A California Man is Facing Fines After Growing Vegetables in His Front Yard
The summer growing season is an exciting time for folks who like to see their garden come alive with plants. From edible gardens to beautiful flowers, there’s so much you can add to your landscape to improve the way your home looks.
However, one homeowner in California tells CBS LA that he hasn’t been feeling the love after renovating his front yard, turning it into a massive edible garden. Instead, he tells the outlet that he has received a boatload of fines for the work he’s doing out front… and the hits keep coming.
So, what’s the big deal? According to Michael Sherman, the city of Chino is calling his “food forest” an eyesore, telling the landscape contractor that he needs to remove the overgrown vegetation or face more code violations from the city.
But Sherman says he doesn’t understand what the big deal is, especially since he offers his neighbors some of the bounty that he grows. Now, he says he’s fighting back against the city and meeting with officials to find out how he can keep his garden while also avoiding more pesky violations and fines.
Sherman Has Been Growing His Garden Since 2019
The edible garden isn’t a new thing, according to Sherman, who told CBS LA that he started growing all this food several years ago when he began worrying about issues with the food chain. “It’s getting more expensive; you don’t know what’s sprayed on it,” he told the outlet.
So, in 2019, he started growing things like radishes, sunflowers, bananas, and more. And things seemed to be going fine until earlier this year when the code violations first started arriving.
Sherman received a number of fines this year ($1,250 as of the time of publication), along with a request to remove any of the overgrown vegetation, stop growing crops within 15 feet of his neighbor’s property line, and maintain a line of sight on his property.
A Neighbor Was the One Who Complained
When it comes to why the city felt it had to get involved, Chino officials told CBS LA that neighbors had begun complaining. That would include people like Monica Siepert, who told CBS LA that she was concerned about Sherman’s “food forest.”
“I’m worried about rodents,” Siepert told the outlet. “They’re not always trimmed… It’s not always kept up.”
However, Sherman insists that his garden is well maintained, even if it doesn’t look that way to people who don’t understand landscaping. “Everything that grows, like the leaves and the trees, I let it fall; I leave them there; they decompose, and the soil has improved significantly,” Sherman said. “Everyone’s view of what looks nice is different. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”
That being said, Sherman has admitted to giving in to some of Chino’s demands, but he is still trying to have a conversation with representatives so that he can find a compromise that works for him.
“I don’t know what the city wants. I think the city code enforcement needs an education about how these types of plants grow,” Sherman told the New York Post. “They’re annual plants, squash and all those are annuals. So they grow, bloom, and die within, like, under a year.”
According to the Backyard Boss blog, Chino isn’t the only place with rules about growing “food gardens” in your front yard. That’s because different places have different rules about what you’re allowed to plant and where. The blog suggests checking out your local zoning laws before planting your front yard garden. These rules can affect everything from what plants you’re allowed to plant (and where) to how tall they are allowed to grow.
Hopefully Sherman’s meeting with the city goes well. And he’s able to come up with a solution that will make everyone happy.
