{"id":16158,"date":"2014-01-24T13:08:06","date_gmt":"2014-01-24T19:08:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=16158"},"modified":"2014-01-24T13:08:06","modified_gmt":"2014-01-24T19:08:06","slug":"update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Update: Sean Law&#8217;s Fight to Keep His Food Forest&#8230; and His Home"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_16159\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-16159\" style=\"width: 500px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/sean-law-food-forest.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-16159\" alt=\"sean law front yard food forest\" src=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/sean-law-food-forest.jpg\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/sean-law-food-forest.jpg 500w, https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/sean-law-food-forest-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-16159\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sean Law&#8217;s front yard<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Originally, I&#8217;d planned just to update <a href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/2014\/01\/permaculture-food-forest-sean-law\/\">the post I wrote on Wednesday<\/a> when I got the decision of the Longwood, Florida city council about Sean Law&#8217;s accrued fines levied over his budding <a href=\"http:\/\/greenlivingideas.com\/2013\/09\/03\/forest-gardening-is-creating-eden\/\">permaculture food forest<\/a>. But there&#8217;s plenty to share &#8211; enough to warrant a separate post. First, the decision: as expected, the city council upheld the fines against Sean &#8211; here&#8217;s the report by Orlando&#8217;s WESH on the decision:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Longwood man plans to take garden fight to U.S. Supreme Court\" width=\"1170\" height=\"658\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Erf2UEfvLN8?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As one commenter at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wesh.com\/news\/central-florida\/seminole-county\/longwood-man-billed-138000-in-code-enforcement-fees-over-garden\/-\/17597106\/24086394\/-\/v5li64z\/-\/index.html\">WESH&#8217;s web site<\/a> noted, this report doesn&#8217;t exactly show Sean&#8217;s yard from the most flattering light. No, that&#8217;s not their job, but the images they chose do seem to support the notion that he&#8217;s just letting his yard grow wild (though, in fairness, they do allow him to explain the long-term plan for his yard). Sean has posted a video on his Facebook page explaining the organization of his &#8220;foodscaping&#8221; project &#8211; it&#8217;s definitely worth a few minutes to understand the choices he&#8217;s made, and the permacultural principles underlying them:<\/p>\n<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p> <script>(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));<\/script><\/p>\n<div class=\"fb-post\" data-href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/photo.php?v=693476924038171\" data-width=\"466\">\n<div class=\"fb-xfbml-parse-ignore\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/photo.php?v=693476924038171\">Post<\/a> by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/bearsandcats\">Shon Law<\/a>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Sure, this video (and the photo I chose to post at the top) show Sean&#8217;s food forest in a more flattering light&#8230; but, ultimately, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And that&#8217;s what&#8217;s at stake here in terms of the city&#8217;s position: one aesthetic vision over another. No matter what people claim about property values, the fact remains that the city of Longwood has chosen to endorse a particular aesthetic. Sure, those rules were in place when Sean bought his house (as many have pointed out), but is it the place of a government, at any level, to make aesthetic choices for its constituents? And I don&#8217;t necessarily buy arguments about rats and fire ants: while heavy mulching can provide nesting space for ants, so can patio slabs&#8230; and as someone who spent his early years in Florida, I know these invasive creatures are all over the place. Rats could be an issue with the taller plants, but, of course, any covered spot could provide nesting space for them: wood or lumber piles, outdoor appliances &amp; furniture, and holes under buildings can also serve this purpose.<\/p>\n<p>Sean has made choices about his yard\/landscaping that tread lighter on the Earth&#8230; and, in the process, demonstrated the costs created by &#8220;traditional&#8221; lawns and garden spaces. As long as he&#8217;s not infringing on the rights of his neighbors, I have a hard time understanding the city&#8217;s position. Yes, he probably should have discussed these choices with his neighbors ahead of time &#8211; he might have even created some converts &#8211; but that&#8217;s not an error that deserves over $130K in fines or loss of his house.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, I&#8217;m interested in your thoughts &#8211; please share them with us in the comments.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Top image<\/strong> courtesy of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reddit.com\/user\/TheAdamMorrison\">TheAdamMorrison at reddit<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Originally, I&#8217;d planned just to update the post I wrote on Wednesday when I got the decision of the Longwood, Florida city council about Sean Law&#8217;s accrued fines levied over&nbsp;[ &hellip; ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":16948,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,13],"tags":[6728,270,6724,6729,4351,6726],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Update on Sean Law&#039;s Food Forest Fight<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Lakewood, Florida resident Sean Law has planted a permaculture food forest in his yard; the city has upheld fines against him of over $130K for his &quot;messy yard&quot;\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Update on Sean Law&#039;s Food Forest Fight\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Lakewood, Florida resident Sean Law has planted a permaculture food forest in his yard; the city has upheld fines against him of over $130K for his &quot;messy yard&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sustainablog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-01-24T19:08:06+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/update-sean-laws-fight-to-keep-h.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"576\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/update-sean-law-fight-to-keep-his-food-forest-and-his-home\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Jeff McIntire-Strasburg\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/#\/schema\/person\/9b578e764fdaeb0c31f2d565d3f02b30\"},\"headline\":\"Update: Sean Law&#8217;s Fight to Keep His Food Forest&#8230; 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