Edit: Thanks all, I think I have a plan forward!
My neighbor is building his "dream house" and I quote, on the hill above us. This individual has placed silt barriers on his property in such a way as to dump all of the runoff silt, clay, dirt, etc. onto my property. He claims that he will fix it by re-seeding. It is now October and he has done nothing to remedy this. Help me out landscapers, what should I expect him to reasonably do to remedy this issue? Is re-seeding enough? Is it too late in the season to expect anything to be done?
To add a bit of context, he had a dirt work company come out and do the dirt work. Didn't pay them to put down a silt fence, told them he would do it himself, didn't put down groundcover. Additionally, he has flooded the yard directly behind the house twice (1st image is the first time it happened last year). I have made sure to document everything and he has been informed multiple times (images and video) over the last 1.5 years that he is dumping dirt on our yard. (Last 2 pictures are his silt fence and the area that drains right down onto our yard. He started with 1 silt fence, dumped water into my backyard, put up 2 more silt fences, continued to dump into my yard. We allowed him to put up the additional silt fences on our property (my mistake) because he claimed the new fences would remedy the drainage problem, now there is about a foot of clay at the base of each fence that he claims he will take care of and re-seed as well.
And the icing on the cake is that he sits on the HOA board.
by Wild_Bergamot
44 Comments
Typically, there is a legal obligation to not alter the natural flow of water, and he is liable to fix any damages that arise from redirecting water onto your property. I would notify him and also speak to a lawyer.
Get three landscaping companies to come out and give you a bid to fix it in writing. Let them know you are getting three bids. Email those bids and the before and after photos to your neighbor and the rest of the HOA board.
Take those bids and your before/after photos to the next HOA meeting, bill the neighbor when the work is done.
His permits should cover this stuff. Go to the city/county.
I know it seems insane right now with the govt being shutdown, but it wouldn’t hurt to contact land management or the EPA to see if this has affected water runoff/flood plains.
If you’re in the US, you need to go to your county. They most likely enforce erosion/run off from construction. The state will do the heavy lifting
Like others have already mentioned, you need to contact your local building department ASAP. They will send an inspector from your locality out to inspect it probably within the day or so. This is 100% on that contractor to fix. They will probably face fines as well if that silt fence wasn’t installed properly. I’m not a lawyer but I wouldn’t talk with the contractor before you contact your local building official. The building official should take this very seriously.
Get a lawyer and a civil engineer
If he has a swppp permit he has probably violated said permit. Notify county/state of the violation and say that you expect action.
If no permit is required then they actually have gone above and beyond the baseline requirements. It’s still bad and frustrating
Edit: does your state/county try require them to be an RLD? If they aren’t and they did this work they will be a world of hurt soon
That construction fence was there for this exact reason. (picture 6)
immediately, I would reinstall an erosion fence at the property line to prevent further issue.
If you want him over a barrel call codes enforcement. If you want a good neighbor, tell him you are calling tomorrow and to fix this for good now
Well if he’s the cause of this why isn’t he fixing all of this. I don’t understand . It’s all the documented take it to the HOA and if that doesn’t get you the action take it further. Not your job to fix it isn’t that what you pay HOA for
This keeps happening and its ruining your ability to use and enjoy your yard long term. You really need a lawyer. The pattern is this will keep happening and its going to have longterm effects on your property.
It’s nature.let it go.it will reach equilibrium in time.
Go to the city’s zoning/inspection department, whoever issues building permits and advise them of the situation. There are usually provisions in the permits that cover this exact scenario. Go talk to (not necessarily hire) an attorney or two (or three, so at worst it creates conflict of interest if he tries to counter) and get some idea of legal remedy. Have a landscaper estimate the cost of full remediation. And go to the next HOA meeting if it’s an open meeting (it had BETTER be) and present your concerns there. He’s trying to manipulate you into letting him kick the can down the road. He has no intention whatsoever of making things right with you. Protect yourself and your property, OP.
EDIT: Almost forgot: Check your HOA by-laws and see if there’s a remedy in there also. If he’s violating that, he’s probably not going to be a board member for long. Most HOA by-laws I’ve seen have provisions to remove members from the board who violate the by-laws.
he’s part of the hoa board? explains the entitlement
Contact code enforcement, this is likely a violation. If you have any damages, you might have a valid claim against them.
Document everything.
Pictures of everything.
Lawyer up.
Depending on your locality, may have a local SWCD (Soil and Water Conservation District), which you can try calling. They are responsible for permitting erosion control measures during construction. They may be able to help you.
Contact your local DEQ office, that’s a violation of their land disturbance permits. This could result in a fine and should require them to fix the issues they caused on your property. FYI this is a civil engineering questions not a question for a landscaper
I would go right to the building department for this.
Neighbour should be fixing it, so I’d say that telling the neighbour too fix it, is a Reasonable request.
File a complaint with evidence to your local government office, bypass the HOA. Once he is fined get a copy of the findings from the local government. Now get three quotes from landscapers to fix your property back to how it was. Take those three quotes to small claims court with the government findings from a records request. Basically open and shut case
I assume this site plan was approved by the city-I’d contact them also-lawyer will just get you tied up in small claims for years and you don’t want that-this is what I do in my town (oversee the MS4 permit for EPA)
Site plans are approved for final build and full vegetation not during construction that’s what BMP’s are for-looks like he had everything in place just should have J hooked the silt fence-they should also have a stormwater permit with the city.
I will hold CO’s until they get the mess cleaned up-some cities will use stop work orders as enforcement so check with them.
HOA board doesn’t mean anything. Go to the County and report land disturbance permit violations to clean it up if it’s really bad. He should be seeding disturbed ground in 7 days in most vicinities.
But at the least, at this point in the season, seed with rye grass – it takes pretty quickly in cool weather
I’d get a plan drawn up with areas and dates of flooding recorded as a record. You can supplement the plan with contemporaneous notes ( your diary) which includes all new events and communications.
Then you have something tangible to provide for advice from legal council.
You are not set to go to court but the weight of evidence will sway him into action.
Give him a reasonable time line to comply to any agreement but you then have lots of evidence to claim if he doesn’t do it.
And ask him to agree to the record in the first instance. It should chivvy him up into doing something.
Wow
Speak with your local code compliance dept. There are most likely local run-off regulations in addition to the mandatory EPA regulations to prevent this
If the HOA didn’t act on your neighbors violations you can sue the HOA as well as the board in many cases.
It happens often that board members have to vote to sue themselves.
Put in a shovel and give it back to
Please give an update post on this in the future!
I’m confused about what happened here. Where did the water go before? What exactly was the change?
You are responsible up front for fixing it. Even if your neighbor is found legally liable for every penny worth of time and inconvenience that this causes you, you still need to start making your best reasonable effort right now to minimize your damages.
I don’t think you will have enough damages thus far to make a lawsuit worth anyone’s time on money. It might be worth a few hundred dollars to dig out that blemished mulch and replace it with fresh.
The civil law here, trespassing, is that a landowner is liable for damages caused to adjacent owners by artificial alterations to the natural watercourse. That could include inundating the neighbor’s property with silt and wrecking their garden bed.
However, normal, natural and quasi-natural alterations to the watercourse are not considered artificial. Impounding a stream or digging a pond would be artificial, installing rain gutters on your home or re grading your yard one way or another are not artificial alterations, since that sort of thing is within the natural and expected uses of property.
It’s likely that the alterations here, if I understood correctly, are within normal use and thus neighbor would not be liable. That may vary per your state law. It doesn’t seem like anything the neighbor did because some unusual change in the flow of runoff. It looks to me that, although the water course has changed, it hasn’t changed in such a way that nature could not have changed it on its own. After the landscape changes, some silt is normal.
The law of nuisance might offer a remedy however. There, knowing disregard of construction rules, ordinances, or codes, can be used as proof that the uphill landowner caused an unreasonable interference with your use and enjoyment of your own property.
In any event I would start by immediately planting thirsty plants by that fence and putting in some rocks to direct the water, cause that’s where your new rain garden is.
https://extension.psu.edu/rain-gardens-the-plants
If it was my yard, at this time of year, I’d be throwing down about 15 pounds of long stem white clover. It germinates extremely fast and densly. Holds soil together well. Improves soil through nitrogen banking. Great for pollinators and grazing animals. Also really easy to kill with broadleaf weed control once the turf heals.
I am a lawyer but not your lawyer. State law may vary.
I’m going to assume you are in the States. It almost sounds like he didn’t get erosion control permits. When we develop land here, we need a submittal package that includes Existing condition plans, Site plans, Utility plans, Grading plans, Erosion Control plans, and Construction details. It sounds like he either skipped out on his erosion control plan approval or isn’t following the plan. I’d reach out to your local Erosion Control authority. Does his silt fence have wire and washed stone outlets? They should be at least every 100′. If not, the water and silt are just going to flow along the fence until they find a way out.
Dep and soil conservation would fine us until the site is remediated
This is the second post I’ve seen about a neighbour spilling stuff onto property
You guys are better and way more patient than me.
Call the county or city and take pictures take it to them and complain about it !
You should contact the local government, they issued permits for the home that most likely have an erosion control aspect to it, if not an entire different permit for erosion/sediment control.
Stop talking to him and contact whoever in your county you need to. You were a good neighbor for long enough, and people like this will continue to do this until you bring the hammer down on them. Not every relationship is worth preserving.
A concert wall but take the people to court and it will stop
Drain commission and have his soil erosion permit revoked. You have pic proof. All that MUST REMAIN on his property. It’s a bad sign in the future. Just imagine that rain. Builders and big troubble
Law suite
Use a real estate attorney.
Call the county or state storm water agency that’s in charge of erosion control.
They’ll be fined and have to clean up the mess. Afterwards, they’ll take their sedimentation controls more seriously.
How about just ask them to clean up there mess which was probably an accident and quit hunting to for settlements….. seem like the kinda neighbour I wouldn’t want to have.
Improperly installed silt fence. Silt fence fabric has to be buried 6-8″ below grade and backfilled on top of the fabric to ensure nothing runs underneath it. You also have to design for water in heavy rain conditions to escape without blowing out the fence. It’s actually not easy to do by hand – typically done with a skid-steer digging the trench and backfilling.
Looks like clay silt, which will probably kill off your grass. Go to the permitting authority and file a complaint. You can also probably figure out how to file a lien against the project that keeps them from getting a Certificate of Occupancy until they fix it or pay you to have it fixed.
But short answer, you have a mess.