[photo1902]

Originally Posted by Love2Swim

I personally think its up to the neighbors to report the stuff they don't like. For example, one of our neighbors had 2 metal bird statues in her front yard. They went beautifully with the approximately $10,000 worth of landscaping she had done. All the neighbors raved about how nice it looked. Then one of the troll police, somebody who probably lived about 10 miles away in a different neighborhood, drove through and reported every violation they could find on our street. So, She removed her birds, the other people removed their violations, and a couple of months later, they all put the stuff back up again. If we live in the neighborhood, and everyone is in agreement about what can and shouldn't be there, I think that is enough. If you have a neighbor who overdoes it i.e. goes beyond the bounds of good taste, get neighbors together and go visit the offender and tell them in a nice way, that what they have looks like crap. As far as the logic of "the rules are the rules", for every rule, there seems to be some way around it, or some variance granted based who the person knows, or any variety of strange reasons. You have one set of rules for one neighborhood, another set in another neighborhood. And some of the rules are just plain stupid. I remember reading at one point you couldn't have a tomato plant in your yard. Really? I think that rule might have changed, thank God. I think the ultimate aim is not to get caught up in the whole concept of "the rules" but to get caught up in the concept of keeping neighborhoods looking nice. And yes, there are a lot of crappy looking things in backyards, that meet the "rules", but look a lot worse than a few tasteful lawn ornaments in the front yards. Use some common sense.

Common sense and taste are the issue. Everyone has what they think is tasteful. A tomato plant harmful, no, but how about a small garden in a yard? How many tomato plants are appropriate? We all know what we signed up for when we moved here. To those that didn't read the fine print (aka-the Deed Restrictions), too bad for them.

And how do you know someone from 10 miles away was the person who reported the issue. Stop with the hyperbole.