Vague Law + Vindictive Law Enforcement? Hide Your Veggies!
from the this-is-not-how-things-are-supposed-to-work dept
You may have heard the recent story about Julie Bass, a woman in Oak Park, Michigan, who was facing 93 days in jail... for daring to plant a nice vegetable garden in her front yard. Apparently, the city has a rule that says you can have "decorative planting" in your front yard, but some city officials deemed that the vegetable garden was not decorative. The specific law, of course, is vague. It says: "all unpaved portions of the site shall be planted with grass or ground cover or shrubbery or other suitable live plant material." The problem is in the word "suitable." Many folks, including Bass, believe vegetables are suitable. The city disagrees, and was threatening her with 93 days in jail for not removing the garden.On Friday, the charges were apparently dismissed. While most reports suggested that officials dropped the case, Bass's own blog claims that a judge dismissed them, though the details were hazy (at best). But, here's where it gets ridiculous. First, the dismissal was "without prejudice," so the charges can be brought again. But... even more crazy is that now the city is going after her for not having licenses for her two dogs, an issue that was brought up earlier, and which she quickly fixed.
As lots of people are saying, it appears that the city is just being vindictive to Bass.
This is why broadly worded laws scare me. This is why the broadly worded definition of what counts as an "infringing site" in PROTECT IP scares me. This is why the vagueness of S.978, the felony streaming bill, scares me. They can easily be abused to put people in jail just for embedding videos. What the Julie Bass story shows is that when law enforcement feels vindictive, there's no law they won't try to twist against people. And we shouldn't be handing law enforcement more ammo by giving them vaguely worded laws that potentially make huge segments of the population into felons.
Jail time for veggie gardens is nothing if they can put you away for embedding a video on your website.
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Filed Under: dogs, law enforcement, veggie garden, vindictive
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Correction -
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Yes, sorry, typo on my part. Fixed.
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If the dismissal is 'with prejudice', then the charges cannot be brought again. The original article has it listed as 'without prejudice,' meaning the charges can be brought again.
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But would the AC's brain be considered 'suitable' plant life?
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The solution
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Think of the children!
Next thing you know, lots of people will grow veggies in their front yard.
Then children will be forced to eat more veggies.
Think of the children!
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Not selling enough fat-burgers would mean they need a government bailout...
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Mike, "with prejudice" means the charges cannot be brought again.
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"Suitable"
Of course a lot of people did look it up at Merriam-Webster's dictionary here and discovered (to no one's surprise but Rulkowski's) that "suitable" does not mean "common." And if you go there you'll see many sarcastic and critical comments about this.
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Unlikely as it probably is, if Mr. Rulkowski had looked at the dictionary himself he might well have chanced across the term "potager" - a garden comprised of vegetable plants.
And very appropriate to these times of rapidly rising international food prices ...
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Vindictive
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The issue of veggie gardens in the front yard is all that can come with time, from stakes to trellises, and so on. It can create quite an eye sore. Without some control as to what is in front of the home, you risk lowering property values for all. Can you imagine someone converting their front yard into a corn field, example?
What is interesting too here is that she is playing the media like a fiddle. Her blog is taglined as "trying to make sense of oak park's war on vegetables". There is no war on veg, and she knows it. She can fill her back yard up to the guts with veg. There is no "you may not have veggies" law. She is being misleading and playing it to sites like techdirt.
http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/region/oakland_county/oak-park-battles-city-over-vegetable -garden-in-their-front-yard
The video shows her entire front yard covered with 5 full size boarded off beds. Other citizens complained. Enough said.
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Tell you what. You give up eating food and I'll give up growing food in your sight. Deal?
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My neighbor turns their front yard into the mess she made her yard into, and you can bet I am calling the city for an inspection.
You give up being an idiot, and I'll stop point out that you have been an idiot in the past, okay?
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Food -- like industrial goods, fuel and power, to name a few -- should not be produced where a person of means must see it.
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seriously.
mind your side of the fence, not mine. i'm sorry you don't like the look of a vegtable garden. personally i cannot stand the sight of a empty grass field.
if it is maintained and cared for, then who are you to say what i do about my yard. i paid for my yard, you did not.
btw, i called the city about those purple flowers you have, they clash against the color of your shutters and are really an eyesore.
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Local ordinances like this are not necessarily a bad thing. The main purpose is to keep neighborhoods looking nice, thereby keeping property values higher which is plus for everyone.
The vindictive part about the dogs does seem a bit out of line though.
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She's an idiot for picking the wrong fight, and she will spend the rest of her days in her little community with a target painted on her head. You reap what you sow, you know?
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Don't know about that Chris, but, one thing to remember, I can guarantee that this ordinance was in place before she moved in to her house.
There are plenty of places where the restrictions are much, much more stringent then this one. In Historical Districts you have to have the exterior color of you house approved and you have any landscaping approved, etc. Condo communities put restrictions on almost anything outside. My city doesn't allow any fencing past the front of the house.
If all of these restrictions are in place prior to you purchasing your property then it's no one else's responsibility but your own to make yourself aware of them before you purchase.
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I just disagree that this is a "bad" law, a bit vague, perhaps, but not so bad in my view.
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It's precisely because the law is a bit vague that makes it a bad law. Vague laws make criminals of everybody, including you, somewhere sometime.
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- ...And all laws in place are good and just laws.
- What is the basis of your assertion? I didn't happen to notice in the article any mention of how long she's lived there vs. how long the law has been in place, so obviously you've done research I haven't. (I'm not saying you're wrong; I'm just wondering how you know this.)
- What ordinance are you referring to? The only one I've seen quoted does not, in fact, prohibit growing vegetables in one's front yard.
"There are plenty of places where the restrictions are much, much more stringent [than] this one."
Ah, the old "somebody else has it worse, so you shouldn't whine" argument.
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Never said that. It's just that I feel that ordinances that restrict what many might consider an eyesore are not necessarily bad. I really do not want my neighbors keeping 5 old dead cars on their front lawn and as such, laws like this have their place.
- What is the basis of your assertion? I didn't happen to notice in the article any mention of how long she's lived there vs. how long the law has been in place, so obviously you've done research I haven't. (I'm not saying you're wrong; I'm just wondering how you know this.)
Your right. I don't actually know. Should have put an "almost" in front of guarantee. But, the village of Oak Park has been around since 1927 and I would bet that the ordinance has been around for a long while.
"There are plenty of places where the restrictions are much, much more stringent [than] this one."
Ah, the old "somebody else has it worse, so you shouldn't whine" argument.
Nope. Wasn't my point at all. Even though you own your property, there are still restrictions on what you can and can't do with it. Always has been.
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No. You want your neighbors to have five brand-new shiny cars to keep on their front lawn! And for that to happen, those neighbors need jobs. Good jobs! Honest jobs! High-paying jobs! Which is why the neighborhood needs this sheet-metal plant!
So everyone can go to sleep —day or night— with that clear, sweet sound ringing out across the land, the sound of liberty:
Ka-Ching!
Ka-Ching! Ka-Ching! Ka-Ching!
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> prior to you purchasing your property then
> it's no one else's responsibility but your
> own to make yourself aware of them before you
> purchase.
Yeah, there are still some places that have restrictions on whather blacks and Jews can live in certain neighborhoods, too.
Gotta do whatever the law says, though, right?
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Nope. Never argued that. Obviously, this ordinance was poorly written and appears to be being stretched a bit. I am arguing (perhaps not so well) that I feel that aesthetic ordinances written by local governments (about the closest thing the a real democracy left anymore) are not necessarily bad things.
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> and she will spend the rest of her days in
> her little community with a target painted
> on her head. You reap what you sow, you know?
Yes, it's much better to be cowed by authority and lick the boots of any government official who demands obeisance. "Shut up and do as your told" should become the new motto of America. "Land of the free" is so quaint and anachronistic.
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Yeah, I can't imagine why the threat of having men with guns kidnap you from your home and lock you away in an 8x10 cage for three months because you created a vegetable garden on your own property would worry anyone in a supposedly free country.
(Especially when the law in question is vague enough as to be decided at the whim of an unelected bureaucrat with obvious power issues. Is bermuda grass "suitable", or only St. Augustine? Roll the dice to find out if you end up with either a nice lawn or a cell mate who wants to dance with you!)
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And a lot of close minded small penised people, like the AC who started this thread, see the lawns around them as a reflection of there status too and complain if they are not to their liking.
This also leads to morons in AZ trying to grow fucking grass in the desert and eating up local aquifers because they have to show how important they are, and need to impress the small penised jackasses around them.
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Seriously, almost every town has some laws like this that say what you can and can't do with your own property because it might effect the property value of your neighbors, as if it were enshrined in our constitution.
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I am part of a community victory garden. Its on a lot formerly occupied by a house that the city razed. The entire property, from front to back, is covered with 34 of these boxes, they are all 4x8 plots.
They are working on adding another garden because the first one is so popular. Again, it will be on the entire property of an empty lot.
I don't know anyone that has complained about the victory garden I'm in. Half the plots have an 8 foot trellis on them, many have stakes, lots have metal baskets for tomatoes. This is supposed to be an "eye sore?" I'm sorry but no one in or around our community (whether they are members of the garden or not) thinks this is an eye sore.
So what if the video shows her front yard covered with 5 or 10 or 50 full size beds? They are neat and well maintained. So how many neighbors does she have, in her street, etc. How many people complained? They have to use all those resources at the behest of a handful of disgruntled neighbors? If there are 50 homes on the street at 1 or 2 complained, how do they justify trying to make 2-4% of the residents on that street happy when none of the rest complained?
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> grass and other "suitable" items.
Says who?
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> with 5 full size boarded off beds. Other
> citizens complained. Enough said.
My freedom to use my own property as I wish is not rightly limited merely by another citizen's complaint.
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Until then, she owns it and should have control over what is done with it. If you don't own the property, it should be filed under "Things I don't control but wish I did", right alongside Natalie Portmans' sexual desires.
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Vindictive City
ORDINANCE NO.062011-5
BE IT ENACTED BY THE CITY OF GOULD AND THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE COUNTY OF LINCOLN, STATE OF ARKANSAS, AN ORDINANCE TO BE ENTITLED:
AN ORDINANCE TO DISALLOW THE GOULD CITIZENS ADVISORY COUNCIL FROM EXISTING WITHIN THE CITY LIMITS OF GOULD
BE IT ORDAINED by the City of Gould City Council:
SECTION 1: GOULD CITIZENS ADVSIORY COUNCILS ABILITY TO OPERATE WITHIN THE CITY OF GOULD. The Gould Citizens Advisory Council by passage of this ordinance is hereby banned from doing business in the City of Gould.
Section 2: That the said Council is, in effect, causing confusion and discourse among the citizens of Gould and as a result is contributing to the friction not only between the Mayor and Council but also among the citizens who deserve a cooperative government. Also no new organizations shall be allowed to exist in the City of Gould without approval from a majority of the City Council.
SECTION 3: Therefore, an emergency is hereby declared to exist and this ordinance being necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety shall be in full force and effect from and after passage and approval.
(Source: “Gould Council bans citizens group”, by Max Brantley, ArkansasTimes, Jul 13, 2011)
... Pass the veggies, please? I guess this ordinance is pretty specific.
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What's worse is that even though the city failed, Monsanto's right behind them with their "patent-infringing" lawsuit because the corn she was growing isn't theirs.
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If she wanted to run a farm, perhaps she should have moved to the country.
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Well, you're right about one thing: Trying to grow corn in an inner suburb of Detroit just ain't suitable, no-how, no-way.
Corn ain't suitable in Detroit—no more than watermelons.
In Detroit, you always got to be growing automobiles.
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Others don't have a right to my property, so there's no "rights of others" being violated.
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Even though it's your property, it's still subject to zoning ordinances.
If you buy a piece of land in an area zoned residential, you can't put up a sheet metal factory.
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No. I was pointing out that local ordinances can and do limit what you can do with your property.
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Zoning laws are ostensibly about preventing the use of your property from actually impacting the use of mine. If you turn your house into a pig slaughterhouse, it isn't simply about some (completely imagined) right of your neighbors to have their property values always increase. A slaughterhouse will be noisy and smelly, supply trucks will impede the use of the roadway, etc.
If you try to use zoning laws to beat people over the head because of aesthetics ("Your house color is too bright", "Your grass is the wrong species", "you have woodchips for a lawn instead of grass") then you're not protecting property rights, you're violating them by being an authoritarian prick.
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But, aesthetics laws are not necessarily bad. I am in the sign business and every city, village and township in my area has different laws concerning size, quantity, color, etc. of what signage a property owner can erect. There is even one township in my area that doesn't allow any color other than black & gold, regardless of what your business logo looks like. These things are not necessarily bad, it's the community deciding what they want and what they do not want.
It's like I stated in an above thread, such laws do have their place - I really do not want my neighbors front lawn to look like a car junkyard. It would reduce the investment I have in my house.
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Only if everyone to be held to the rules agrees to them and signs a contract (think HOA). Then you can be sure that everyone is on the same page. Rules imposed on homeowners by bureaucrats and busybodies who have no claim to that property are immoral.
I really do not want my neighbors front lawn to look like a car junkyard. It would reduce the investment I have in my house.
In that case, I want someone to reimburse me for all the "value" that my stocks lost during the recession. Of course, that's ridiculous, because no one has the right to the value of an object, only to the object itself.
Why do you assume that the mere value of your property trumps the actual property rights of others?
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Ok. I get what your point is on this and I will respectively disagree.
Real property ownership doesn't give you sovereign nation status. There will always be restrictions on what you can or cannot do or build on that property (at least where I live).
Perhaps some of these laws have become antiquated, or were poorly written or stretched where they shouldn't be, but that doesn't mean that the original intent is wrong, especially since such laws were usually put in place because property owners in the area wanted them.
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In that case, I want someone to reimburse me for all the "value" that my stocks lost during the recession. Of course, that's ridiculous, because no one has the right to the value of an object, only to the object itself.
While that is true, why would I not want the value of my property to increase? I would venture a guess that you intended for your stocks to increase in value.
Why do you assume that the mere value of your property trumps the actual property rights of others?
I don't assume that. I guess my question is this - if a law prohibits you from doing something with your property prior to you acquiring it, how is that a right? You never had it in the first place.
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Your repeated use of the phrase "property rights" made me decide to look it up. I found this informative site:
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PropertyRights.html
A small excerpt states:
A property right is the exclusive authority to determine how a resource is used, whether that resource is owned by government or by individuals. Society approves the uses selected by the holder of the property right with governmental administered force and with social ostracism.
That sentence "Society approves the uses selected by the holder of the property right..." says a lot. Local ordinances concerning real property uses are exactly that, society approving (or disapproving as the case may be) how your property may be used.
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Hard to pick.
I don't know, it's hard to pick which one is more ridiculous.
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As usual, Mike, weird wind up to a plain story:
With ya so far though you're WAY onto another topic...
"What the Julie Bass story shows is that when law enforcement feels vindictive, there's no law they won't try to twist against people."
THUD. Your Pollyanna view again. "Law enforcement" -- who are supposed to be Public Servants -- are ALWAYS flat out vindictive and hostile to the public. Prosecutors keep score by conviction rate, that's all they care about: "justice" is irrelevant. You clearly don't grasp the nature of gov't.
"And we shouldn't be handing law enforcement more ammo by giving them vaguely worded laws that potentially make huge segments of the population into felons."
THUD. WE aren't handing them that, Mike, they're TAKING it with guns drawn.
"Jail time for veggie gardens is nothing if they can put you away for embedding a video on your website."
THUD. Lousily phrased at best, and one of your worst twists trying to tie this to your copyright mania.
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Re: As usual, Mike, weird wind up to a plain story:
You <>
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Re: Re: As usual, Mike, weird wind up to a plain story:
Yeah, I know, gross, but why not, eh? >:P
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Criminal Gardning
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Externalities
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why not the back yard?
Property values in Michigan?? for real and near Detroit??
if you want property values to increase anywhere near Detroit just build a Mosque. I moved AWAY from Michigan 5 years ago, Because it's become so petty and such; like this.
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