County says I have too many cars. HELP!, What can I do to get around this? Options

[bondo]

I got a letter saying that I have too many cars visible from the street. not parked on the street, just VISIBLE. In my own fricken DRIVEWAY! They say the limit is 2 per residence.. that's right, TWO. This is a three bedroom house, with enough driveway space to park 7 cars. It's an unincorporated part of the San Luis Obispo County called Los Osos. It's somewhat rural with no sidewalks and not even all the streets are paved. Somehow having cars in my driveway is a blight to the neighborhood? Come on. My first instinct is to build a giant sign that says "The county says I can only have two vehicles visible from the street, so I built this sign to hide them" and then put the cars behind it. Then when they complain about the sign I can claim freedom of speech. My dad owns the house (we pay rent), so there's no chance of getting evicted. Any suggestions how I can fight this? (the letter was actually sent to my dad) I moved here specifically to avoid this sort of ordinance that cities typically have.. who knew the county would come after me?

I'm pissed! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif)

--Royce
(6 cars and a 914)
(two are temporary)

[dmenche914]

get a copy of the law that they cite aginst you, and let us see it. I fouhgt a law in Redwood City that gave $20 tickets to people with for sale signs in their cars. They were raking in about $1000 per month on this. I fought it, and it was ruled ILLEGAL as worded in the city code (they can do it, but must have a notice sign posted at each location they write the ticket) Their code was in violation of state code!

Now get this, I showed them state law, and asked them to dismiss, they did not and made me go thru three levels of appeals (hoping I'd drop it no doubt) they knew they were wrong, the city council, the chief of police all knew it, but kept writting the tickets. I even got a phone recording from the issuing officers captian, who said he believes I am right, but wants me to fight the ticket anyway!

After I won, it took three months to get MY money back from them. also within several months, they started writting those tickets again. This time I wrote down all the phone numbers of the people that got the ticket, then I called the captain, and told him that he was not supposed to write them anymore, and he better dismiss all them new tickets, this guy tells me there is nothing he can do about already written tickets (false! calif vehicle code allows for issuing agency to dismiss any ticket in interest of justice within 30 days) I told him I have the phone numbers, and will tell the people that got the tickets how I fought it, and how the police know it is an illegal ticket. He stopped me and told me to have the people call him, and he will take care of it, which I did, so far after about 6 months, no more tickets like that are being written in Redwood City.

Talk about crooked cops making $12000 per year off illegal tickets, tickets that if any of them cared to read the vehicle code, they would find illegal. Yet they continued to write them, until caught not once, but the second time. These guys won't even think of refunding the prior years tickets. Heck they wouldn't think of giving back what THEY stole from the public. Nice little racket they had going. Bastard cops. Pretty smart too, keeping the fine at $20 so most people would just pay it, not me!

At any rate, read the code, and any law that the code cites as authority. You might have to go to a council meeting with this. They can have laws on the books, but you may find those laws to be illegal, so be sure to get the entire code, with references to state laws.

There are laws that have said that visual tastes can NOT be used for laws like these. Now they can pass building codes for safety, and make you remove blight that hobors rats. But cars is another matter, and unless there are CCR's for your property, the number of cars should not be enforcable by them.

let me know how this goes. I really get worked up with government intrusion, and will help you fight this anyway I can.

Are the cars in running order, and licesensed? That can make a difference.

some times a car cover might be enough to get them off your back.

Also did someone complain? or was this just an over active code enforcer, this too can make a difference?

dave