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This I don't understand... Just so I understand the great State I live in as well. If I don't use grid power and county water, code is gonna come knocking on my door to hand me a fine? So what about all the other people in the State that are forced to use well water, because county/city water isn't available? I bet the rain water is cleaner than that water, too. Plenty of people in the world living off of cisterns that capture rain water - so unless they tested the water and it was contaminated I don't see the issue.
I hope the ACLU gets a hold of this and takes this is as high up as it needs to go.
I bet this is all about money. The power and water companies are upset because they don't get to bill this person. I would say she should hook up and just not use it, but there is still a minimum charge per month whether you use it or not.
This I don't understand... Just so I understand the great State I live in as well. If I don't use grid power and county water, code is gonna come knocking on my door to hand me a fine?
Possibly, IF you live in an area where those are required by local codes and regulations. Many of those trace back to public health concerns about people living in uninhabitable dwellings. If you want to go off the grid, you really should look for someplace to live that allows that. Or get to work and change the local regulations. But just ignoring the local rules? You've got to expect somebody to knock on your door sooner or later.
Frankly, I don't know the woman's story, but it just looks like theater to me. She's got a kitchen full of electric appliances, and has a maybe a 300 watt folding solar panel. She has a 50 gallon rainbarrel for her water supply and adds colloidal silver to purify it? She's got a shelf full of throwaway propane bottles. This doesn't look like a sustainable operation, or one she has a major commitment to. More like something you might see in a tent city.
I know plenty of people in our unincorporated area that would love to be what they consider to be "living off the grid". They would be p**ping in the river and dumping their waste in it for sure. And burning their garbage or dumping it along the roadside. In fact I have seen some losers with failed septic who are running pipes into the culverts by their house.... and granted this is a regular nhood, not "out in the middle of nowhere" like everyone assumes an unincorporated area is.
They are not exactly "green". I am assuming the woman's issue is with sanitation mostly.
And she has plenty of other issues too. I read the other thread. It isn't as clear cut as the paper eludes.
I see this being an interesting fight. I wonder if she is using rain water and the sewer which would technically be theft. Or if She is on septic which is OK.
This isn't about the woman or her specific situation but the idea in general. This is a far bigger issue than what this one woman is doing or wants to do.
The precedent has been set already and that is health care. Of course health care has nothing to do with energy until you analyze the mandate and how it has been implemented.
What is this really about? An individual (anyone) right not to be forced to consume a product or service from a business. While the argument involving municipal or other government owned and operated energy systems is one thing, those operated by a business is quite another.
When it comes to things like this, detractors will always cite the individual and use that as the total basis for not allowing something. That is the road to losing.
What we have here is not some woman who lives a questionable lifestyle and perhaps in danger to herself or others, this is about a lack of choice. Remove the woman from the equation and consider the person who has set up a well engineered off-grid energy system and water resource solution. Should they be required to purchase energy and water from a business?
The choice is not to move to a city with health codes.
That is better than having codes that allow for and foster the development and use of off-grid energy and other necessity systems?
Moving is always an option until there is no place else to go. Moving is essentially running away.
The façade of solar power for example is that being required to be grid tied means that aside from the cost of the panels, you are now part of a financial benefit from which others prosper and for which you obtain a benefit dictated to you by others.
The choice should be health and safety codes that address commonly accepted concerns while maximizing, not restricting choice.
Nope, this case is not about health-care or personal freedom or government intrusion. This case is really about a con-artist duping the public.
Remember I said this appeared to me to be a piece of theater? I didn't know the motive, but it just didn't feel right to me. The story didn't track for me. A poor widow lady, being harassed by the city unnecessarily just because she was trying to live a simple life in a house she owns free and clear, bless her soul?
Nope, it's more like adverse possession by a squatter who has a track record of larcenous real-estate transactions, and who is currently 2 years into a 10 year probation for failure to return a $30,000 real estate deposit to a client, only one of several complaints against the woman.
And that cute little house? It has now come out that an elderly woman who owned the duplex felt sorry for the "poor widow" and let her live there free gratis, but then a real estate transaction was somehow recorded that showed the house being sold to Robin Speronis for $10, but the woman says she never sold it. Could it be a... forgery?
Oh, there's more... much, much more... like the part about Robin the waitress marrying an elderly man named Speronis, more than 40 years her senior, and nursing him when he got sick with "alternative" medicines until he died. That's the widow part.
Incidentally, here is text from the printed notice the city pinned to her door back in December, which triggered her whole self-generated "poor me" teleplay on the news...
Quote:
Uninhabitable Property
Do Not Enter
This vacant structure is unsafe/unfit
for human habitation and occupancy
But even then:
Quote:
Cape Coral told the station if Speronis can prove she can sustain her life and the home without running water or electricity, they may be able to come to an agreement. Widow faces eviction for ‘living off the grid’
Now that we know this story really is not really about Green Living, perhaps the moderator should move it to a more appropriate forum, like Real Estate, or perhaps True Crime?
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