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Title: Couple sues after town bans front-yard gardens
Source:
Yahoo
URL Source: https://www.yahoo.com/news/couple-s ... nt-yard-gardens-181405934.html
Published: Jun 8, 2016
Author: Curt Anderson
Post Date: 2016-06-09 11:11:07 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 13804
Comments: 66
MIAMI (AP) — For 17 years, a South Florida couple grew vegetables in a front-yard garden until a new town ordinance was passed limiting such gardens to backyards. Now, the couple is asking a judge to uproot the ban they claim violates their constitutional rights. Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts say they dug up the garden in front of their Miami Shores home in August 2013 when town officials threatened to fine them $50 a day if they didn't. The threatened fine came a few months after the Miami Shores Village Council adopted a new zoning plan for the town of about 10,500 north of Miami. The couple sued, and at a hearing Wednesday their attorney said the ban violates the Florida Constitution in several ways, including improper limits on their private property rights and violation of the equal protection clause by singling out vegetables over other plants. "We're not saying you can do anything you want on your property," attorney Ari Bargil told Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Monica Gordo. "We are simply saying you can grow vegetables on your property and that is protected by the Constitution." Richard Sarafan, attorney for Miami Shores, said the new zoning rule was not irrational and treated all homeowners the same: their front yards should be covered with grass, sod or a "living ground cover" not further defined. It's no problem, he said, to have a vegetable garden in the backyard. "There certainly is not fundamental right to grow vegetables in your front yard," Sarafan said. "Aesthetics and uniformity are legitimate government purposes. Not every property can lawfully be used for every purpose." Carroll, who attended the hearing, said the couple sought to grow produce using organic practices, such as no use of pesticides. He said he had never gotten a complaint from a neighbor in all the years he tended the garden, which grew some 75 varieties of vegetables. "It's important that we have the right to do something on our own property," Carroll said. "We're just trying to grow vegetables." The couple is being represented by lawyers from the Arlington, Virginia-based Institute for Justice, which describes itself as a Libertarian nonprofit organization that focuses on issues such as private property rights, school choice and free speech. Gordo did not immediately rule. Both sides said the judge could decide the matter without a trial, but either way the case is likely to be appealed, attorneys said. ******* "Aesthetics and uniformity are legitimate government purposes..." 
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#1. To: Deckard (#0)
You can. In your back yard.
Aesthetics, yes. Uniformity - why? Sounds to me like the flip side of government-imposed diversity. A government strong enough to impose your standards is strong enough to ban them. The people above fought for their garden, and won. 9th Amendment, un-enumerated rights... the right keep and grow vegetables anywhere on your property. End vegetable discrimination! You can. In your back yard. On the other side I been following queenscrap.blogspot.com/ for a while now. The theme of its user submitted stories is how NYC doesn't properly enforce its zoning laws leading to Queens being over populated, (water) pollution, crime, noise, garbage ,...generally crappy. They want Blasio thrown in jail for his affordable housing and gentrification initiatives. Examples are building high volume rentals for areas zoned for single family houses. I can sympathize with them. We need a blog like that where I live.
You can. In your back yard. "For 17 years, a South Florida couple grew vegetables in a front-yard garden until a new town ordinance was passed limiting such gardens to backyards." Now all of sudden for no reason, they pass an ordinance banning front yard gardens? "Aesthetics and uniformity are legitimate government purposes..." Only in a police state. Buy more. Be Happy. Consume.... www.youtube.com/watch? v=ly_djozCksg ...what the king forces you to buy by prohibiting what you can grow and eat on your own land.
...what the king forces you to buy by prohibiting what you can grow and eat on your own land. No one is forcing anyone to buy anything here. Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts can grow food in their back yard.
Major "Gatlin" Burns hath spoken. And the fact still remains that Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts can grow food in their back yard. You do have a hard time handling facts ...
Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts can grow food in their back yard. Or they can buy some property out of town with plenty of open land and no trees. I find it hard to sympathize with this couple. My community association enforces stuff like that and it doesn't bother me.
Absolutely. You choose to live in a town, you live by the rules established for the community. If you don't like the rules, you either get the rules changed or you move away. Simple.
Absolutely. You choose to live in a town, you live by the rules established for the community. It's their property. The "rules" were already established for at least 16 years - now the town wants to arbitrarily change the rules. None of the neighbors have complained, this is just another instance of petty bureaucrats denying the rights of citizens to use their own property. Plastic flamingos are OK, but veggie garden is not Hermine and Tom are part of a nationwide movement of small-scale food producers and consumers who are tired of the government dictating what foods they can grow, sell, and eat. On November 19, 2013, they joined with the Institute for Justice to challenge Miami Shores’ senseless front-yard vegetable garden ban. Their case aims to vindicate the right of all Americans to peacefully use their own property to support their own families. Miami Shores Village, Fla.’s unconstitutional ban on front-yard vegetable gardens prohibits homeowners from growing vegetables in their front yards. But trees, fruit and garden gnomes are just fine. The argument for regulating neighborhood aesthetics is not a new one in South Florida. Coral Gables used to have an ordinance prohibiting residents from parking pickup trucks in their own driveways at night. I don't know about you government apologists, but I would much rather live next to a house with a well-maintained front-yard garden (like this one) than a yard littered with pink flamingos and garden gnomes. Sorry, SPORT, that is the way government works. You live in a town, you follow the rules, the old ones and the new changed ones. Miami Shores Village Council adopted a new zoning plan for the town of about 10,500 north of Miami. A town council has the right to do that whether you like it or not and you obviously do not. That's tough shitsky!!! You want to be the anarchist that YOU are and not obey town ordinances established by an elected city council ... then you move FAR out in the country where there are no zoning requirements, if you can find such a place.
Determined to be unconstitutional by whom, why and when?
Seems to me they are getting the rules changed via the courts. That should be okay with you. Is it not okay?
Somehow, the idea of freedom being a central facet of living in America seems quite foreign to you.
Seems to me that they are TRYING to get the rules changed via the courts. Is that okay with me? Oh, absolutely, you betcha, that's fine with me. It's the way to go. We have laws in our society that represent a purpose to supply a deficit in human consciousness. If people would only act with deep discernment, then we would have no need for laws … but unfortunately they do not. It is only that we are unable to cultivate esoteric discernment that we need laws to provide an exoteric alternative to facilitate and channel human interactions with each other.
front night one what's meth hoarders particulary bring tobacco road love If you ... don't use exclamation points --- you should't be typeing ! Commas - semicolons - question marks are for girlie boys !
I believe in the idea that the basic foundation that has continued to separate America from essentially every other nation founded throughout history is the concept of America being a nation of laws and not a nation of men. It has long been established that under our nation of laws, laws rule and everyone is to be governed equally by the same laws. No one can ever be allowed to be above the law. There can be no better way for America to deal with people that to treat all of them equally under the law. When there are disputes, the most familiar way for parties to engage in a dispute resolution process is the civil justice system where litigation and a trail by a judge or jury to decide who/what is right or wrong. That is the place to decide where someone wins and someone loses. The is not to say that negotiation, mediation and arbitration do not fit in as alternative solutions to dispute resolution. So, I do believe in freedom. But a gaggle of anarchists, libertarians and Paultards on LF are not going to tell me to comply with their version of freedom and try to force their ideas on me or tell me what to believe.
I sure don't want my neighbors planning a food garden on their front lawn. I am in a townhouse so it would look pretty bad. Back yard is fine.
This today: Leads to this tomorrow: And this "Green Acres" next week:
I was gonna applaud you for not posting a Paultatd yella article... and then at the bottom of the decently written article, you had to post your favorite anarchist art. My wife and I grow our vegetables on the side and back of the house. We leave the front for Aesthetics. Because my neighbors have just as much rights as I have. Then again, normal people are more concerned with ANOTHERS RIGHTS... and a Paultard is only concerned about their own rights. A Paultards definition of constitutional rights are having more rights than the next guy. I'm the infidel... Allah warned you about. كافر المسلح
Vegetable Pests: Garden Nazis Seriously? And what "anarchist art" would that be? Playing stupid only works for your Paultard fan base. I'm the infidel... Allah warned you about. كافر المسلح
Playing stupid I posted a picture of the couple's well-tended garden that apparently none of the neighbors ever complained about. Gosh - I didn't realize that growing your own food was something only "anarchists" do. Great image - seems we have quite a few of the Nazis here. Sie werden nicht Nahrung in Ihrem eigenen Garten wachsen. No, of course you won't. Instead you'll let Republicans and Democrats tell you to comply with their version of freedom because R&D freedom is sooooooo much better than libertarian freedom.
If you were my neighbor and your ignorant ways devalued my home, id invite you over for a BBQ... about 2 months after you noticed your family dog went missing.
I'm the infidel... Allah warned you about. كافر المسلح
No, I will not allow that either, but the Republicans and Democrats make more sense since they possess far greater intelligence than the grotesquely ignorant and dim-witted anarchists, libertarians and Paultards who continually display their extremely slow mental development while trying to promote themselves as experts on everything.
A sure sign a poster is a mentally ill dimwitted retard .... This is a scientific fact. It has been proven 100% accurate. People who do this are officially categorized as mentally ill dimwitted retards. What is it? It's posting an idiotic picture in a post without anything supporting or illuminating the poster's position. A variation on this deranged type of posting are posts that contain nothing but personal attacks and name calling, lacking any substance and failing to actually promote critical thinking or to promote or defend a sensible and sane position. Mentally ill retards use this technique because they became exhausted trying to write something sane and sensible, or they were so proud of having finally written something that wasn't totally retarded they find themselves compelled to keep reposting it. Why, you might ask, is this a sure sign of mentally ill retards? Because these people don't have the mental horsepower to articulate a cogent statement. They have to rely on pictures to do their speaking. Because they're mentally ill retards. 97% of mental health experts agree. Strange but true.........
If a government has a Constitutional authorization to prohibit homeowners/renters from planting a garden in their front yards, that same government can also ban gardens in back yards. The bottom line is this... Either a person owns property or he does not. If he does, he has a right use his property as he wishes (within reason). If he does not have that right, he does not fully own the property in question. If he does fully own the property, he has no mandated duty to base his use of his land on whether or not it might affect the value of property belonging to others. If a person believes a neighbor's use of his property devalues his own property; or, dislikes how said neighbor uses his property for whatever reason, THAT person has the option of moving into a neighborhood with a homeowner's association which has use of property restrictions already set up and agreed on by the homeowners living there. "Within reason" means things other than those that are against the law for ANY citizen to do ANYwhere or that might reasonably be believed to be a clear and present danger to others living in close proximity to where certain things might be occurring. On the other hand, any property owner who wishes to be a "good neighbor" by using his property only for things his neighbors approve of can certainly do so; but, that is HIS choice.
Who gets to decide what is “within reason?”
In the following order... 1. The property owner. If a dispute arises, then;
I'll buy that.
I never thought otherwise.
They should be able to do plant whatever they want to in their front yard. It is their property not their neighbors. If you do something on your property that someone thinks brings makes their property worth less then move. It is their property not yours. If you put in new windows i will sue you because you could have gotten better windows so that affects my property. If you plant blue grass i will sue you because hou should have planted fescue. If you park a ford in your driveway i will sue you because you should have bought a porsche. If you put vinyl siding on your house ill sue you because you should have used redwood. If you hace kids ill sue you because they make noise.
It's called "common courtesy" and "being a good neighbor". When you participate in society by buying a home, you take your neighbor's feelings into consideration when you make decisions, realizing that not only do you have rights, so do they. 50 years ago we didn't need 90% of the laws we have today. People took care not to offend other people, especially their neighbors. Today, it's me, me, me. My rights. My life. My choices. Fuck everyone else. So we write laws to control this rude, impolite, and selfish behavior. You reap what you sow.
Carroll, who attended the hearing, said the couple sought to grow produce using organic practices, such as no use of pesticides. He said he had never gotten a complaint from a neighbor in all the years he tended the garden, which grew some 75 varieties of vegetables. Great! Do it in the back yard. "He said he had never gotten a complaint from a neighbor in all the years he tended the garden" HE said that, huh? Makes you wonder why the ordinance was passed. Did his neighbors come to his defense, supporting his decision to keep that eyesore in front of his house?
Comments (41 - 66) not displayed.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest"It's important that we have the right to do something on our own property," Carroll said.
#2. To: Deckard (#0)
"Aesthetics and uniformity are legitimate government purposes.
#3. To: Deckard (#0)
(Edited)
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#4. To: misterwhite, Deckard, ConservingFreedom, hondo68 (#1)
"It's important that we have the right to do something on our own property," Carroll said.
#5. To: misterwhite (#1)
"It's important that we have the right to do something on our own property," Carroll said.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#6. To: Deckard (#5)
#7. To: VxH (#6)
#8. To: Gatlin, VxH (#7)
Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts can grow food in their back yard.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#9. To: Deckard (#8)
#10. To: Gatlin (#7)
No one is forcing anyone to buy anything here.
#11. To: TrappedInMd (#10)
No one is forcing anyone to buy anything here.
Tom Carroll and Hermine Ricketts can grow food in their back yard.
Or they can buy some property out of town with plenty of open land and no trees.
I find it hard to sympathize with this couple.
My community association enforces stuff like that and it doesn't bother me.
#12. To: Gatlin, TrappedInMd, boot-licking slaves (#11)
(Edited)
I find it hard to sympathize with this couple. My community association enforces stuff like that and it doesn't bother me.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#13. To: Deckard, TrappedInMd, (#12)
It's their property. The "rules" were already established for at least 16 years - now the town wants to arbitrarily change the rules.
#14. To: Deckard (#12)
(Edited)
... unconstitutional ban ...
#15. To: Gatlin (#11)
If you don't like the rules, you either get the rules changed or you move away.
#16. To: Gatlin (#13)
You want to be the anarchist that YOU are and not obey town ordinances established by an elected city council ... then you move FAR out in the country where there are no zoning requirements, if you can find such a place.
#17. To: Pinguinite (#15)
If you don't like the rules, you either get the rules changed or you move away.
Seems to me they are getting the rules changed via the courts.
That should be okay with you. Is it not okay?
#18. To: Pinguinite (#16)
idea of freedom
yard
refrigerators
washing
machines
clubs
too
big
ghetto
next
labs
rubbish
collectors
bother
me
the
funny
farms
back
boris
#19. To: Pinguinite (#16)
(Edited)
Somehow, the idea of freedom being a central facet of living in America seems quite foreign to you.
No, but the notion that someone can IDIVIDUALLY decide what freedom is, what is unconstitutional, and selectively decide which laws they will obey is. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other. So said John Adams in the year 1870.
#20. To: Gatlin, Deckard (#13)
#21. To: Deckard (#12)
#22. To: Deckard (#0)
(Edited)
#23. To: Gatlin, Deckard (#21)
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#24. To: GrandIsland (#22)
.....and then at the bottom of the decently written article, you had to post your favorite anarchist art.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#25. To: Deckard (#24)
And what "anarchist art" would that be?
#26. To: GrandIsland (#25)
And what "anarchist art" would that be?
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#27. To: hondo68 (#23)
Vegetable Pests: Garden Nazis
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#28. To: Gatlin (#19)
But a gaggle of anarchists, libertarians and Paultards on LF are not going to tell me to comply with their version of freedom and try to force their ideas on me or tell me what to believe.
#29. To: Deckard (#26)
(Edited)
#30. To: Pinguinite (#28)
No, of course you won't. Instead you'll let Republicans and Democrats tell you to comply with their version of freedom because R&D freedom is sooooooo much better than libertarian freedom.
#31. To: hondo68 (#23)
#32. To: Deckard, Gatlin, misterwhite, ConservingFreedom, hondo68, TrappedInMd, VxH, Pinguinite, BorisY, GrandIsland (#0)
#33. To: packrat1145, misterwhite, ConservingFreedom, hondo68, TrappedInMd, VxH, Pinguinite, BorisY, GrandIsland (#32)
If [a person owns the property], he has a right use his property as he wishes (within reason).
#34. To: Gatlin (#33)
Who gets to decide what is “within reason?”
2. The local authorities. If their decision is disputed, then;
3. The court system.
#35. To: packrat1145 (#34)
#36. To: Gatlin (#35)
I'll buy that.
#37. To: misterwhite (#1)
#38. To: A K A Stone (#37)
#39. To: misterwhite, A K A Stone (#38)
When you participate in society by buying a home, you take your neighbor's feelings into consideration when you make decisions, realizing that not only do you have rights, so do they.
“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards."
#40. To: Deckard (#39)
"Carroll, who attended the hearing, said the couple sought to grow produce using organic practices, such as no use of pesticides."
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