"rachael simpson" wrote in message
...
Pennyaline wrote:
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.


Here's one for you:

we own some land outside of a town near here. 20+ acres of pasture land,
currently occupied by 9 horses and 5 cows. NC DOT recently decided that
they want to take our pasture and run a *new* ditch thru it. The overflow
from an area pond runs thru the pasture in a little stream and now they
want to re-route it. We have been informed by local government, that they
are taking a little over 5 acres for this project, right down the middle
of the pasture, digging a trench, and lining it with landscaping rocks.
Do you know what effect that the rocks will have on the horses feet?!?
The way they want to fix it will almost eliminate any water flow thru the
pasture, thus having a bad effect on the cows. For those who aren't
ranchers on the group, the water is vital to the cows in other ways than
for drinking. Cows don't sweat, so they stand in the water to cool
themselves. The township and the county have already approved this
project. So how can we fight this one? Oh, and during this process, we
are *required* to remove all animals from the pasture, so as the machinery
won't scare them and make them *wild*. They *assure* us that we will be
paid for the acreage they take, as soon as the project is complete. Like
we had it for sale before hand or something............Everything I've
tried to do to prevent this, has turned into dead-ends. Frustrating! UGH!


What does your lawyer say about this? And, did you attend any town meetings
where this could have been discussed?