1. Using tools not normally found in a residence;
2. Conducted on vehicles registered to persons, not currently residing on the lot or parcel;
3. Conducted outside a fully enclosed garage and resulting in any vehicle being inoperable for a period in excess of twenty-four hours.
It can be argued that this law is meant to prevent someone from operating a car repair shop on his front lawn. But at the same time, if you’re simply working on your own car in your own driveway, you had better get it done in less than a day. And you had better not be using any exotic tools.
And don’t even think about working on a relative’s car.
Of course you can’t, where would the Illegal Invaders living in your Garage go?
No one does that anymore anyway. Unless it’s an old car.
“ But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government...” DOI, 1776
So the county has turned into one big HOA
Not defending Sacramento County, but the headline doesn't match the article. Apparently, it IS legal to work on your OWN care IN your garage (sometimes).
Your observation is absolutely correct.
I would make one slight change.
And you had better not be using any tools.
So much for that pesky constitution.
But you can still screw lobbyists at 3 hour boozy lunches?
when it all comes down, if Trump can't prevent it, there will also be no home schooling and probably no religious schools.....
Live in a tent on the levee? No problem. Live in a motor home that obviously hasn’t moved in 3 months? No problem. Use a torque wrench at home: $430 fine.
Code enforcement has two choices - go after people they’re told they can’t touch who ignore them anyway and keep on doing whatever they want, or go after middle class homeowners who are violating some perhaps well intentioned but utterly excessive law.
Guess who gets the tickets from code enforcement? And this is a sequence repeated each and every day across the country.
Can’t use an impact wrench in your driveway but you can take a dump in front of a restaurant.
More democrats = less freedom...
Poorly drafted law. If they want to stop person from conducting business...wait for a complaint...go undercover and get the perp. If the person is conducting a business and not bothering neighbors...i.e on 5 acre plot of land...what is wrong about that? As long as neighbors are not disturbed or harmed...its ok as far as I am concerned.
In very many coastal Calif cities starting from about 2 years ago the cops will stop and bust you for very minor car work on the street.
The tip-off:
HOOD IS UP.
If they see any oil bottles or oil draining equipment, the ticket books FLIES out into their hands.
If there is even just a little coolant or a couple drops or oil on the ground (could be OIL drops) they will call the FIRE DEPARTMENT.
They will even take photos and make ridiculous claims about a HAZMAT SPILL.
Next they’ll classify duct tape as an exotic tool.
Meanwhile the rest of the population will have wooden bicycles....
But it’s okay to poop in your front yard, yea?
But what’s next with this trend? Cabinetry? Artwork to sell to others? Owning more than one fishing pole being considered a commercial fishing venture? Owning more than one firearm makes you a gun store? Being illegal to prepare a meal for more than 5 people at a time or you could be considered a commercial eatery?
Is it YOUR private property or THEIR public property in common? Give them an inch and they will take a mile, where is the line drawn and called overreach? Need it or not, everyone should have the right to if they want to unless they have entered into a private contract not to or be proven as guilty and truly in violation.
This code is a blanket assumption of guilt before being proven. Just because I own more than one fishing pole it does not prove I am guilty of operating a commercial fishing business from my home. No one fights against this stuff so they just keep encroaching further and further onto our private property.
Having once lived in a neighborhood where a “chop shop” operated for years, I’m behind this law 100%.
Enforcement is the problem.
The perps ALWAYS claim it’s their own, or a relative’s car.
The cops ALMOST NEVER run the plates or VINs, they just take the perp’s word for it.
The operators even had a tow truck driver bringing in stolen cars. The mechanics were blatantly switching license plates and erasing VINs.
Crooked cops and crooked code enforcement were all too willing to accept “salary enhancements” in exchange for looking the other way.
There’s big moolah in stolen cars & parts.
The headline is a bit of a lie. You can work on your car in your garage. You can’t work on other people’s cars. And if your car will be inoperable for a while you can’t work on it outside your garage. Having grown up in a neighborhood where half the cars didn’t work, I’m kinda ok with this. Nothing says “poor neighborhood” like a bunch of cars with their hoods up every day.