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About 15 years ago, Don and Roxanne Carpenter went into business after buying what they said wasn't much more than a shack at Taylor and Morris streets.
They installed ice cream machines, pop machines and cooking equipment and set up shop as the Dog-Out, a walk-up hot dog stand.
To be honest, it wouldn't strike people as the best place to open a business. It's a little out of the way.
But there were 500 people living within walking distance, Don Carpenter says, and several large factories were nearby, and business flourished.
Word of mouth brought customers to the little eatery, and eventually it started getting some big orders in addition to the small walk-up trade. Factories, hospitals, schools, people throwing graduation parties would order 800 to 1,000 hot dogs at a time.
Meanwhile, the business had some incredibly loyal customers, out-of-towners who, when they came to Fort Wayne, would head for the Dog-Out before they went anywhere else.
Last April, though, the little shop had a fire. Nothing to worry about, really. Insurance would cover it.
So the Carpenters hired a contractor to make repairs, but when he went to get the necessary building permits, he was denied.
It all has to do with the fact that the little hot dog stand, which has never flooded and has never had flood insurance and really isn't in a flood plain, sits on the fringe of a flood plain.
Because of that, according to federal regulations governing buildings in flood-prone areas, the business was not allowed to spend more than 50 percent of its assessed value on improvements or even repairs.
"There was a fire, so we figured, OK, we'll just get it repaired," Roxanne Carpenter said. "But you can't just do that."
The problem is that the business was assessed at only $10,000, which is about what they paid for the property in the early 1990s, before they installed all the restaurant equipment.
That's good news if you're paying taxes, but it meant that the Carpenters couldn't spend more than $5,000 on repairs after the fire, and that wasn't even enough to repair the roof.
"I don't know whose responsibility it is to assess the property," but it's underassessed, Roxanne Carpenter said.
To get around the problem, the Carpenters hired a professional appraiser, who eventually came back with an appraisal of $48,000, less than the $59,000 figure used for property insurance. Now they have to go to the county and try to get their assessment changed.
But the Carpenters are worried. The business that provided her husband's income has been closed since April, so he's been largely unemployed since then, except for a couple of short-term positions he's found. To make repairs and get him back to work, they need a permit.
The question haunts them: "Are they going to give us one," Roxanne Carpenter said. "We want to be on the up and up and hire a professional contractor, but what if they can't get a permit?"
Don Carpenter said the property is on a flood plain fringe, "but the plan commission said it's all lumped together."
In a way, it doesn't make sense. The business has never had to have flood insurance. There have been occasions when nearby areas flooded and the shop had to close because people couldn't get to it.
"I looked at it as a snow day," Don Carpenter said.
"I'm not upset with the city," he said. "The big question is, why? I understand they have dictates from FEMA, but we're an existing business.
"My argument is, for 14 years, we ran this business with no interference," he said.
"Then there's the fire, and we're not allowed to pull permits to repair it."
For years, he said, "We created jobs, we paid taxes at all levels. I never even asked the city for a sandbag. I'm just a guy who wants to make a living."
