I think they just need new neck-ties…
Posted on 03/14/2014 1:30:45 PM PDT by thetallguy24
All Andy Johnson wanted to do was build a stock pond on his sprawling eight-acre Wyoming farm. He and his wife Katie spent hours constructing it, filling it with crystal-clear water, and bringing in brook and brown trout, ducks and geese. It was a place where his horses could drink and graze, and a private playground for his three children.
But instead of enjoying the fruits of his labor, the Wyoming welder says he was harangued by the federal government, stuck in what he calls a petty power play by the Environmental Protection Agency. He claims the agency is now threatening him with civil and criminal penalties – including the threat of a $75,000-a-day fine.
“I have not paid them a dime nor will I,” a defiant Johnson told FoxNews.com. “I will go bankrupt if I have to fighting it. My wife and I built [the pond] together. We put our blood, sweat and tears into it. It was our dream.”
But Johnson may be in for a rude awakening.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Who shows up? They fly a drone over your house, freeze assets and suck your money out of the bank.
“President” Rick Perry would kill the EPA. That is a big big plus for me and all property rights advocates.
I thought that too, particulary in Wyoming. I can see a “sprawling 8 acre farm” in Manhattan...
Make an example out of few of them.
Especially eight acres in Wyoming.
Thats most people’s backyard in Wyoming.
[ Who shows up? They fly a drone over your house, freeze assets and suck your money out of the bank. ]
The more I think about it..... It almost seems like the entire “War on terror” was nothing more than a proving ground for technologies and methods for taking over the country....
Fallujia = Street/Urban warfare in the states
Afghanistan = Dealing with Rurual “Bitter Clingers”
Drones = Spying on Citizens and flushing out more “Bitter Clingers”
A great deal of the tech and methods developed WILL be used on us if we keep losing our freedom and even quicker the longer congress and the senate keep ceeding their power the the executive branch....
Water rights, especially out west, can be kind of a tricky thing. It does seem, though, that the guy is within his state’s guidelines as far as the pond goes, and that the EPA is overreaching here.
I doubt it. He hasn’t done anything to end the green energy scam in Texas.
I grew up swimming in watering holes.
I know, they are nasty, but we really didn’t care.
Bookmark
That’s what Obamacare is all about in my opinion. It’s a ploy to bring full blown communism in through the back door. First, they purposely make the cost too high where nobody can afford it, then comes the fines which undoubtedly they will raise and raise, then they will do away with taking these “fines” out of your tax refund and come directly after your assets; Redistribution: Communism 101.
Johnson plans to fight. “This goes a lot further than a pond,” he said. “It’s about a person’s rights. I have three little kids. I am not going to roll over and let [the government] tell me what I can do on my land. I followed the rules.”
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Such a silly silly man (SARC) Doesn’t he know he must obey his EPA overlords?
My yard is about 5 acres, but I could make it bigger anytime I want. I even dug a pond in the back yard, no permits required.
After a statement like that, I think you need to threaten to report null and void to the mods if he doesn't add you to his Nut-Job Conspiracy-Theory Ping List.
Richard Nixon made his share of mistakes. This was his biggest, not Watergate.
I think they just need new neck-ties…
2nd...this is indeed his property and he can do as he likes with it as long as it does not infringe on others.
Out west, water rights are a sacrosanct thing. There are very specific, most of them longstanding, laws about those rights. If he is blocking a flowing stream, he has to have some very specific rights to do that, because it impacts others down stream.
If he has built a dam along a non-flowing drainage, to capture water for a stock pond (which he did)...that is something else, but even then how he deals with runoff and overlfow are also critical issues that could impact others and put them in jeopardy.
The key part of the article in this regard IMHO is this:
The government says he violated the Clean Water Act by building a dam on a creek without a permit from the Army Corps of Engineers. Further, the EPA claims that material from his pond is being discharged into other waterways. Johnson says he built a stock pond -- a man-made pond meant to attract wildlife -- which is exempt from Clean Water Act regulations.
The property owner says he followed the state rules for a stock pond when he built it in 2012 and has an April 4-dated letter from the Wyoming State Engineer’s Office to prove it.
“Said permit is in good standing and is entitled to be exercised exactly as permitted,” the state agency letter to Johnson said.
It is clear that this man made himself aware of, and followed all of the local rules accodring to the local county and the state.
Those rules are closest to the issue and will be very understanding of the needs out west of the other water users, who themselves have land and water rights.
He followed those rules.
What we have is (once again) a rogue, out of control Federal government that wants to come in and overide state soveriegnty and individual soveriegnty and force individual citizens and entire states to do it there way...or else.
In this case, the should force the "or elase."
For example, over 20 years ago in Salmon Idaho a rancher killed a wolf that was eating one of his cows when he came upon the scene. INstead of following the West's unwritten SSS law (Shoot, shovel, and shut up), that rancher played by the rules and brought the carcass into town and gave it to the state wildlife people explaingin what had happened. They understood and had no problem.
But since the wolf was endangered (which has since been rectified in idaho with them being removed from the "list," and a hunting season opened up on them), when the Feds found out about it, they were determined to investigate.
A week or so later, the local Sheriff got a call from this Rancher indicating he was being harassed by Federal Fish and wildlife Officeragent acting on behalf of the Endangered Species Act.
The Sheriff showed up and there were heated words ebtween him and the Federal officer. Apparently the fed had not bothered to inform the Sheriff he was coming into the county. The sheriff c alled in back up and they ordered the Federal officer out of the countty under pain of arrest.
The Federal Officer left, but did so threatening to return with more officers and "complete his investigation."
The word went out all over the area. I lived in Dillon, MT at the time and heard of this. Myself and a friend drove over ( abotu 3 1/2 hours) and found that there were maybe 100 or more other men (mostly from Idaho) who had come too. We were informed that if necessary we would be deputized and they took all of outr contact information, and indicated we would be called if needed.
We found out later that the Sheriff also worked with the state, with congressional and senate representatives and was able to avoid another confrontation.
The Rancher was not harrassed any more.
But I will tell you, had that Sheriff called for help, not only would his deputies and local people from Salmon, ID responded, but 100 or more men from the surrounding towns would have come to stand with them...armed.
That's what needs to happen here as far as I am concerned. The shreiff in Salmon was a good man, and understood his responsibilites. I hoep the Seriff there in Wyoning does too.
Energy and the iron fist of an agency dedicated to controlling all property having the power to make and enforce it’s own law is two entirely different things. Green energy companies may or may not be productive private ventures. The EPA is an unelected power structure with the ability to tell you and I how and where to live.
Another problem is, our elected leaders have turned over power to these degenerates
to avoid any direct implication to their actions. They have delegated more power to unelected
agencies to do their bidding so they have deniable accountability. We have a major problem.
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