A Southern California couple who scaled back watering their lawn amid the state’s drought received a warning from the suburb where they live that they might be fined for creating an eyesore – despite emergency statewide orders to conserve.
Michael Korte and Laura Whitney, who live near Los Angeles in Glendora, said on Thursday they received a letter from the city warning they had 60 days to green up their partially brown lawn or pay a fine ranging from $100 to $500.
California couple conserving water amid drought could face fine for brown lawn – Yahoo News
h/t to Dave G
… and, to top it off, most cities frown on even using ‘grey’ water discharged onto lawns from sinks or the washer …
Golf courses routinely apply “paint” prior to televised tournaments so everything looks lovely and uniform-green
Problem solved
This type of behavior is nothing new in CA. My wife’s family is intimately familiar with that particular kind of crazy, one of the main reasons they moved out of CA 20+ yrs ago.
California is the first state to perfect the art of legislation. They now have a set of laws such that no citizen — no matter how diligent he is in attempting to remain legal — can keep from breaking the law. The State can now collect an endless stream of fines from anyone, at any time, and always claim justification.
When I lived there we students had this club called ‘break a law a day’ and we had young lawyers who helped us find various novel, stupid, useless or ancient laws to violate. It was immense fun. This was way back in the old Ice Ages of the late 1960’s.
Reading the linked story, it appears that the people neglected their yard, and were just using the drought as an excuse. I’m okay with fining them.
GeologyJim says:
July 19, 2014 at 2:42 pm
Jim, all golf course paint I have seen looks completely fake.
Here are versions with pictures.
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/water-629311-city-glendora.html
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_26174166/california-couple-threatened-fine-lawn-glendora
If their lawn was full of ugly weed they just need a doctors note to avoid the fine.
Yep.. Paint it green with glow in the dark paint “CA Suks”…
Charge a market price for water.
Pity they’re not in the UK, could get some lovely artificial grass from Everest.
If the grass is green, that’s a $500 fine.
If the grass is brown, that’s a $100 – $500 fine.
Obviously the legislation is aimed at getting rid of grass. I suggest a rockery.
And if the grass is weed…that’s just fine (as long as you have a doctor’s excuse for it).
AstroTurf and plastic flowers and you can ‘garden’ for life.