zxcvbob wrote:
In this case, the "neighbor" is Olmsted County, MN. The person living
in the house (rented from the county) is not a problem. The county
itself is sending people out to spray.

The county is most likely immune from any civil lawsuits, small claims
or otherwise. I have to go after the applicator, or find a criminal
statute violated by the county.

I'll bet they're not immune. It used to be a given, but governments big
and small have been made to answer for their presumptive behaviors
lately. If they contracted with Chemlawn, they are responsible for what
Chemlawn does. F'rinstance, Comcast has a right of way through the back
of my property. Two years ago, they had to do excavations on that right
of way to do line upgrading. Comcast hired an outside company to do the
excavation and lay the line. When the work was done, everybody pulled up
and left and the back of my property was a freakin' mess! They were just
gone without a word, and when the yard remained unchanged days later it
seemed evident that they had no intention of clearing up. There were
tire tracks all over my yard from their digging equipment, my back fence
was pushed over, and huge clods of dirt and sod were everywhere. They
hadn't backfilled properly and the trench line was a heaving lumpy mess.
When I called Comcast about it a few days later, they told me it wasn't
their problem since the "other company" did the work. I reminded them
that the "other company" was acting in Comcast's interest and under
Comcast's direction and as a result it was as if Comcast had done the
work itself and was responsible for cleaning it up. But to be on the
safe side, I backed it up with a letter from an attorney. The "other
company" was out there the next day leveling off the backfill, cleaning
up the mess, and lining the fence back up nice and straight.



BTW, it got interesting a couple of years ago when the house was vacant
one winter, and I called the sheriff and told him if I was supposed to
keep *my* sidewalk cleared, he needed to come out and shovel *his*.
(There was a huge snowstorm and the sidewalk went unshoveled for a
couple of days, in violation of a local ordinance.) They sent someone
out a couple of hours later.

As they should.