Posted on 04/04/2026 7:40:50 AM PDT by Bon of Babble
The city of San Francisco slapped a longtime property owner with a $50,000 fine for trimming the trees right outside his home.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Or caused a power outage…
I was there in 1997. Wasn’t too bad then. Went through there on a port stop for a cruise in 2020. It was a complete dump. Even the “nice” places had needles, feces, and bums all over the place.
Like bank robber Willie Sutton once said he robbed banks because that’s where the money was.
Politicians do the same thing to taxpayers because they are the ones that have the money.
“I see that you have some money. Give it to me.”
First my credentials: I’ve lived in northern CA all my life. Harkening back to when everywhere else was a small place, I like many, still call SF “The City.” Heart breakingly beautiful place.
Now I live in the Sierra foothills 120 miles away. And The City is off the menu as a place to take visitors. It’s a very dangerous place. Now this was before my time, but it was thought so cute when it became a Mecca for the hippies. Then so courageous when it became a gay stronghold. Now those crazies and their ideological heirs run the joint and they’ve shattered its governance. It’s such a shame
All that said, this guy’s in the wrong. The claim he thought the trees out in the sidewalk were his is pretextual. He absolutely butchered those trees. And those who actually read the article will see that the fines were reduced to less than $7K. I appreciate the pickle he was in, but if you undertake “self help,” you gotta be prepared to deal with legal consequences
More likely, the insurance company said "Sorry, you knew it was likely to happen but did not inform us about it or correct the problem. No $ for you!"
Other than an overabundance of gay men, what I remember most was all the street performers.....all had “tip” cans and many doing next to nothing and expecting free money.
For instance, one black male was in a park down by SF bay flying a kite with his tip jar sitting right in front of him.
Really?......that totally summarized the lib mentality for me.
Is an Oak less damaging than a Sycamore, a Pine or a Walnut? < /sarc >
Sad it has to come to what it is, I'm not old enough to remember San Francisco in its heyday.
And yes, he butchered those trees.
My nextdoor neighbor hired a cheap tree trimming service to "cut back" his beautiful jacaranda tree - looked just like those trees - my arborist friend said it will never come back.
A local homeowner had two dangerous Maple curb side which the city wouldn’t cut. He paid a tree cutter, donated the wood for the needy and planted two trees. Cop gave him a ticket. I recommended in my report that the court take no action in any form for sentencing. That is what happened. Talk about non-sense.
It’s CaliFUBAR so no surprise.
Agreed. And those trees are goners. Street trees have it rough in any event, but it’s so damned cold there in the summer, and the sandy soil is poor. It’s a difficult climate for trees unless they’re native and in areas like Golden Gate Park
It’s long past time to apply the death penalty to DemocRAT congresscritters.
Not kidding.
They are evil incarnate, pure slime, loathsome, and they smell bad.
Fugly, too.
That is a city tree on the city sidewalk on the street in an urban area, it wouldn’t have occurred to me that I could heavily trim that tree without the city freaking out.
When I said city tree, it means an urban tree a part of that very crowded urban scene, not city owned.
Here in the interior of AK, our utility maintains either a 30’ or 50’ right-of-way on the main power lines. They cut everything out, don’t give a crap. Why? Because trees in power lines cause fires, electrocution, outages… it is simply retarded in the most retarded of ways to not get rid of hazards if at all possible.
The way idiotic government runs things… SMH.
I would say that this is in violation of the excessive fines prohibition in the Constitution.
“and he couldn’t get the city to come out and trim them back”
No indication he contacted the city.
Most of the construction around for the past 50 years or so has underground utilities.
For the areas that don’t, I have seen some mangled trees . The trees be damned, they are slashed any which way as long as access to the lines, poles and equipment are available.
Here FPL will trim lines that could interfere with the lines. Call your utility provider about the trees.
Good point. Especially if there was an urban forestry department.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.