Is this normal?

[roadwreck]

Yesterday I received a bill. The bill was from a neighbor (that I have only met once) who lives on the street behind me. It was to cover the cost of clearing a ditch which is on this his property (technically it's on my property too). Apparently it cost him $124 to pay his "yard guy" to clear debris. In the past, debris has blocked the ditch and cause flooding in his house, so he has taken it upon himself maintain the ditch and is billing everyone upstream from him. He is asking his neighbors to pitch in $17 to cover the bill. Don't ask me how the math on a $124 bill divides to be $17 per person, also I don't know how he decided who to send the bill too. There is a head wall at the beginning of the ditch that I suspect drains from the street so if he's billing people who drain into the ditch he should probably expand the recipient list. The only time I met this neighbor he mentioned the ditch overflowing once and his house flooding. I suspect there is an inlet structure at the other end of the ditch that got blocked and water backed up. My property is probably six feet higher than his, so I'm not to worried about flooding from this ditch. Is it normal for neighbors to send bills to one another for this type of thing? If it were my property, I'd just pay the $124 myself and be done with it. Well technically I would have done the work myself so I won't need to send a bill to anyone. I don't need to create bad blood with my neighbors for that kind of money. At the same time we've haven't even been in this house for a year, i don't want to be creating an issue with someone I share a fence with over $17.

So, what's the best course of action here? Ignore the bill? Nail a $100 bill to the front door with a note telling him this should cover me for debris removal for the next 5 years? Pay the bill and start dumping construction debris in the ditch so I get my money's worth out of his "yard guy"?

 

[snickerd3]

unless talked about ahead of time then I'd say you are all off the hook.

 

[snickerd3]

we have a drainage ditch btwn our house and the neighbors that rides the property line. when it got messed up we talked and he had a guy come in and regrade/fill the area and we bought the grass seed/hay etc... and took care of it until is grew back and gave him the difference to make it even. all agreed to upfront. even though the ditch receives water from half the neighborhood and the problem didn't start to occur until after the neighbor across the street hooked their sump pump to the discharge line that exits to the ditch....so the area went from being dry during non rain events to staying moist.

 

[roadwreck]

unless talked about ahead of time then I'd say you are all off the hook.

also my thinking.

I pulled up the GIS info from the county and learned that the inlet structure at the end of that ditch is on the far side of his neighbors property, so unless his "yard guy" cleared the ditch behind the neighbors property as well and removed any debris from the inlet then what he has done will make little to no difference in the drainage of the ditch and he is basically passing off the cost of clearing his yard on to his neighbors.

 

[snickerd3]

every fall and spring i get to clean out all the neighbors leaves from the ditch...it is just something that falls into the chores of home ownership.

 

[engineergurl]

have you chatted with any other neighbors that may have been "billed" as well? I personally don't think you would owe them anything, but it might be interesting to find out exactly what other kind of stuff this guy may have tried to get money for too...

 

[roadwreck]

No, I only got the letter last night when I checked the mail. To late to go knocking on other people's doors asking about it. The letter that was included was address to everyone he sent it to, so I know which neighbors got it.

Oh, and the guy who sent it to me misspelled my name. I'm not sure where he got it from, or if he was just going off memory from the one time we met (at an HOA meeting last fall), but if you are asking me for money, at least get my name right.

 

[Road Guy]

Is the ditch actually on your property or the right of way?

I think I would just ignore it to be honest...

 

[csb]

wroadreck?

A neighbor up the alley once sent everyone on the block a three page letter about how the city screwed up when they redid the sewer line for an attraction up the line from us. It flooded his basement with sewage while he wasn't home. What got me was he threw out the, "I'm a professional engineer and..." The guy works at the DOT with me. He's not in sewage design. He's in guardrail design. He suggested we all contact the city. I'm guessing no one contacted the city, but the pipe did get replaced a couple years later as part of a citywide project.

I'd give him the $17, but with a note saying I needed more notice to budget in for this type of thing and other passive-aggressive nonsense.

 

[Dexman PE PMP]

Anytime I've done work where I've expected money contributions from neighbors, I cleared it with them before I did it. I gave them an estimate of the costs and an explanation of the scope. They had every right to tell me to pound sand, but they were cool about it, chipped in what they thought was fair (usually what I estimated), and I did the work. For something like this, I probably would have just footed the bill myself, but also let the neighbors know that their runoff/debris is causing me problems and ask for their help in the future.

And I typically do the labor myself, so I only ask for help covering material costs.

 

[Road Guy]

Unless the upstream neighbors made modificatoins to the drainage after the subdivisions were approved they are not really at fault for any drainage issues. Its "gods" water not really theirs..

 

[roadwreck]

The ditch is right along the property line between the houses on our street and the houses on the street behind us. Our side is higher then theirs, my yard slopes down at least six feet before intersecting the ditch, whereas his lot has an almost imperceptibly slope towards the "ditch" at all. I guess in this area it's barely a ditch at all. It's basically the point where the low point at the back of his property meets the 2:1 slope at the back of the properties on our street. Technically my property line is at the bottom of the slope, although the fence in my backyard runs along the top of the slope. I do maintain the slope however. It was covered in poison ivy when I moved in, so I've been vigilant to keep that at bay.

Is it my fault his house is practically at the same elevation as the inlet structure that drains the area? I'm sure it's been this way ever since the neighborhood was constructed, as long as the inlet is clear there are no problems. If the inlet is blocked with debris the people with the low lying house are in trouble. I don't see how I'm responsible to pay to clear your yard debris out of the inlet. That sounds like a him problem to me.

 

[engineergurl]

Unless the upstream neighbors made modificatoins to the drainage after the subdivisions were approved they are not really at fault for any drainage issues. Its "gods" water not really theirs..

that depends on what state your in... cause I'm pretty sure that there are currently three states now that claim it is their water...

 

[roadwreck]

Unless the upstream neighbors made modificatoins to the drainage after the subdivisions were approved they are not really at fault for any drainage issues. Its "gods" water not really theirs..

that depends on what state your in... cause I'm pretty sure that there are currently three states now that claim it is their water...

Good point, I should forward the bill to Alabama and Florida, since they claim that's their water.

 

[Road Guy]

RW- we used to get literally 20 of these types of calls a month at my old job. I enjoyed tracking them down, and 99% of the time if you pulled the original plat of the subdivision either something didnt get built the way it was supposed to or along the lines property owners changed things without realizing that water can do bad things to your house.. Just for fun if you can track those down it might be entertaining for you..

we used to hear these sob stories how the evil DOT didnt clean this ditch so my basement flooded. then you discover that there was an illegal driveway put in without a pipe that diverted the water, or something..

I would still just igonore it to be honest, at least make him walk over mano eh mano..

 

[roadwreck]

I would still just igonore it to be honest, at least make him walk over mano eh mano..

I guess I might not be as annoyed about it all if the only other time I met the couple the wife bragged about what a super successful engineer her husband was (this was once she learned I was an engineer) and how she was a realtor for "upscale" properties. If you are that well to do you could probably afford to pay the $124 to keep your house from flooding.

Would sending him a map of the 500 year floodplain (which his house is in) be passive aggressive enough?

 

[snickerd3]

I like it!!!

 

[engineergurl]

I would still just igonore it to be honest, at least make him walk over mano eh mano..

I guess I might not be as annoyed about it all if the only other time I met the couple the wife bragged about what a super successful engineer her husband was (this was once she learned I was an engineer) and how she was a realtor for "upscale" properties. If you are that well to do you could probably afford to pay the $124 to keep your house from flooding.

Would sending him a map of the 500 year floodplain (which his house is in) be passive aggressive enough? Or should I just start spraying roundup over the fence late at night?

maybe you should pay but include a referral to the number one storm water engineer in the south east

 

[Road Guy]

So did yah pay your fair share?

 

[roadwreck]

Haven't yet. I figure I've got at least 30 days before he starts charging me late fees, right?