'They hopped my fence!': Homeowner catches a tree cutting contractor dumping debris in his trash cans, resulting in a $5000 fine

Did these tree cutters cross the line?

Yes, literally, they were jumping over the property line of a homeowner next door to dump their tree debris in his trash cans. I don't know about you, but if that were my house, there would quickly be a bonfire of brush, timber, and branches prepared on the doorstep of that contractor's office.

Although they had a decent relationship with the neighbor, this homeowner caught tree cutter workers throwing away their branches, leaves, and foliage trash into his limited garbage cans. Not only were the workers illegally dumping, but they were hopping the fence and galloping over his property to do it. Perhaps it was about time that the neighborhood watch did more than just "watch," taking action against inappropriate property invasions right at the source: With the contractor himself.

Contractors are always quick to defend their employees. While there's no harm in that directly, if a contractor isn't willing to accept responsibility for when his workers flub up, they could be looking at a pretty serious stack of consequences. In this case, the owner of a tree-cutting company got extremely defensive on the phone when a neighbor complained about illegal dumping on his land, and if he'd been nice about it or apologized, maybe the situation could have been diffused. Instead, he dug his heels in, leading to a potentially exorbitant fine between $1000 and $5000 for illegal dumping and trespassing on private property.

There are moments where employers should back up their workforce and moments where they should humbly accept responsibility, and this tree-cutting company is going to learn the hard way where they stand on that spectrum.

via Getty Images (Robert_schafer_photography)

^{Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}
“AIO My neighbor hired a tree removal service and I caught them hopping my fence and passing trash cans over to dump the debris”
"I was just outside watering my garden (it's a shaded / woodsy garden) And I look up, 10 ft away from me some guy is on my side of the fence holding a full trash can. I obviously told him to get off my property and he did, immediately."
"I called the company, a worker (presumably the owner??) answered, was extremely defensive kept calling my property "the woods" ??? They hopped my fence..!!?"
“I told them if I see them on my property again I'm calling the cops. Ten minutes later he calls me back to tell me that he was a cop and they won't do anything. And asking me to come down there and make sure everything was cleaned up. I am not going down there again.”
“I really can't believe this just happened and I want to call the cops just to spite him.”
via Pexels (Henk Schuurmans)

^{Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}
It's amazing how far an apology will go.
If this contractor had just simply owned up to the mistake and accepted responsibility, he wouldn't be potentially facing an enormous fine or even criminal charges. The homeowner was reasonable and a concerned neighbor. He wasn't trying to get anything for free or leave a bad review; he was simply trying to call out the injustice and the inappropriate nature of this guy's workers' behavior on the job site.
MechanicalBotantical
Illegal dumping especially on private property is looking at at least a $500 fine
entcanta333 OP
My other neighbor, whose husband is an actual cop, told me it's 1-5k around here 😱
Serpentongue
Report them to the EPA for dumping, you don’t know it’s only tree debris. Call code enforcement also. Then file a police report just in case they choose to ignore it you can give them the federal reference numbers too
AllegedLead
talk to your neighbor. If you have a decent relationship they’ll straighten out their contractor. The business owner apparently doesn’t give a darn about your property because you’re not his customer. But he will care what the person who’s paying for his service has to say.
via Pexels (Aurora Aguilar)

^{Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}

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