Why did he come asking questions in the first place?
Did he tell you what the "concern" was that had him pay the visit?
Could simply be he as checking to ensure someone wasn't squatting on private property; the "attitude" may well have been as he had not yet "verified" who you were.
Perhaps he was given erroneous information by the complainant...
I would be tempted to ring him: "Hello Tom, it's Sam from the property on Oak lane. I fear we may have gotten off on the wrong foot, the other day. My apologies, if I appeared defensive; I was just taken aback by your questions about WHY/WHAT I was doing, when on my own property - to be honest, you were our first ever visitor, and the unexpected nature of your visit caught me off guard and I may have appeared less than friendly.
I realize now, I never actually asked you what, if any specific concerns you might have; is there anything I need to know?"
Something along the lines above; instead of assuming there is a problem, and/or speculating, I would simply ask directly. At least that way you will KNOW what prompted his visit and exactly what his issue(s) or concerns are. He may even be willing to tell you if there is some remedial action you could undertake, at his suggestion, to ensure the situation does not escalate.
I'm suggesting it is possible YOU or your ACTIONS, as the actual landowner, was not the issue. It's possible it may have been as simple as ensuring someone else wasn't abusing private property (druggies, thieves, metal scrappers, meth cookers...) or otherwise engaged in illegal activity in his jurisdiction.
Good luck, trust me it sucks when you get on the bad side of these power hungry little men. I had one make my life miserable for over ten years. Made up all sorts of nonsense I could not fight as it was up to "their discretion". Lived here illegally for two years in our new mobile, before FINALLY he disappeared (quit, fired, retired).
The new person came round, was super helpful, and absolutely agreed that most of the orders had been utterly ridiculous. They apparently cannot actually "rescind" another's violation orders, but instead helped me come up with "work arounds" that satisfied the ridiculous "orders" without me having to actually DO the stupid and unnecessary actions that had been demanded.
A few examples: We have a double wide, on three foot deep rock/compacted gravel base with concrete strip (they run left to right across the width of the trailer) foundations, with tie downs to the concrete. Nimrod insisted we had to install perimeter drains (that we were expressly told by said Nimrod inspector were unnecessary when we sought verification during prelim install inspection). This was ludicrous as the gravel pad was 3 feet deep - and there are no "foundation" to be affected, and there were rain gutters on both sides.
When Nimrod declared this must be done I checked every reg, municipally, regionally, provincial and federally - no requirement. The mobile home company - 40 yrs in business in my district - had NEVER had this be demanded. Yet, when I provided this research, I was simply old that it was at the inspectors discretion as to how the regs were interpreted, and I had no recourse if I wanted an occupancy permit.
He made us do three extra "surveys" - each time for different PRE -EXISTING buildings on the property, onsite decades before I had purchased the property the 15 yrs previously.
He also made us triple survey the new mobile install; before and after the gravel pad was in, and again once the mobile was moved on...then claimed he never received them, as the "weren't in the file" (they were emailed and we had the "received" return email).
This went on for over two years: he failed our stairs (had to be 'non slip'); failed our railings for the front stairs (a standard railing kit from local big box) claiming the space created beneath the bottom board that skimmed the risers was too large; we had to add blocking, and yet passed the exact same set up on the rear stairs...it went on and on and on, every time he would find yet another "substandard" item - although nothing had changed from the initial fail, he somehow kept finding things he had "missed" last time.
Multiple times we did exactly as asked only to be told we
should not have taken 'his word' on how to fix something, we should have verified his instructions in the code book!
Each inspection meant at least a months wait as the queue was long. The last fail was because he decided the crawl space door was 3/4 of an inch too small - the regs said "this many inches by this many inches, for a total opening of this many square inches"; technically ours was larger than required as it was 6 inches higher than it needed to be, but nope, he 'interpreted' the width as insufficient!
Do your best to win him over - trust me, if he decides he want to make your life hell, he will!
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