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Worms and Moats
Posted: Apr 23rd, '12, 17:25
by woozl
Funny article in NYT about David Hoffman's place in Marin CA.
He is the guy from "All in this tea" documentary.
Great photos of an odd place.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/us/in ... .html?_r=1
Re: Worms and Moats
Posted: Apr 23rd, '12, 18:28
by gingkoseto
Just saw it on twitter.
I think they are very brave to live the life style they believe in and invest on it. It seems to me that it's a void of law that should be developed to regulate and probably even encourage the more natural life style. The article mentions "possibility of contamination", but there is no law defining how to measure it. Chances are the short-term and long-term ecological impacts of Hoffman's design are much smaller than those of conventional housing and septic systems. It's the responsibility of law makers to study it and find a way to regulate/measure it, instead of trying to stop it without evidence of harm.
Re: Worms and Moats
Posted: Apr 23rd, '12, 18:41
by wyardley
Perhaps, but for folks in Marin County to be complaining about you, I'm guessing you have to be pretty extreme!
Vermiculture itself is pretty non-controversial - we've got a little worm box in our garage, and they happily eat through the stuff we put in and produce miraculous worm castings. I think the more problematic issue is that there's the potential for human waste to flow into local water, which I think would definitely be an issue. Depending on how close the neighbors are, one imagines there could also be some odor problems....
More to the point, no matter how kooky your beliefs are, you still have to follow local ordinances (like them or not), or risk the kinds of actions that are being threatened here.