response, they have 60 days in which to comply with what ever corrective action we request,” she said.

Schmidt said her main concern is getting the site restored. “We are asking them to remove the structure and restore the site,” she said. In cases like this Schmidt said it usually takes about two years to reach some sort of conclusion. If the couple challenge the DEQ’s process, the matter would most likely be settled in some sort of court case.

Joel Zylstra said Tuesday he and his wife bought the property from his family a few years ago and built the storage building and deck in 2006. He said a letter from Schmidt written Dec. 2, 2006 stated they were in violation of state regulations.

“We didn’t know at the time we built the storage building and deck that a permit from the DEQ was required,” he said, adding that had they received the letter during the construction they would have halted work and figured out another option. “The building and deck were completed by the time we got the letter from the DEQ. We want to work something out,” Zylstra said.

As soon as he received the letter, Zylstra said he sent an official response to Schmidt stating they were not aware a permit was needed and they were willing to work something out that allow them to keep the building and deck. Schmidt’s response letter came in April 2007, according to Zylstra, who said Tuesday he has not heard from her since then.

Leelanau Township zoning administrator Deborah Serwin said Monday she was aware of the situation and that she had not issued a land use permit for the building and deck. She said township Zoning rules require a property owner to get a permit from the DEQ and the county Soil Erosion Control to build in critical dunes area prior to her issuing a land use permit. “I did not receive either of those permits in this matter,” Serwin said. She has talked with Zylstra on the phone and she is waiting to see how the DEQ proceeds on this matter before taking any action.