Northern California

Part of the problem is that CA often goes 'way too far with ideas that on the surface, do make good sense.

I believe property disclosure forms originated in CA--not a bad idea, if you're trying to keep a poor, befuddled old lady (for example) from buying a total piece of junk that was misrepresented as being sound-- until they got to the point where you are supposed to disclose that your next door neighbor is a nuisance with their 10 cats....How do you know how long they'll stay?

As to tree-cutting, I know someone who wanted to cut a tree in their front yard (we're not talking a sidewalk tree, but one in the yard), only to find out that the city owns the tree (we're talking about homes built in the '70s, the trees were planted at the time the homes were built, and we're not talking about 100-year old redwoods or endangered trees here). The city is okay with the tree coming out (apparently they are causing water main problems with the roots), but because an old wrought iron fence would have to be cut into to get to the tree, the iron fence would then have to be replaced completely (at the homeowner's cost) because it is one of the old ones that have the rails too far apart. The city will not allow a repair. That's stupid, so the tree is staying for now. Incidentally most of those trees have been removed from the yards in that neighborhood over time.

As to whether "they" care if you cut a tree or build a shed, it depends on whether you live in a newly developed area or not. Almost every new house if it is even remotely part of a development (whether it consists of 5 houses or 50) is starting to come with HOAs and CC&Rs. Usually the builder has the money and legal muscle to keep them enforced until the last home is sold, then all heck breaks loose between people who knew what they signed up for and wish to abide by those rules (why they bought in the first place) and others who just don't care. If you really care about keeping the neighborhood nice, you can count on dealing with HOA issues 7/24--writing parking tickets, lawn mowing tickets, etc. etc. Or you wind up moving, but your house is worth less than it could be because your neighbor is running a junkyard, or perpetual yard sale, or whatever. Once the first set of neighbors move out, or a vast majority do, HOAs aren't worth the paper they're written on. I think HOAs are from CA too....

On the other hand, I've seen trashy places out in the country, too, and their only saving grace is that they're surrounded by acres and acres of undeveloped land.

As far as buildings requiring new this and new that, with people signing off, that is not all the state, that is union stuff--can't do anything that might take a job (and unnecessary overtime) from someone. Although there should always be some provision that if things are done in a "workmanlike" manner, it should be able to pass inspection, regardless of materials used, or who does the work, imho.

I'll second that, Dave,

Sounds to me like this conversation has turned to brainwashed people rather than homesteaders. Maybe I'm simply among that crowd Laura talks about. I'm old enough that my education was truly a matter of teaching me how to think for myself and not the usuall dumbed down brainwashing that passes for education today. I cannot imagine, even though I see it daily, that people follow that socialist garbage about Uncle Knows Best. Those are the people, when troubles come over the next few years, will be out there screaming for the Governator to "Do Something" and having no clue what is consistent with life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. My god, that is why MOST of "us" have been so agreeable to trade our God given rights away for a little state security.

Where I live there are very few people that are interested in such nonsense. Most of the people I know in and near "my" valley see both hard times coming, and a high probability of a new revolution as clearly stated in our own Declation of Independance. And are preparing for it all.

Are you men or sheep? (sorry ladies, I've never been politically correct).

As regards building, those of us in obvious places are more likely to submit to the states dictates, but most of us realize that they are largely unconsitutional and criminal. Given those facts, why pay attention to them? In my area if the Building Division puts up red tags, the county loses its tax base, so they don't.

I've had direct experiences with the CAMP Pot Patrol and Dave is quite correct. Those vermin daily violate the law to "protect" us from ourselves. By now the Founding Fathers must be spinning at 25,000 rpm. How long are "we" going to let this continue?

Those socialists in Excremento have turned DMV into just another tax and spend program since less than 15% of the DMV fees are relevant to your car. And "we" keep electing these Demopublican Big Spenders who have no clue how to create a dollar outside of stealing it. There is not one that I know of who has not violated his oath to preserve, protect, and defend and every one of them should be fully exposed to the corrections as specified by the Consitution.

So Yes, we are a well encumbered state from the standpoint of political nonsense and excess abundance of left wing amoral kill all the capitalists morons who will die faster than the capitalists when they can no longer rob us blind.

BUT, Northern California is still a good place to live and raise a family. Maybe we have to work a little harder than elsewhere to enjoy our life liberty and pursuit, but so what? Those who can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen and quit whining. I said earlier the politics here is less than good. But life in these mountains is better than most other places I've been.

bearkiller

When my parents lived down in California, my dad built a patio with a roof over it--and he was an experienced builder, knew what he was doing. As soon as the city found out he hadn't had a building permit when he built it, they fined him and made him tear it down...My in-laws live outside Valley Center. Everything they put on their property, they have to have a permit for. It's ridiculous.

__________________
Just feed me chocolate.

Dave, I like that if you really wanted to, you can recycle all your trash in the bigger cities of CA. Once you move out to the country, you're lucky if they take newspapers and milk jugs.... I think that is why you see a lot of illegal dumping in the country.

I like In-and-Out Burger, El Pollo Loco, and Strings Italian Restaurants. It is also nice that you can buy alcohol in both supermarkets and that big party superstore (the name escapes me at the moment) for reasonable prices.

Well as usual here, any discussion about California has turned into bashing stories .
All I can say Suze, is come on over and see if you like it, trust me you will.
Obey the rules, keep an open mind and don’t forget the checkbook. It cost to live in paradise.

I have never had any problems here, the few that have blame the state instead of perhaps looking at themselves. Yes the state can be rough. There are rules here which must be followed just like anywhere.
Could you image what would happen if states had no laws? Chaos.
There are many people here that abuse the system, the powers that be pick on the good people sometimes, easy targets, which is sad. They don’t seem smart enough to catch the shysters.
Yes I get buzzed by the choppers a couple times ever summer, I just wave at them.
If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about, invite them in.
Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

Vickie, as to how you afford to live here, that’s a story unto itself. Remember the gold rush?
Well, we had ourselves a technology rush. Was part of it myself for 22 years.
You have to give them your soul, 6 or 7 days a week, 12 hours a day, no exception, no excuses.
You have no life, but for the money it’s worth it for a while.
There was a time the companies would give, yes, give you thousands of shares of stock just to come work for them. Apple, Microsoft, IBM, Palm, Intel, Seagate and the like. Stock doubles and triples, you sell, life is good. Switch jobs every few years you could make yours very very rich. It’s all over now.
California and the buying public have burdened these companies into leaving, China is the next big move.
That is why the price of electronic gadgets and computers is so low. The public demands low prices, the companies have to accommodate them. Cheaper labor, less rules, means overseas.

It was good while it lasted. But I don’t remember my 20’s or my 30’s, all I did was work.
Those of us who were wise with the money we made are sitting pretty right now.
Those who spent it all on frivolous things are hurting bad.

California has been a gold mine twice now, it’s busted again.
And that, my friends is why we are all leaving, take the money and run.
That’s about it.

Kris

__________________
I know all the rules, but the rules do not know me ... Eddie Vedder

Hi OUVickie, I'll address your question in the context of San Francisco proper, since I'm familiar with that.

If you're single or a couple with no children, and all you need is a small area to sleep with access to a bathroom, store a few personal items, microwave/hotplate for cooking occasionally and you're not a homebody, it is VERY doable. Rent a bedroom. There are lots of parks to walk in, you can walk along the marina, across the Golden Gate Bridge and back for the day, stores and so on are within walking distance. You don't need a car since there is pretty good public transportation (when not on strike). If you need a car to get out of the area on vacation, rent one for the week. Lots of museums and other educational activities, lots of volunteer activities if you want to garden but don't have any space of your own. Owning a car is for the well-off, as your insurance costs are higher in the city, and many places charge rent for parking spaces, even when in most places you think you have a parking space if you rent an apartment. Not in SF!

On the other hand, if you have a family and you want a yard, even a tiny one, you need to go at least to the suburbs, and even those houses are not cheap, especially if they are anywhere near a BART (rail) line. There you have all the usual suburb problems--all the bad of the city (too close to your neighbors) and all of the bad of the country (have to drive to get to any cultural or pro events of any kind, etc.) and none of the good, imho. You will need a car, or reliable transportation of some sort, and unlike high property taxes, you cannot deduct car/gas expenses on your taxes.

The cheapest places in CA are either 'way inland, and/or where there are no jobs other than minimum-wage tourist/waitpeople jobs. For Suze, I think that if you could relocate near to a somewhat affluent retirement community you could probably get work cleaning houses or doing minor repairs/errand running as a supplement to your land income. Since retirement income is steady your income would be pretty steady. Part of the problem with Silicon Valley's economy busting was that as people lost their jobs and still tried to keep their homes, all of the service businesses that had been built up among all the nouveau riche--the pick-up-and-deliver to your home dry cleaners, personal chefs (you might look into that also) that shop for and cook two weeks of gourmet freezer meals at your house, etc. also collapsed because they were (to put it honestly) frivolous expenses to be cut.

Your right, Dave, most of that stuff doesn't affect the majority of Californians since the majority lives in the cities and are socialist sheep anyway. I lived in rural counties for 33 years and never in a town of more than 500 people. I lived in the most beautiful areas of the state.

Woulda', shoulda', coulda'. Yeah I coulda' made it easy on myself and said, "Sure, spray 2-4D on my springs, shallow well and creek in violation of federal law. When you poison my water supply, you can just condemn my springs and well!" Heck, my neighbors had no clue what that county truck was doing on their property every year, they were too intimidated to ask.

Yeah, I shoulda' kept my head down and my mouth shut, paid double taxes and keep shelling out cash to pay for my illusion of freedom, but why would I want to? You are right, nobody cared if I cut down a tree, as long as the gov can get some money out of it. I guess I would consider it reasonable to need a building permit to repaper my bathroom or an Ag permit to grow garlic, if I didn't remember what the founding fathers said about intrusive government....

or..

Did what I did and find a better place to live, where I don't have to worry if my water is poisoned, where my neighbors don't spout, "The government oughta do something," where I can change a light fixture without paying the county for permission, where I am free to profit from my own labor, where we don't need nanny state to protect us from ourselves. I don't need to worry about being harrassed because I speak up against what is wrong and government entities understand what -private property- means.

You folks are happy there and it fits your comfort level, great. It is a beautiful place with still some pockets free of much government intrusion, at least in practice. The ones that have always bother me are the ones who export a slice of San Jose and L.A. to every beautiful spot in the west.

Dave, go research 2-4D and come back and tell me if you still think it is okay for for a county ag agent to to force private land owners to allow this to be sprayed on their land instead of allowing hand pulling of weeds. Once I talked to my neighbors and gave them information, the spraying of McAdams Creek was stopped. Now I happily reside in a county whose noxious weed control program consists of sending us pictures of what we need to pull and cut and the government trusts us to know how to pull weeds.

All the things I mentioned were part of county codes. I am not kidding about needing a building permit for light fixtures or garlic permits. That makes most residents lawbreakers. Perhaps you should spend some time reading what your county codes are.

I haven't seen a problem with spraying here. Most of it's done on road shoulders, and most of those are county owned. They do spray a lot for mosquitos, and if you lived here, you'd understand. We've mostly seen notices to weedeat a firebreak around your house and then around the fence line to stop or slow any fires. Again, if you lived here, you'd understand. It gets DRY and HOT in the summer time, and fires are the norm. If you didn't weedeat within a certain amount of time, the fire department would and they'd charge you something like $400 to do it. All of our neighbors did the weedeating and nobody complained or got fined.

It really is a beautiful area, and every area has it's pitfalls. Really though, the biggest issue right now is the economy. It it weren't for the economy being in the crapper, I'd be happier living here.

Did anyone get poisoned in the spraying?

Let me tell you a litle bit about spraying. When my parents lived in Oregon, they came in to spray along the road where they lived...this was JUST ALONG THE ROAD, not even anywhere near anyone's well...

Most people had signs out saying, "No Spraying". But there were quite a few others who didn't care. Within five years, everyone who let them spray had cancer in the family. Different kinds of cancer--some men had testicle cancer, some women had ovarian cancer, children had different cancers. Approximently 1/4 of those people DIED of those cancers.

Hmmmm...coincidence?

__________________
Just feed me chocolate.

"I haven't seen a problem with spraying here. Most of it's done on road shoulders, and most of those are county owned."

Actually, that is not the case in most areas, unless you live in a really old area. If most people look at their deeds, they will find that they actually OWN to the middle of the ROAD, but that the city/county/whatever only has an easement right of way.

So, in theory, if you fall down because of a crack in a sidewalk, you should be suing the homeowner, because they own the property under the sidewalk. But, no one does, because the city/county of course has deeper pockets....

I see lots of signs saying "no spray" along the roads where we live and they seem to respect that. I'm willing to bet that in some cases where they're very insistent upon spraying it's because some property owner did not perform due diligence in getting rid of their weeds. What's a better solution? Confiscating the property and selling it to the immediate neighbors for the cost of the weeding?

As to some of the county codes Laura mentioned, most people aren't affected--until they try to go and sell the property (unless a neighbor has looked over the fence and called code enforcement), and an intelligent buyer has an inspection done and actually checks to see when the house was added onto, had the patio put in, etc., only to find there's no record. Some friends of ours had put in a concrete path around their swimming pool--they didn't have to tear it out when they sold, but they did have to pay for the permit and penalty fees...held up the sale for a time as well. It seems an entire industry has developed over the metal straps that hot water tanks are required to have in CA now. With all the earthquake nonsense, I'm surprised they allow people to use natural gas in their homes at all down there....

And permits/rules aren't necessarily a bad thing--would you like to own a nice home in an area of nice homes and have your neighbor put up a nice, safely built, eyesore? It's great to recycle, but unless you have the money to do it right, using recycled building materials can look like a shanty town. What's the solution? Evergreens or a screened fence or a block wall? Is it being a good neighbor to keep your front yard nice, but your backyard that shares boundaries with other neighbors a dump? What do you do about people who put their trash piles on their property, away from where they look out on their yard, but right where you have no choice but to look at it?

And you can't think that just because you move to a remote area out of state you're protected from all the interference, because as people leave CA (and to be fair also from the "city" in general) they not only bring their attitudes, they bring their money as well, and money talks. I've seen subdividing rules reversed to higher acreage because of trying to contain sprawl. I'm all for containing sprawl, but the people squawking most about the 20 acres next to them that they DON'T own being subdivided should find some way to buy the owner out to keep it nice, since THEY are the ones primarily benefitting from looking at that nice, open space--not the populace at large. It's not right that tax money goes to buying out properties (and making someone wealthy) for the benefit of essentially very few next-door neighbors.

Suze, I know some of this may sound discouraging, but this is why you need to really invest some time and money in just visiting for a while--if you have a location in mind, see if you can find someone to exchange housesitting with for a while--friend, relative, or maybe there's an organization that sets up these things--I seem to remember there is, but can't remember the name or how much it costs.

Some places that are far out and great to vacation in can get very lonely and isolated if you are used to running around and going places locally.

Three comments,

1. Trinity County has a NO Spray policy so we do not need to put up signs...they simply do not do it. If the weeds are especially bad the county will send out a mower attached to a backhoe and prune everything into a heavy ground mulch...rarely see it. Other counties have different policies.

2. RAC seems unusually concerned with what his neighbors may be doing and wants to use government coercion to force them to live their lives by his rules. While none of us like to look at a trashy, junk laden property, that property owner has every right to live his life as he choses. If you are disturbed by what your neighbor is doing look within for the solution, don't bitch to the gubmint. Plant that row of trees so you don't have to look at it. If you won't do that, then shut up!

3. Those building codes serve limited purpose today other than to rob you blind of your wealth. Code enforcement is dedicated to stealing your money and NOT building or fire safety. Look back at the various codes over the years...you will find those codes have moved dramatically away from safety to outright meddling and absurdity.

bearkiller

Bearkiller, I'm a she.

I agree with you on #3.


But let's change the spraying scenario just a little bit, since you seem to be all for private property rights. What if it isn't the county using the chemical Laura was mentioning, but your next-door neighbor, and it contaminates your well (because, well, it's all the same water table), or makes you sick, or worse. From what you write, it sounds like a too bad, they have the right to do that situation.

Of course you would use the laws (the government) to take them to court over it.

I think CA as a state has gotten a little extreme, especially when you consider it as a state where people take such pains NOT to know their neighbors at all, but maybe they have to have such laws because people no longer have any sense of courtesy or consideration for others. The issues Laura, Jerneeon, and I mention may seem extreme to some of you, but even if you have lots of acreage, you can still have a problem neighbor....

I just haven't seen a problem with the spraying. I live on the border of Sacramento and Placer Counties in an area coded for 'rural residential.' Most of the land directly surrounding our little neighborhood is cow pasture or parklands. Most people just mow down their own weeds, and the county sprays the roadside only in nonresidential areas.

Like I said before, every area has it's quirks.

Miz RAC,

In point of fact I doubt we have much argument. As the ole saw goes, your right to swing your arm stops at my nose. Clearly, you, or the gubmint has no "right" to do harm. I strongly suspect we will agree that that dictum is often ignored, often wilfully and especially by various gubmint sorts. it IS incumbent upon each of us in a responsible society to preserve our own rights and at the same time respect the rights of others around us. If our actions offer harm to others than we must rethink our own behavior. Failure to do so is not excuse and does not offer "right" upon the behavior.

We see that respect often in its absence as others mutter and then scream "There Otta Be a Law". Therein lies much of my outrage because those that so scream often want to get the gubmint to force others to live by their own rules. And that, emphatically is NOT what this country is about.

It is a similar issue to the "Abortion Rights" vs "Right to Life" argument as well as many others we hear repeated today. In this and many other situations people are standing up screaming for the gubmint to "Do Something" by which they mean agree with MY viewpoint and make it law. My response is to ask "Is it your child?" IF the answer is NO then I would ask "Is it your body?" IF again the answer is NO then my reaction is simply that you are not helped or harmed by those actions of others who have a different viewpoint than you do in which case it is time to be quiet. A diversity of views is not a crime nor should it be. As another old saw goes One man's meat is another man's poison. It certainly is your right to disagree with my viewpoint, but I submit it is NOT your right to seek the gubmint to make my viewpoint unlawful just because youe own view is help with passion. Such is the path of statism which is anathema to our Constitution.

What do you gain by forcing others to live by your ethics? Answer! Simple! Power over them. Where is that granted in our Constitution??? And since it is not, I would suggest the entire argument is specious.

As a society we need to end these sorts of divisions and get back to respecting our fellow citizens and stop assuming we know better than they do how they must live their own life.

Further, let me assure you I have had problem neighbors. And often the problem derived simply from a failure to respect the rights of others. Dealing with resolution to that sort of problem can be very difficult in current society that often could not care less about right and wrong and especially what is relevant ethically let alone legally.

Nevertheless, what I do on my property is not your business. If I harm you then you certainly have right to address that issue. For my own self, when I am considering what I want to do and achieve on my own property I do in fact consider those downstream from me. Last time any such issue came up I went to my neighbors and talked to them about what I wanted to do and listened to their comments both pro and con. And yes it had an impact on my considerations. Yet I do recognize I am a rare (if grouchy old man) one to make such considerations. I do so because I recognize my actions may have an impact on others and it is my responsibility not to harm others. Much of the problem lies in the simple fact that many of us do not accept those responsibilities and to hell with you if I harm you. Tough! Certainly there is much experience in every state that can be traced to that issue. Often related to gaining a usurious profit.

I suspect we have no disagreement about the out of control nature of government, be it city, county, state, or federal. It is ALL out of control and WE need to reign it it, but we do not because we each want something without working for it and without regard to ethics. So the problems keep accruing.

I am not saying I have the answers suitable for you...I can make that judgement only for me. Meanwhile I will get very upset if you go whine to the gubmint to make a law to prevent me from minding my own business.

bearkiller