For Sharon and Gene Bobbin the issue of land size and zoning is not new.
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Three years ago their son wanted to build on a 78 acre block which had been in the family for three generations.
"Around late December 2016 - early January 2017 we wrote to council for permission to build on the land and got a letter back denying us the right to build as the land was under 120 hectares and the council had no records of a house ever being built on the land," Mrs Bobbin said.
She couldn't believe what she was being told.
"My mind just went crazy. How can you not be allowed to build a house on 78 acres, when in town you can buy a postage stamp size piece of land and put a house, a garage, a granny flat, a barbecue area and a garden shed and we aren't allowed to build a house on 78 acres," she said.
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What was standing on the block was a four room house that was erected after the 1952 bushfires that took out all but one house on the Nullica plus a few in Eden. After the fire it was arranged for houses to be erected by volunteers with materials cut at the local saw mills for the fire victims.The couple's son wanted to build anew on the block.
But their problem was to prove there had been a building entitlement dating back for many years.
"We said that council had been collecting garbage rates on the property for years so why were they taking money if they had no record of a house ever being there?" Mrs Bobbin said,
After council came to the property to see the house and the evidence provided, the Bobbin's claim was accepted and their son was allowed to build.
But Mrs Bobbin is now concerned she will have to go through the same process again having lost one of two homes on an adjacent 60 acre block that they own and purchased in 1983 with two homes on it.
Again there is a four room home built after the 1952 fires but also there was a 100-year-old home which was lost in the recent fires.
"We want to rebuild the house but were told previously that we had to prove it was a legal dwelling. The original owners are no longer with us, at the time the house was built the council was Imlay Shire Council which has since joined to be Bega valley Shire Council," Mrs Bobbin said.
"When they cleaned out the records a lot were dumped, burnt or shredded leaving us no hope of proving it's legality," something that was confirmed by Cr Russell Fitzpatrick.
He said that a photo of the old building and/or a statutory declaration should be sufficient to ensure that building permission is given.
Mrs Bobbin says the process of dealing with the effects of the bushfire weighs on her mind and makes her wonder where to start.
"It's a bit like a funeral; you can't really move on until you've dealt with it.
"We lost four homes in the Nullica area and countless outbuildings," she said.
The couple had to put a couple of their stock down because they were badly affected by the smoke and had trouble breathing.
"We got power back about two weeks after the fire, that was reasonably quick but there was no phone for four or five weeks," Mrs Bobbin said.
"That house had been there for 100 years. I don't want to lose something I had."
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