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Title: Temporary injunction bars man from lighting up inside his Washington home after neighbors sue
Source:
FoxNews
URL Source: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/03/1 ... ide-his-washington-home-after/
Published: Mar 10, 2015
Author: Associated Press
Post Date: 2015-03-10 17:42:54 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 10510
Comments: 68
A temporary order by a Superior Court judge is keeping a man from smoking inside his home in the District of Columbia. WJLA-TV (http://bit.ly/1BrlPLl ) reports that Edwin Gray's next door neighbors in northeast Washington have filed a civil suit claiming they're being harmed by smoke that sneaks into their home through a hole in the basement. They are seeking an injunction and $500,000 in damages. A judge issued a temporary injunction last week saying neither Gray nor any family or guests may smoke in the home the family has owned for 50 years. Gray's sister, Mozella Johnson, says they will fight. In court filings and a statement, the neighbors say they tried to work with Johnson and Gray, and filed suit when mediation attempts failed.
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#4. To: cranky (#0)
Nuisance theory. You can do what you want on your property, but not if it creates a nuisance for your neighbors. In this case, it sounds like a complete breakdown of communications between warring neighbors. If smoke is coming through a hole in the basement, then the hole needs to be plugged, obviously. They went to mediation, but apparently could not agree on it. It's not hard to guess why: Gray and Johnson have been living there for 50 years, are older, and come from an era when cigarette smoke was not considered a nuisance. Times have changed, and now it is, and they're not going to get "grandfathered in" on it, because it's a recognized health issue. They almost certainly took the: "our home, we've been there, we don't have to do anything, too expensive to plug, unreasonable to ask us" approach. They would have certainly won the case 50 years ago, or 30, or 20. But today? No. Today, cigarette smoke is considered a carcinogen, and those who are generating it will be found to have the abatement responsibility. Gray and Johnson have already lost, and they'll keep on losing here. My own personal opinion? The obvious answer: Johnson and Gray should remediate by plugging the holes, at their expense. An objective third party tester should conduct tests to ensure the remediation is effective, and then that's that.
I've dealt with this bullshit, often. Most people like this hate each other and any kind of communication or reason is fruitless. This complaining neighbor must feel that his neighbors deed must dictate no smoking, for his benefit. How arrogant.
The court should be wise enough to force both parties to pay for plugging the holes. My guess is the court will want to intervene to punish any smokers and to lay down precedents for further regulation of homes by courts. BigGov wants inside your front door. Where are all the libs screaming about the government in their bedrooms? Apparently, that doesn't count when they don't want it to. Of course, it's a craphole Blue dominion so they'll go for intrusiveness. It would be a different story in most Red states.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong,but don't stacked boxes like that have Homeowners organizations that collect monthly dues to do repairs to common areas?
Not all of them. They look like post-war row houses to me.
I'm guessing that the kind and loving yuppie that filed this complaint to strike a blow for communal living everywhere (once we get rid of the darkies,of course)will soon be organizing his fellow trust fund explorers who are moving in to create one. I would live in a tent in the woods before I would have a Home Owners Committee of busy-body airhead lefties dictate to me how I have to live and think at home.
Many of these homeowners only lack the swastikas to qualify as Nazis. Very heavyhanded. Now and then, you see a few victories against these petty tyrants. My favorite is the one with Rick Perry, a comedy goldmine when he struck back at these busybodies over the small Jewish mezuzahs on doorposts, a very ancient Jewish custom. A 26-inch-long stone box—about six times bigger than the kind Jewish families typically use to affix a tiny Torah scroll to their doorframe—is being marketed as a Texas-sized “Rick Perry mezuzah.” The Rick Perry mezuzah and a regular one. (Mezuzah Store) Earlier this summer, the Texas governor signed a law protecting religious displays outside homes, inspired by the case of a Jewish couple in Houston asked by their homeowners association to take down their small mezuzah. MezuzahStore.com is honoring Perry by naming their largest mezuzah after him, designed to be just longer than the 24-inch allowance given by the new Texas law and costing $999. The store clarifies they do not endorse Perry, now a presidential candidate, but support the law and want to poke fun at the bigger-in-Texas stereotype. Mezuzot fulfill the Torah’s commandment to display God’s teachings on the doorpost of your homes. Perry topped off this feat by hosting a little Hannukah party where he held hands and danced with other dudes around the governor's desk a month later to celebrate on 9/27/2011. Gotta love how Texas increased the allowed mezuzah size to a whopping 24" and the Jewish mezuzah suppliers promptly introduced a 26" model named after Perry. Witty.
I agree that Texas Home Owners Associations often behave like a bunch of jack-booted Nazis, but I don't know if I can honestly describe them as being politically "left wing" or "right wing." Seems to me like their more like sockpuppet employees of whatever real estate developer who built the community. Instead of having any truely elected local government, these petty tyrants settle neighborhood disputes involving loose dogs, junk cars in the driveway, unraked leaves, uncut grass, etc. etc. etc. So a lot depends on how pissy your neigbors are with the lawn ornaments. Some ornamentation is tasteful and blends with the style of the neighborhood, other ornamentation is tacky & tasteless and detracts from property values. And it's up to the unelected, real estate developers hired mignons to settle the disputes.
*I* am NOT responsible for anyone else's property values and future potential profits. If you don't like the way I live,you shouldn't have bought a house close to me. If you did and I offends you,you have a perfect right to buy me out by making it worth my while to move. If that doesn't appeal to you,pack YOUR ass up and move. Please note that I have zero sympathy for people who knowingly bought property controlled by a homeowners organization. They knew what they were getting when they signed on the dotted line,and have no one to blame but themselves. I had a good friend that sold his paid off house in the early 80's,and used the entire amount as a downpayment on a quarter million dollar house in an exclusive neighborhood. I was visiting him one day and we got to talking about tv programs and he started talking about how unhappy he was with the local cable supplier,so I asked him why he didn't just get a sat dish. He told me the homeowners committee had banned sat dishes as well as antennas for esthetic reasons. It was thought they hurt property values. I then told him to just put the damn thing up in his back yard and nobody would know about it because it was fenced off by a tall wood fence in front,and in the back it was facing a lake over a half-mile wide. That's when he told me about his next door neighbor that had put up a clothes line in her back yard because she didn't like clothes driers and liked the way clothes smelled that dried in the sun. One of the alleged people that live in that development spotted her clothesline though the telescope he was using to view and take photos of the backyards of people across the lake from them not only ratted her out,but gave the board photos of the line with clothes on it. Instead of having this yahoo looked up as a peeping tom,they fined that woman and told her the fine would be repeated for every day the line was up starting on a certain date,and that if push came to shove they would force her to sell and move. To be honest I have zero sympathy for her because in MY mind she just encouraged this sort of shit when she signed the agreement so she would have the "privilege" of paying too much for upscale tract housing. I AM outraged that the goober across the lake wasn't arrested for being a peeping tom,though. You KNOW this guy was looking into fenced back yards to look at women and girls sunbathing with no clothes on,no matter how much he claimed he was working as a zoning Nazi in the public interest. IMHO,people whose back yards face a half-mile of open water and whose front and side yards are fenced off have a reasonable expectation of privacy,and that SOB was trespassing and peeping. I kinda pissed my friend off too,when I told him he knew about that crap when he bought the place,so he needed to live with that cable company and quit whining because he was getting what he had paid for.
Hey... maybe I bought my house FIRST and YOU moved next door to ME. The homeowner's association gets pretty pissy about stuff like that... They'll come down on you a LOT harder than just nagging you about getting your lawn manicured properly.
Nothing changes. You are still free to sell out and move.
That's what happens when you live in a neighborhood that doesn't have zoning laws or a homeowners association to protect your propety value: some yayhoo ding-dong can move in next door and depreciate everybody's property by turning his own home into a rat-infested scrap yard, and there's nothing you can do about it lest he go waving his copy of the Constitution around in the air and barricade himself behind a pile of old rubber tires and start plinking at you with a surplus AK47 or AR15 assault rifle. There goes the neighborhood... damned if you do, damned if you don't... The homeowner's association is a minor nuisance... but overall, it's best to let them deal with the kooks instead of trying to reason with them yourself.
Oh,yeah. DAMN those people who choose to be individuals and choose to live free without acknowledging any debt to others bank accounts! Why,I bet deys Birchers!
There are no replies to Comment # 55. End Trace Mode for Comment # 55.
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#8. To: Vicomte13 (#4)
(Edited)
In this case, it sounds like a complete breakdown of communications between warring neighbors. If smoke is coming through a hole in the basement, then the hole needs to be plugged, obviously.
#17. To: GrandIsland (#8)
I've dealt with this bullshit, often. Most people like this hate each other and any kind of communication or reason is fruitless.
#26. To: TooConservative (#17)
The court should be wise enough to force both parties to pay for plugging the holes.
#28. To: sneakypete (#26)
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong,but don't stacked boxes like that have Homeowners organizations that collect monthly dues to do repairs to common areas?
#29. To: TooConservative (#28)
Not all of them. They look like post-war row houses to me.
#30. To: sneakypete, redleghunter, Willie Green (#29)
I would live in a tent in the woods before I would have a Home Owners Committee of busy-body airhead lefties dictate to me how I have to live and think at home.
‘Rick Perry mezuzah’ proves Jewish objects are also bigger in Texas
#35. To: TooConservative (#30)
I would live in a tent in the woods before I would have a Home Owners Committee of busy-body airhead lefties dictate to me how I have to live and think at home.
Many of these homeowners only lack the swastikas to qualify as Nazis. Very heavyhanded.
Now and then, you see a few victories against these petty tyrants.
#43. To: Willie Green (#35)
Some ornamentation is tasteful and blends with the style of the neighborhood, other ornamentation is tacky & tasteless and detracts from property values.
#48. To: sneakypete (#43)
*I* am NOT responsible for anyone else's property values and future potential profits.
If you don't like the way I live,you shouldn't have bought a house close to me.
And maybe YOU'RE the one devaluing the neighborhood's property values because YOU'RE the one operating a auto repair shop out of your garage and it's strictly a residential neighborhood.
#49. To: Willie Green (#48)
Hey... maybe I bought my house FIRST and YOU moved next door to ME.
#51. To: sneakypete (#49)
Nothing changes. You are still free to sell out and move.
#55. To: Willie Green (#51)
there's nothing you can do about it lest he go waving his copy of the Constitution around in the air and barricade himself behind a pile of old rubber tires and start plinking at you with a surplus AK47 or AR15 assault rifle.
Replies to Comment # 55.
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