Woman is denied from using rainwater off her own roof!

we have to attack our government
we have to establish a government made for the people, not just particular groups of people

reply to post by Lincolns_Avenger


I think this is not a wise thing to say. It is likely not an effective thing to do either. Anyone doing an attack as you suggest certainly is in the wrong because they initiated the use of force. This is exactly why the state is such a dangerous institution. I think pointing out when they are wrong and crafting a response is appropriate but an attack would require force in most instances and this is just not a very advanced response.

Far more advanced forms of response must and are being pursued. Force is never the first answer it is in fact the last.

The discussion is about control of the water falling on your property. I think catchment can be made more obscure to locate and identify with some planning as one approach. It does not require an attack either. It simply requires adequate intellect and the right use of will to address the problem.

My grandfather used to collect rainwater. It was more common I guess in years past. Why would you need to ask?

I agree with what some other people said. "Yeah, look at what 'your' rainwater did to to my driveway. I want this gully fixed..... It is 'your' rainwater right? You told me I couldn't use 'your' rainwater, right?"

Shovel the manure back to them!

Troy

I guess I live in a sort of free state. Saving rain water that falls off my roof is illegal? Wake me when the nightmare is over. Jeeze. Here in Kentucky we are encouraged to save rain water in barrels so we have "free" water to use for our gardens. If it falls on my property, I own it if I choose to own it. Rain water, hail, sunshine, it is all mine. Get yer governmental a$$ off my property! I have a cistern that collects rain water and I use the water to feed my garden. And my daughter just procured some plastic rain barrels for me to gather the rain water that flows off my roof into gutters. Dayum!!!!!!!!\

I own this property, as long as I pay yearly taxes for it. That's another issue, though. If water falls on my house I own it. If some piece of an airplane falls on my roof, I also own it and I need compensation for the damage that is done.

[edit on 10-5-2009 by kyred]

Well, the good news is that one more family realizes the spread of the gangsters.

reply to post by kyred

What you've got to consider is most of the water coming out of Colorado is from snowpack. Sure the mountains get lots of summer rain but areas a little lower can be quite dry. Rains are spotty you can see storms all around and even smell rain but we won't get a drop. We live at an altitude of 7000-8000 ft. We could probably count on one hand the number of good rains that hit our roof in summer. Often it shows up as hail. So the snowpack is watched closely they don't want it melting too fast they want a consistent flow to last through the growing season down below. If the snow melts too fast or is lacking every drop of rain is needed to supplement. Sad but true.

Even if a person does collect rain in barrels it could be some time between fill ups. Kentucky is like a rain forest compared to us. You've got a beautiful state.

I'm not defending this "water ownership" but like Gando702 said 100% of the water for his area comes from the Colorado River. It's not so much the government being restrictive just to be powerful @#$%holes as it is urban sprawl. The great need for water and the money to be made from it.

You tell the little old lady in western Kansas with garden hose in hand watering her sod that's she is denying me the water off my roof! She'll probably say it must suck to be me. She could care less as long as she pays her water bill and it keeps flowing she would tell me to move if I don't like it.

So no it's not just the government it's people's insatiable need for water. I never knew conservation until I moved here I grew up by Lake Michigan. If I ran things I would be worse no one would have a lawn. It would be Xenoscape or no-scape saving water for vegetable gardens.

I wish we could hog all our water not sharing with anyone but it's too late the populace is expanding they need water and lots of it. I just wish everyone would be a bit more conservative.

This really is an incredible piece of legislation that should not stand up to analytical logic in a court of law, in fact it should be able to be argued as being both unreasonable and dismissive of sovereign right. Of course, the legislation is meant to protect an avenue and generation of income for the water authority...and certainly needs challenging. It needs challenging not by one household, but by many as a collective, as it is not affecting one household only, but all those that fall withing the legislation's apparent jurisdiction. The challenge has to be legal, not illegal or violent, or confrontational in any of those two areas.

The point at which to look at is the legislation's origin. What arguments were proposed for the right of the legislation to stand? What counter argument was there placed in challenging it? Who were the proponents of the legislation, and who against. What ruling decided the legislation's authority, and by what summation? There is a need to research these points, that is where to begin.

Now, we are talking about the precipitation of water from the atmosphere as rain...a quite natural event, and as far as I am aware, it is impracticable to legislate for natural events, except where an event might cause potential loss, injury of life, and/or damage to property. However, the legislation cannot pertain to the event itself, only to the human activity it causes or affects. Water itself is equally a 'natural' source, but legislation on water should only be applicable to the water captured by the water utility, stored by such utility, who then transports it to your house by some means. Did they 'create' the water, or make it fall? Legislation can only pertain to that man-made chain of supply and demand. Until the water from the heavens is captured at the water utility's points of capture, such water cannot be deemed ownable by anyone.

You cannot market natural events, you have to be able to prove ownership by some argument, and I would deem this impossible, but should some clever fellow bring a proposal to the table that provides some such argument, then by that argument they can be sued for damage, from the floods and for any loss of life. For if you own it, you control it, and are therefore responsible for it (as 'cause'), for its precipitation.

The point is, the legislation warrants argument against it, and it looks to me that it would not stand up to it.

Have LOCKED UP the right????? who the heck do these people think they are?
If it falls on her roof, guess what? it's game! none of this Rights BS that they're trying to feed. She should tell that engineer to go shove that application up his you know what!

Maybe there is an issue with her roof material, maybe she has something in the material that would be toxic as runoff.

Originally posted by Lil Drummerboy
Maybe there is an issue with her roof material, maybe she has something in the material that would be toxic as runoff.

All the more reason she should collect it and keep it out of the environment. Maybe they'll find out the water running off her roof is somehow tainted and come up with a new law making that "tainted runoff" illegal and subject to a fine of $10.00 per gallon.

But I think a better idea would be to throw the entire damned insane government out and start fresh with good people, unlike the greedy, inbred, morally bankrupt, slimeball bastards who currently hold office.

I read crap like this and it makes me look forward to the end of the world. 12/21/2012 can not come soon enough for me when I read crap like this. On the down side 12/21/2012 will most likely be a big let down.

I wish somehow we could wash our hands of the bad desicions made by the settlers of this country. In so many ways we still use their ways and ideas. Some are the cause of big problems these days, yet rather than completely think of a new way, we try to improve the same old wheel.

Hence why this lady is fighting for water in a desert her family calls home.

Towns and cities should devise a way to slowly develop into a new location, dont rebuild that building where it was...put it a mile down the road, over time move all the buildings a mile down the road. Nomad your way out of that bad area. Would create jobs and keep the town healthy, wich would be better than people just moving to a new town.



[edit on 10-5-2009 by Mailman]

The government just wants to collect her rainwater so they can sell it back to her. How insane has this country gotten? She should sue the government for "their" rainwater falling on her roof!

And how much rainwater can one homeowner possibly collect anyhow? She obviously will use the rainwater in her garden or lawn, which puts it back into the water table anyhow, she's only moderating its use in a fashion more beneficial to her garden/lawns needs.

Hey guys! Great stuff! I am reading and enjoying your posts immensely!
While its not practical to answer each post, know that I(usually always)agree!
Here are a couple of more articles I found interesting on the subject.
We have been arguing over snake river water for a long time here.
The droughts make it worse! Which we finally have had a couple recent
normal years so it has taken some of the pressure off.
Fighting over water rights can be a nasty game, as we have seen in Washington state before. Thanks again everyone! May rain fall on YOUR roof once in awhile!

But while rainwater may seem like a global common, nowadays it depends on where you live: By capturing rainwater, some homeowners are breaking the law.

www.popularmechanics.com...

A person wanting to harvest rainwater in Colorado faces a rather formidable barrier in state law. The doctrine of prior appropriations with its mantra of "First in time, first in right" rules and determines surface water rights. This means that senior water right holders, those who first put water to beneficial use, have priority water rights in the now overly appropriated rivers. In the event of shortages on the river, their rights are satisfied before junior water right holders.

www.ag.arizona.edu...

reply to post by dodadoom


Thank you, dodadoom. I feel welcome already, and I hope that perhaps sometime I can share some useful thoughts and comments. For starters, congratulations on the intelligent decision during 'web-design' -in my opinion- of using dark backgrounds with bright readable text for your webpages: I think it's much easier on the eyes, and healthier too, as I read somewhere sometime back. Thanks again.

Extraction. Abstraction. Addition, no subtraction.

reply to post by ZindoDoone


They already do that here in Portland. We have to pay a tax (or fee) for the water that drains off other people's roofs. It rains a lot here, and my water bill is about $60.00 per month. Late fees send it over $75.00 per month. they made us disconnect our downspouts. I don't understand why, we have dry wells, so I see no difference it makes. And there is no storm drain on the street. Everyone who had a septic had to pay to have it destroyed. It set us back $14,000.00. The assessment fee was $9,000.00. That is when someone comes along and says yes, we can put a sewer here.

So my water bill shot up from $10.00 per month to over $60.00. That is a sixfold increase within a three year period, from when we were told we had to comply to when we had to pay for it. The whole ordeal set us back all told on the average $15,000.00 to $20,000.00 per household. And we, like good sheeple, did exactly as they told us, because no one likes to have their home condemned.

Oh yes, I am now comfortable sending pollutants down the pipe as I feel I am paying for them to keep it properly processed. I used to watch that like a hawk, but now I don't care. And I have lots of chemicals to dispose of, maybe they are good, maybe they aren't, but I don't know, they should because they are getting their money.

I am going to go throw an armful of spent compact fluorescents in the garbage tomorrow. Not that I want to, but if I ask they will charge me a fee for disposal, if it exists. Instead I will let 'em fill the landfill, mercury and all. Tsk.

With regards to the following comments:

----
If she would have done this secretly and not created a scene about it she would have been left alone to do what she wants. [wiredamerican]

That's business she was just doing what was right. [Morningglory]

I'm not justifying anything, I'm simply saying that when the State denies someone the ability to catch what you'd think is a resource everyone has a right to, they're not necessarily denying that person's rights to it, they might be looking out for the wellbeing of others who rely on that resource as well. [Gando702]
----

I'd like to say the following:

If she would have done things secretly, for one thing this thread wouldn't exist. Many of us wouldn't be aware of the problem. Also, it would give "them" time to make even more illogical laws, to later enforce them violently if necessary. In my opinion, when people of good will are forced to do things of a good and necessary nature in secret, something terribly wrong must be going on.

Also, the lady in question was doing 'what she thought' was right, not necessarily what was right, by asking for such permission. There's a huge difference in my opinion.

With regards to the final comment, I think the poster IS in fact justifying things, or at least trying to, by the mere 'logic' and possibly questionable line of reasoning in his posting. It's a tricky way to put it, as I see it.

"...when the State denies someone the ability to catch what you'd think is a resource everyone has a right to, they're not necessarily denying that person's rights to it, they might be looking out for the wellbeing of others who rely on that resource as well..."

They're not necessarily denying the persons' right? Yes they are.
They're looking out for the wellbeing of others? No they're not, unless "others" is just "they". If the term "others" includes the lady in question, her wellbeing is NOT being considered because she is being denied the right to collect a precious substance necessary for her sustenance as a living being and as part of the "others" group, and more so a substance that occurs or seems to occur naturally to begin with. In my opinion, what "they" are looking out for is nothing more than control, "the tax factor", as sometimes I like to call it. As someone else put it right on this thread, we live in a 'closed' system. Sooner or later and one way or the other, eventually water should return to the 'source'. I think it's a crime and plain murder to try to capitalize on rain.


So much interesting material on this thread. Impressive, in my opinion. Examples:

"That's what happens when you let the scum take over." -Vitchilo

"Imagine, every rich person, and person in power is a parasite to the rest of us!" -Elliot

"Stupid laws don't need logic to substantiate them, just complacency on behalf of the public."
"The more noise made about this, the better I say. Apathy is no excuse." - badw0lf


"I mean seriously, it's an indirect form of state sponsored capital murder preventing someone from collecting a basic necessity like water." -flysse


"From here it looks like you are all happy just being slaves."
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe themselves to be free..." -chiponbothshoulders


"The only reason they are getting away with his junk is because you let them..."
"What makes us think that just because a law is passed or on the books it's for our own good? -cenpuppie

"This needs to be squashed in a very public fashion." -PhoenixDemon


Thanks again for reading.

It's clear to me that this is backwards thinking from a conservationist point of view as the truth is when you use the water that falls on your buildings for things like watering the garden or even flushing the toilets you use less city water and thus take stress off the system.

While I can remember paying for estimated rainwater runoff from my property in Seattle, at least there's some forward thinking there in regards to runoff capture.

It Seems Bill Gates is doing some high/low tech rainwater capture with his new building in Seattle

Major project under way beneath new Gates Foundation

(Video) Bill and Melinda Gates Foundations goes green

By GARY CHITTIM / KING 5 News

Workers are building a concrete basin for an underground reservoir capable of holding a million gallons of rainwater. Runoff from the rooftops of the sprawling headquarters will be captured and held in the tank for use to flush toilets, keep water features filled and to water the landscaping. SkyKING The new Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Headquarters dominates the blocks east of Seattle Center. This is the parking structure. Imagine the pressure that will take off of the city's water supply.

Now that makes sense. The Colorado Water Board does not.

Of course I realize that Seattle has more rainfall and greater water resources, but taking less water from the municipal water system makes more sense than arguing about water that will most likely evaporate in the high desert anyway.

[edit on 11-5-2009 by verylowfrequency]

Don't ask for permission to take what belongs to you. Another reason to avoid the govt whenever possible.