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legal or illegal? you tell me!!!!!

3K views 27 replies 16 participants last post by  MARTINSR 
#1 ·
i live in northern california and for the last couple of years ive been doing a lot of restores. i was warned then fined for painting in my garage. i learned my lesson and now rent a booth. i still do all the body work, then all the wet sanding and buffing stuff in my garage. i get hassled for this all the time. im carefull not to let the contaminated water from wetsanding to hit the street, and all the dust from sanding, i feel i control in the appropriate manner. is it illegal, or should it be, to work out of you garage? am i being harrassed? has anyone out there expierience this type of problem? any advice would be appreciated. thanks
 
#3 ·
If you are in a residential zoned area then one is basically out of luck in running a business from ones home..people do get by under those circumstance if all they are doing is their own car and not bringing in customer cars..

When one brings in customer cars to work on then all kinds of rules are implemented..

Sam
 
#4 ·
The laws in other states don't apply to CA.

They have their own set of Marriage laws and VOC laws.
CA is divided in to four different voc zones to give an example.

Buffing of course is not VOC related to a degree but compound falling on the floor would be county law, so that is where you need to check for rules and regulations.
 
#5 ·
Your main problem is where you live. Only the dweebs in charge of California would be stupid enough to crap on a hobbyists like they do. You can't even fart in California without violating their VOC regulations.
 
#6 ·
Centerline said:
Your main problem is where you live. Only the dweebs in charge of California would be stupid enough to crap on a hobbyists like they do. You can't even fart in California without violating their VOC regulations.
AMEN!!!------

And then being so close to all the Berkley hippies that never moved from home.

If your own car--I see no problems
Cars for profit----problem there

Bryan

(Native of East LA---FORMER resident of Sonoma & Alameda Counties)
 
#8 ·
Watch out guys, don't be so cocky one day you will have some kooks get some power and you will be in the same boat.

isaacray, check out this tread over at Autobody101 for some info.(click here)

Get down to your city hall and ask to see the regs on working in your garage on YOUR OWN cars. Every city is different so you really need to get down there and don't listen to all the "Sky is falling" stuff until you have more REAL information.

Brian
 
#10 ·
Woman I used to live with, her nephew painted cars in his garage for other people. And the city came down on him hard.
(no thanks to nosey neighbors) :mad: :nono:

This was in the mid-1908s in Richmond, IN.

You think you're safe cause you live in another state and what happens in California is okay cause that's Califonia.

Hate to tell you but for some reason our other state politicians look to Califorinia for guidience and follow suit. :mad: :spank:
 
#12 ·
just got another friendly visit from my towns air quality people. im not painting what so ever, even got receipts from the booth i know rent, but they refused to even look at them. to top it off i go out to get the paper and guess whos garage is on the front page.......MINE......taken about 2 months ago when i was painting. headline saying "BUSTING CODE IGNORERS" aint that something else. they use a picture from before trying to make seem like its still like that. check it out www.cerescourier.com dated wednesday oct. 11 vol.96 no.38. they totally twisted everything. what shall i do? oh and that 70 nova, it was towed, but later painted and striped. whats next?..............we shall see
 
#13 ·
controversy sells papers

Take the receipts of your booth rental and a photo of it, talk to an attorney about it all first and ask about slander.
Otherwise, if it was your own vehicle and not paint, you were OK during 1970s/1980s. I wonder who is cleaning their driveway and all that oil? envireonmental laws still pertain.
A tough brake, if you only lived in a place with a status of residential and business, you would get an ease, though on the painting, they would get you about the envireonmental laws anyways.
Hmm Think of checking into a non city - county dwelling? County was always more relaxed and only the sherrif could touch you. :D
(Former Santa Clara and Alameda amidst others )
On the dual zone property, that would take some research, but might be worth it for you. Either that or GREEN ACRES is the place for me, Farm living....
 
#15 ·
I had sort of the same problem with the city I live in. A neighbor called the city to complain about a car I was working on under a carport rather than a permanently enclosed structure. The city pretty much told me I had to get rid of it or I would be fined. After a while the city would just show up and harass me. I ended up going to the City attorney office and speaking with them, attended some city council meetings where my roommate and I got up and addressed the situation. After a small letter writing campaign the newspaper got wind of it and did this small story. The city ended up backing down and the city council ended up having a business meeting to talk about changing the code.
I would suggest looking at your city codes and contacting the correct people. Go about it tactfully and intelligently and you might get places
 

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#17 ·
anyone living around you can shut you down. once zoned residential you cant do much of anything. the guy next door needs only to complain and it's done. you can work on your car in the garage but you cant spray anything or it becomes a nuisance . been there done that. now i live and work on the farm. if the cows complain i'll eat them. :D
 
#18 ·
You need to rent a shop and do it right. If the amount of business activity you do at home has you in the newspaper, it's time to get legal,or move out of town. (I've been to Ceres..It is pretty rural already)

Isn't this your one of your threads too?

Later, mikey
 
#19 · (Edited)
The codes in my city are sort of vague and seem to be left op to the code enforcer’s discretion in regards to how they want to interpret them. From my understanding (in my town anyway) a very minimal amount of painting is tolerated… after reading that second thread it seems as though you have quite a lot of painting going on.
I would highly suggest you find the city codes and read them… just call the city and ask for a copy.

If you think about they are or have been banning smoking in public establishments. Some places you cant smoke within 25 feet of a business (mostly bars & restaurants). When it comes to painting there is a flammable and offensive vapor being released into the air…. That’s when the EPA and clean air act comes into play....dont want to mess with the EPA
 
#20 · (Edited)
LOL, one of the guys I work with brought in that paper for us to see. Listen, you may be a nice guy trying to do your best but that looked way out of line to me. It looked like one of those funky bodyshops in a barn with a foot of overspray all over everything and an attic fan hung in a doorway for overspray to be pulled out. If your garage isn't cleaned up **** and span now, it STILL looks like you are painting. If those officials walk into THAT garage that I saw in the photo and you havn't cleaned it top to bottom, what are they supposed to think?

It is obviously a garage in a dense neighborhood with that garage door being only a few feet from some elses home.

And all you guys, you can knock California laws and we are all kooks here. But if you think that someone is a kook because he doesn't want his home filled with vapors full of isos that is a twenty feet or so from a car being painted I guess I am a kook too.

By the way, I have a very old house (1947) and my garage is ON the property line of my neighbors. So if he were out on his patio with my garage open as the photo showed in the paper he could be as little as five or ten feet from that car being painted! As I was driving around a neighborhood across town today I saw most houses were ten to fifteen feet apart.

I think about how when the guys out in the shop have primed (we are talking simple spot priming of a few panels) at the shop how I can't go in the lunch room to eat the smell is so bad.

And yes, I have done that before to my neighbors. I painted a number of cars at my home when I was 20 years old or so. God, I remember how I had overspray on the dishes in my cupboards!!!

It's nasty stuff guys.

Brian
 
#21 ·
LOL brian, now you got me thinking of the movie days of thunder where the old guy crew chief is out in the barn painting up the race car (without a mask). But he only had corn and field around him. Does talk to the race car an awefull lot too in the movie, maybe from painting with no mask.
I'll give you a fuel line that'll hold an extra gallon of gas.
I'll shave half an inch off you and shape you like a bullet.
When I get you primed, painted and weighed...
...you're going to be ready to go out on that racetrack.
You're going to be perfect.

Ohh yeah, and since I am off subject already, this line from the movie is for Mikey and Brian. :p
Harry, where's your driver from? - Eagle Rock.
- Is that up around Wilkesboro? - No. Glendale, California.
He's a Yankee? - Californians aren't Yankees.
- They're not really anything. - You said it.
 
#24 ·
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_in_the_Civil_War
yeah, California played a big part. Figures they would be able to send gold for financial support though, lol. If only it would have been fighting to save a tree instead. LOL, You know I am just giving you are hard time, and this is way off topic for the body section, so I'll just shut up now. I was never much for history in school, but it is interesting reading some of it now.
 
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