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Woman living "off the grid" faces eviction

I got it from my local paper.

Not exactly telling me where you got it, name of the paper and a rough date would be nice... Like I said Lawton had a rain barrel decorating contest. Tax dollars are helping ranchers dig deeper/more catch ponds for cattle. Very curious what part of the Dustbowl state forbids catching rain water...
 
That last point first, there are composting toilets (legal in every jurisdiction), and incinerating toilets that run on either electricity or propane (also legal in every jurisdiction). And I disagree, one should be able to refuse any city or town services they can provide themselves. Anything less is the total antithesis of America.

I don't disagree much. I think, if one has zero water usage, the building department should have the right to inspect one's facilities to make sure they aren't posing a hazard to others. Sewage particularly. Where I disagree is that one should be responsible for in-place infrastructure. A minimum charge, so to speak, for the very fact that these services run to your home.
 
There are parts of the country where that may be true, in my part its not. Are you saying the water pressure thru the fire hydrants comes from a totally seperate water system in FL? Ours in CA come through the same system, and without water pressure no fire fighting.

And what of sewage? Sure she could have a septic or a leach field (I do) but my parcel is quite large; in a city in CA they'd never let anyone "not" hook up to the city sewer system inside a city. Now there were some old homes that had septic before sewer lines were in place, but most of them are encouraged to tie on too in due time; such underground uses can negatively effect water qualities for a municipal water supply.

I'm not opposed to living off grid - I do it - but I do it outside a municipality (in fact not even close) not in one.


The fire hydrants aren't connected to her house and their installation and maintenance are paid for by her taxes, not water bills.
 
Lots of people in the desert do this. They have huge underground cisterns to store the captured rain water. This is complete BS and the lady should have shot it out with these jack boot thugs.

The first part of this reminds me of the book Dune. Those fremen in the desert gathered water underground in cisterns like you said. Not really on point, just fel like saying it :p
 
If I'm not mistaken, the issue more than anything else has to do with health/sanitation. Its assumed in 2013 people will use indoor plumbing when they have to go. Most people today have water and sewer services connected to their homes so when they flush, waste water is disposed of properly.

I vaguely recall talking with a water service worker a while back who told me its a standard collections practice to threaten seriously delinquent customers with homelessness. The threat is if their water gets shut off, they will immediately notify the health department and their home will be condemned as a public health hazard prohibiting anyone from entering the residence until their account it made current.

I think if she can show she has a cistern, rain collection system or deep water well and septic tank on her property or some other means of dealing with human waste, they should leave her alone. I'm sure this is done in communities all over America. Growing up I lived in such a house for a while and there were services that came out and will up the cistern with water and emptied out the septic tank when needed I but I think we might have had municipal services plumbed into the house as a back up if ever needed.
 
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