Posted on 04/07/2008 10:03:57 PM PDT by melt
SUNNYVALE, Calif. — Call it an eco-parable: one Prius-driving couple takes pride in their eight redwoods, the first of them planted over a decade ago. Their electric-car-driving neighbors take pride in their rooftop solar panels, installed five years after the first trees were planted.
This redwood tree was pruned to reduce the shade cast on solar panels in a neighbor’s yard. Trees — redwoods, live oaks or blossoming fruit trees — are usually considered sturdy citizens of the sun-swept peninsula south of San Francisco, not criminal elements. But under a 1978 state law protecting homeowners’ investment in rooftop solar panels, trees that impede solar panels’ access to the sun can be deemed a nuisance and their owners fined up to $1,000 a day. The Solar Shade Act was a curiosity until late last year, when a dispute over the eight redwoods(a k a Tree No. 1, Tree No. 2, Tree No. 3, etc.) ended up in Santa Clara County criminal court.
The couple who planted the trees, Carolynn Bissett and Richard Treanor, were convicted of violating the law, based on the complaint of their neighbor, Mark Vargas, and were ordered to make sure that no more than 10 percent of the solar panels are shaded.
A few weeks after The San Jose Mercury News wrote about the situation, the first act ended with the couple pruning 10 feet to 15 feet of Tree No. 6’s upper branches. The event drew more cameras than an episode of “Extreme Home Makeover.”
“Across the nation, everyone’s had a push-and-shove situation with a neighbor,” said Joe Simitian, a Democratic state senator from nearby Palo Alto. “Everyone who reads this story can imagine themselves on one side or the other of that backyard fence.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Fun to watch. Trees are now considered to be politically incorrect by "Global Warmists"...
Doesn’t the constitution protect us from ex post facto laws?
Seems like the redwoods and live oaks could be declared endangered and therefore protected. Oh my, oh my: hpw will the Gaea worshipers resolve this with the Neo-Techno-Pagans?
So, if I hate my neighbor in California, and they happen to have trees, I can just make sure that there are solar panels in the shade of said trees, call the cops, and then they get massive fines?
I’ll keep that in mind in case I ever move to California.
Well said.
Cage Death Match: treehuggers vs solarfreaks. Smackdown!
If you look carefully at the picture of Dumbass # 1 you can see he owns a delicately manicured lawn next to a rather large house. Basically he’s a rich metrosexual, most likely married to a guy named Bob.
I’d have to accidentally damage his solar panels a couple times in the same situation.
these pompous arrogant envirowhackos........self-righteous and self-absorbed to the end....
As a side note concerning the federal Constitution, it was decided in Barron v. Baltimore (1833), a state private property land-grab case, that "generic" prohibitions on government power in the Constitution apply only to the federal government, not to the states. In other words, the "public use" clause of the 5th A., for example, is a prohibition on the federal government, not also the state governments as is popularly believed.
So a part of the problem with property ownership rights is that people need to work more with their state's lawmakers where property laws are concerned, as opposed to finding out the hard way that the federal Constitution's protections are not going to help them.
So these people that planted their trees a decade ago are convicted of shading this guys solar panels that were put in 5 years ago? California is one screwed up place.
Just a quibble. But those panels don't look like they're on a rooftop.
What to do ... what to do ... which endangered species do we eliminate ??? The wailing of the pony-tailed metrosexuals and their overweight frumps on both sides was very entertaining.
The left is always looking for more ways to infringe on private property rights. They love it when they can tell you what to do with something that you “own”. They love imposing fines, because that enables them to take partial posession of something that you own.
Don't do it. Wouldn't be prudent!
Actually, this reminds me of an O'Henry story involving hair combs and watch fobs, only kinda reversed. :)
Panels installed AFTER trees planted. Case closed.
Oh... this is California? Never mind. Logic doesn’t play into things in that God-forsaken land.
20 years back, anyone using a wood-burning stove was considered in the vanguard of trends; now eco's wanna ban wood burning stoves.
Plastic shopping bags at grocery stores was going to "save the trees" (paper bags). Now stores and cities are banning the plastic bags, and pushing consumers to purchase their own "eco green bags made from recyclable goods".
It's never really been about "saving the Earth" in CA, it's about newer technologies, new means, and the almighty buck.
Staying abreast of how fast things change in CA requires a social secretary.
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