ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — Residents in an Orange County neighborhood said they feel like prisoners in their own homes since the owners of a nearby property turned it into an area for target practice.
The residents fear they’ll get hit by a stray bullet.
Their homes are across from a retention pond next to the vacant land.
Tricia Meyers said she considered moving when she first heard the gunfire.
"We're just prisoners in our own house. We can hear it in our house," she said.
Meyers has lived in the Grande Preserve at Cypress Lakes for 14 years, but said things changed a little more than a year ago.
"What has changed now is that it has now become a gun range," Meyers said.
From her back yard, the land on County Road 13 is in plain view.
There are mounds of dirt and a “private property” sign.
Orange County records show the property is zoned as "vacant-residential,” but Meyers and other neighbors said the land owners have turned it into a spot for target practice, and it's just too loud and too close.
"What if I'm just lying around enjoying myself here and then a stray bullet comes around? That would be an untimely demise," said resident Myrna Wilkinson.
Although Orange County deputies check things out if there's a complaint, there's only so much they can do because of a Florida statute that leaves regulation on firearms and ammunition up to the state.
If the range is in compliance with distance and other requirements, the shooting isn't illegal.
"It is just not safe," Meyers said.
Meyers recently started a "Stop the Shooting" petition online.
And if there's nothing that can be done on the local level to ban these sounds in her backyard, she plans to take it higher up.
"We're going to get this resolved because this is not how a residential community should live," Meyers said.
Channel 9 attempted to reach the land owners for comment, but they were not available.
Meyers plans to deliver her petition to the state attorney's office next week.
Cox Media Group
