It is illegal to do major repairs on your car in your garage in Sacramento County

Um, this thread just hit Jalopnik. Congrats everyone! GRM forums are soon to be overrun. 

https://jalopnik.com/sacramento-county-says-its-illegal-to-work-on-your-own-1836085130

The fact remains the forum title is not an exaggeration, it IS illegal to work on your car in your own garage in Sac county, there is a law against it.

This is the neighbor 3 houses down the street..some  have not moved in quite some time.  There are more plenty like this, this is a rural area.

Dave M said:

Um, this thread just hit Jalopnik. Congrats everyone! GRM forums are soon to be overrun. 

 

https://jalopnik.com/sacramento-county-says-its-illegal-to-work-on-your-own-1836085130

ah E36 M3, here we go again. 

As an update, my wife called the code enforcement officer to get some questions answered, most important being how do they determine

if major repairs are being done and how do you stop them from making that determination?  They can't just rely on the neighbors opinion can they?

The officer is on vacation for two weeks.

Whooo Hooo, extra time to get in all the Major Repairs I can before the next fine, which btw, is cheaper than paying for a real shop, at least until

they start up with the $1,000/day fines, in which case, knowing how you stop them from determining you are doing Major Repairs

is going to be very important to know, because it is not anywhere on the website how they make that judgement.

nimblemotorsports said:

The fact remains the forum title is not an exaggeration, it IS illegal to work on your car in your own garage in Sac county, there is a law against it.

This is the neighbor 3 houses down the street..some  have not moved in quite some time.  There are more plenty like this, this is a rural area.

Clearly those are not "Cars that are being worked on." It's a collection of 20th Century industrial art.

Well take advantage of your international coverage and get the law changed, how bout that?

In reply to AAZCD :

Dibs on the Charger. 

This, like EVERYTHING else in Kalifornia, is a revenue deal.  If you DIY, they can't tax it.  Law is written in overly broad fashion, giving the code enforcement people huge latitude to decide what can be cited.  Looks to be pretty much anything could be construed as a violation.  Leaves you having to break the bank to fight it.  You will run out of your money to fight before California runs out of everyone else's money.  Almost certainly unconstitutional, but who has pockets deep enough to go all the way with it.

Progressives have just totally ruined the Golden State.  Next up, everywhere else.

Any zoning laws against you putting a big-ass privacy fence around your entire property?

Gotta love internet forums.  The discussion went from outrage over “the city made it illegal to fix my car” to “well, maybe my junkyard/dumping site is a nuisance and eyesore to neighbors and also in violation of several laws” to “this is all the fault of <other political party> who is stealing from me”.  Can I be the first one to blame this on the terrorists?

Welcome to all the folks who have found us via the Jalopnik post. Feel free to look around while you're here.

And to our folks, you should go check out their discussion on the topic. Some interesting insight there as well.

Politics aside, I think this is horseE36 M3, hope you work it out man. Terrible law, and terribly written.

I will say I'm the type of spiteful person that when something like this has happened to me I have put way more time and money into rectifying it/making whoevers live a living hell/or winning my personal victory than could remotely be considered reasonable. It's not a character trait I'm proud of but that's me

Judging by the photos I would happily pay a million dollars for a house to live in that neighborhood.

Can you think of all the Saturdays taking a long walk in the great California weather bullE36 M3ting with your neighbors having a beer or two along the way.

berkeley me what happened to the country.  Next thing they'll be telling me my lug nuts are loose! 

I am serious though I'd love to live there but I'm broke.

Seems like the only way to get any piece and quiet nowadays is to crawl high up into a holler somewhere. 

Perhaps if the OP had not used the nearest 1/2acre closest to the neighbor out of the 20 that he owned- to store/build/fabricate etc- then it wouldn’t have been a problem.  They likely bought in the area because they wanted space as well and you didn’t just put stuff near the line- but actually over the easement and on their property line. I can sort of understand. Where is the rest of your land? 

So I have sent email to all the county supervisors,

 SupervisorSerna@saccounty.net,SupervisorKennedy@saccounty.net,SusanPeters@saccounty.net,SupervisorFrost@saccounty.net,NottoliD@saccounty.net

You might too, and ask them how they have allowed this law to stand.

I just might run against someone with the "Right to Repair" slogan.

These sort of posts always devolve into a "damn it, I'm a freedom-loving patriotic American and I have the right to do whatever I want!" One of my favorite stories was someone who'd moved out of "Kalifornia", because, obviously, all problems are located there. He bought some land in Oregon, next to a stream, and became outraged that he wasn't allowed to  dam the stream for his own use. Immediately, the arm waving anti-government rants started, with everyone else piling on (this was a survivalist forum, so, of course). Then someone pointed out, "Okay, so you should be allowed to block the stream, which screws everyone downstream, right? Using your same logic, your neighbor upstream of you should have the freedom to do the same, right?"

Rules exist because people in the past abused their freedom and annoyed others. Yes, some good-intended laws can go a bit overboard, yet almost always, there's a backstory containing information that offers a more balanced view of why things happened; it's practically never by random chance.

nimblemotorsports said:

The fact remains the forum title is not an exaggeration, it IS illegal to work on your car in your own garage in Sac county, there is a law against it.

This is the neighbor 3 houses down the street..some  have not moved in quite some time.  There are more plenty like this, this is a rural area.

Bet you that guy didn't piss off his neighbor enough for them to call code enforcement on him.

I get it, we should have a right to repair and this law is an affront to that.  But as long as you continue to run afoul of the law, you have no chance to change it.  Make sure you poop doesn't stink and then fight the law.  It sucks, but saying "%^&$ it I'll run a race shop out of my garage then, I thought this was 'Murica" is only going to make you "that guy" and entrench the ordinance further.

grover said:

Perhaps if the OP had not used the nearest 1/2acre closest to the neighbor out of the 20 that he owned- to store/build/fabricate etc- then it wouldn’t have been a problem.  They likely bought in the area because they wanted space as well and you didn’t just put stuff near the line- but actually over the easement and on their property line. I can sort of understand. Where is the rest of your land? 

The Barn was there before the Grumpies, the rest of the land is in a flood plane that can't be built upon.

Jalopnik has an article with link back to this forum:

jalopnik.com/sacramento-county-says-its-illegal-to-work-on-your-own

OnTheChip said:

Jalopnik has an article with link back to this forum:

jalopnik.com/sacramento-county-says-its-illegal-to-work-on-your-own

 

You're a day late....

Dave M said:

Um, this thread just hit Jalopnik. Congrats everyone! GRM forums are soon to be overrun. 

 

https://jalopnik.com/sacramento-county-says-its-illegal-to-work-on-your-own-1836085130

kb58 said:

Rules exist because people in the past abused their freedom and annoyed others. Yes, some good-intended laws can go a bit overboard, yet almost always, there's a backstory containing information that offers a more balanced view of why things happened; it's practically never by random chance.

This is my mantra when it comes to SCCA RallyCross grey-area rules questions. "Don't be the guy that forces a new rule to be written."

For every rule that exists, there was That Guy who decided, hey, I can ziptie a coffee can lid to a hood latch and call that my hood.  For example.

Stop whining and move to Kern county.  

Because Dulcich...

In reply to A 401 CJ :

But then you’re in Kern County. Btdt. I can breathe now that I’m out. 

nimblemotorsports said:

The fact remains the forum title is not an exaggeration, it IS illegal to work on your car in your own garage in Sac county, there is a law against it.

Umm...

That’s not what the law says you linked to.  It says major repairs. It does not stop doing minor repairs. 

Your statement as printed IS an exaggeration. 

So...do major repairs not qualify as "working on your car?" Is that statement an exaggeration?