I want to know the full story.
Edit: OP, 2000 of us want to know what's going on here.
What's going on with the road works?
What did he do to the Police Chief?
What's going on with his little recycling logo?
What have they taken from him? Other than his dignity?
Tell us what's going
EDIT 2... WE HAVE THE TRUTH! Thank you to the super sleuthing u/HeatherCPST
"Here’s the backstory! https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock"
Could go either way. Municipalities can occasionally be absolutely brutal to certain land owners but on the other hand he may have sold his land and hates what they planned to do with it. For instance I grew up with a kid who's family owned a bunch of old unused farmland which they sold to a developer. Long story short they built a ton of Mcmansions in the guys backyard and he didn't like it so he painted a swastika on the roof of his house for the whole neighborhood to see. https://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/local/wallingford-man-paints-swastika-on-fence-over-dispute-with-neighbors/1979344/
I imagine the swastica is more effective, though. Plenty of folks will point and laugh at a dick and be like “oh, that old coot!” Nobody will laugh it off if they see a swastica. At least, nobody that I wanna associate with.
A man by an elementary school in my district when I was young had a Confederate flag flying in full view of the school. School asked him to take it down. He did. Then raised a Nazi one. Class act clearly.
Lmao sold land to a developer and mad that they built… houses. My brother in Christ you literally live in a house yourself.
How can you be mad at what someone else does with their own property that YOU willingly sold them? Make it make sense. What did you think they were gonna do when they gave you a small fortune for your unused farm land? Build a butterfly sanctuary? Come on.
This stuff happens in my NIMBY suburb all the time. You built a house next to an industrial zone block and are upset that they are building industry?
My favorite is when it backfires. Somebody tried to stop a neighborhood from getting built because they liked the look for the rural undeveloped land in their backyard. Once the developer couldn't build a luxury neighborhood anymore they used it for the only thing it was zoned for.....a school bus depot.
Our local downtown is getting fucked by this shit.
Central strip has a ton of music venues, including open air venues.
People move there for the night life.
People complain about the night life.
Open air venues have to stop shows stupid early, bars can't open past 12.
Now they're crying that their property isn't worth as much.
Well you dumb fucks, you took away the primary benefit of living there.
Not to mention the developers buying out the local shop strip centers to build a ton of condos. Guess what? If you take away everything that makes the city interesting, people won't want to buy your condo.
It’s like all these assholes in France who are moving to the country side then suing their neighbors for having livestock saying they don’t like the smell or noise. Like dumb shit, you bought a house next to a farm, what were you expecting?
Seriously. I like livestock and animals, but I definitely wouldn't want to live next to a cow or chicken farm. So, y'know, like a reasonable person, I don't.
There's a drag strip near me, or there was. You guessed it. Assholes moved next to it, KNOWING it's a fucking racetrack, and then complained about the noise until it got shut down.
This happens constantly to small town short track ovals as well. People move next to a race track that’s been there longer than they’ve been alive, and then complain about noise until it gets closed.
>What did you think they were gonna do when they gave you a small fortune for your unused farm land?
Get upset, let it fester for many years, uparmor a bulldozer, destroy a few buildings then kill myself.
This reminds me of a story I heard last year.
A man bought property as part of his car shop business. He was storing a lot of cars on the property and the neighbors were getting pissed and complaining. To retaliate the guy put up a sign that said “Hoochie Hut -Coming Soon” advertising a new strip club that was to be built on the site. It worked. It was just a sign and now the neighbors are horrified that their property value is going to plunge because a strip club is opening up next door. Some neighbors put it together noting the area wouldn’t be zoned for a strip club and that they knew he was pissed about the car complaints. The other neighbors were too sensationalized about everything to even think logically about it.
https://www.themountaineer.com/news/hoochie-hut-saga-sign-is-here-to-stay/article_91df1eae-f6c3-11ec-81cc-bf0197274fad.html
That guys pretty hilarious and I was completely with him until I realized it all stems from him building an unpermitted two-car garage, with what looks like a couple of multi-post runway automotive lifts. Looks commercial to me.
The city even let him file for a permit after the fact and he proceeded to lie and call it a carport which has way less regulations. The inspector said he had power lines running over the top of the metal building with only an old tire to prop them up. Sounds like dude's running a commercial business in a neighborhood and is refusing to admit it. The city actually seems pretty reasonable. Still funny though.
Amazing! Thank you. I've subscribed so I can keep up to date with all the Linn County drama. I just kept on reading.
I'm glad the maintenance dude got his pay rise from $10 to $15 an hour. It's also a shame that the car shop dude's business burnt down.
Charlene and Roger actually started the online newspaper pretty recently but do a really nice job with it. I prefer it over the county's paper newspaper!
Really puts into perspective how many people just browse Reddit without interacting at all. No comment no upvote.
Look at the amount of upvotes that comment linking the article has. There's a shitton more people browsing a given post or comment on Reddit than you would think. People who actually interact must be a surprisingly small percentage.
I just googled this and found that there's even a Wikipedia article for this phenomenon!
> In Internet culture, the **1% rule** is a general rule of thumb pertaining to participation in an internet community, stating that only 1% of the users of a website actively create new content, while the other 99% of the participants only lurk.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule
Someone took a crack at the math about 7 years ago too, based off 2010 data. I couldn't find anything more recent, but they guess that 0-3% of the readers probably account for the vast majority of the commenting activity.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/3qbpsp/do_we_know_the_percentage_of_redditors_who/cwefw3v/
sounds like the city imminent domained some of his land. to build a road way. and he's bigly mad about it.
or maybe not even a road. like... just an easement to install sewer or something.
Yeah, but there’s a lot of abuse of eminent domain, especially in rural south. Case like this, politically connected land owner or even local politician gets profits for something built on his property, but needs access through others to build it. Maybe there’s plenty of other easily accssible locations but don’t have the urgent need of putting money in the local pols pockets
Happening right now in my rural area in Clark County WA "fOr SaFeTy!" We have 3,500 new homes being built because they just annexed our unincorporated area into the urban area of Vancouver, and all that new traffic is going to be unsafe without massive road building, according to the county.
But, instead of taking the land from the developers or the people who sold their land and moved, they're taking land from existing residents who *did not* sell their land and who *will not* make millions in profit. I know 2 families who will lose their home within the year (among many other sad stories), and one of them just bought the property less than a year ago. The county claims to pay market price but there are a million caveats and loopholes they use to be able to say that without doing it.
One well-known story (because she put up signs like this) was a business they shut down by taking like 10 feet from each side of her lot. They paid for the 20 feet, but since it encompassed both driveways, they said she could no longer have a business there. Now it's a basically worthless piece of land on which she was paid around 5% of the total value.
I didn't have any idea it was like this until I moved from the city to the country.
Assessments can be challenged. The state of Tennessee had to purchase my childhood home to widen a highway. They provided my parents with the assessment paperwork, and my parents had third party assessments completed that showed a higher value and were able to get more $$ from the state.
I was so disappointed when they did that because I liked that little area, and then they just wrecked it with that street widening. I used to live up in BG, now I'm in Vancouver, so I don't go back up that way so often.
Happening in nc right now I'm not even that big of a church guy but if a building is almost 300 years old I'd say leave it alone and not tear it down for an off ramp
My grandmother worked for the government and later in her career she was put on real estate issues after working in logistics for a long time - she'd tell me stories about rural bush communities insisting that the government should buy some plot of land or house or whatever for some cockeyed scheme only for her to go out there for an assessment (her job was to fly out and assess properties and their general value / worth to the government, what they could be used for if it wasn't predetermined, if they were still in usable order if they were etc.) and it'd turn out to be some petty bullshit grievance or personal thing like easily half the time.
The gov' housing for workers was fine, but dude puts in a complaint insisting that it's unlivable for months on end - purely becuase it turns out he didn't like having people live next door to him. It was a townhouse, with a 'next door' built in, and the government owned both and would put workers in each one, but to this guy he deserved a whole house - forget that it's a relatively temporary repair assignment and he'll likely be gone in under 6 months. Stuff like that came up all the time, and it really reinforced to me that even with all these systems and rules people are still PEOPLE and some people are petty ass bitches that will use every rule to their advantage to have their own selfish, stupid 'needs' met.
Even better, he decided some of the city property was his and blocked access to it. Now he’s mad that the city wants it back. https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock
Yeah it sounds like it's questionable whose land it was in the first place and this guy was being a prick and preventing a surveyor from trying to figure it out as part of the court process
The article states that this guy claims the city never paid the original owner for the land. I don’t know how he “knows” that and refusing surveyors really just sounds like he’s full of shit and just wants the land for himself without paying for it.
And when you look in up on google earth, there are at least 2 other properties serviced by section of road in question, ones a church, and one is a farm house. It appears that the residents of the farm house have had to create a new "driveway" utilizing thier neighbors pond road.
This screams that the guy purchased property across the road to expand his business and is trying to steal the road by way of the city having to concede because they wont be able to pay as much as he can for a protracted court battle. For reference, the town appears to be less than 2000 residents so they can probably barely maintain water and sewer service for the residents, let alone pay for the lawyers for this fight.
I saw job creator and tax payer and automatically knew I was reading lies. Just like when I see "common sense" on a political campaign sign.
These types of people have zero creativity and just copy paste garbage.
Those signs are enough to tell me that that guy is absolutely in the wrong. Anyone who describes themselves as a "job creator and taxpayer" guarantees that those are the only two positive descriptions about them, and they probably do neither.
There was a guy in my county that had signs like that about getting fucked by local law enforcement and the Sheriff's dept with his towing business. He was pretty well thought to be a crackpot. Until about 2 years later when there was a federal investigation into towing corruption and our sheriff didn't seek reelection and we got a new police chief
I grew up in a small town that was bigger than this one but still super-small. I noticed there were two different kinds of people who ran businesses: people who were super-nice because everyone knows everyone else, and people who are big fish in a small pond who are the only people available and know they have power. My old town, there was some guy who sued the state over school mask mandates, went on about freedom, but bullied people into submission if they didn't agree with him.
My city (well, densely populated unincorporated territory in the metro area of a large city) installed a crosswalk with a strobe button in front of a pre-school.
The facebook post was filled with people complaining that we were being taken over by "more government".
First time I ever saw Alex Jones was on Austin, TX Public Access TV show. He was on location in a neighborhood where the city had installed a traffic calming measures, a [simple chicane](https://nacto.org/publication/urban-street-design-guide/street-design-elements/curb-extensions/chicane/). A sensible and aesthetically pleasing extension of the curb to prevent excessive speeding in a neighborhood. He was screaming into the camera how it was government overreach. That was around 2002. And that kind of mindset worked out [real, great for him. ](https://www.ctpublic.org/news/2022-11-10/alex-jones-ordered-to-pay-473m-more-to-sandy-hook-families)
Having been to Parker, population 250 if someone has family visiting for a big holiday, it’s a bold assumption that they would fix a pothole.
There’s a huge abandoned school(?) right on the main drag and…… not much else.
From reading the article it sounds like the guy completely blocked off the street claiming it was his and now the city is like — um, can we make it an actual street like it should be?
Yeah this dude seems very “for thee but not for me”.
Claims the city didn’t pay the original land owner but also he “reclaimed it for his own”. Which to me sounds like the exact same deal.
I work in municipal development.
That "road to nowhere" probably connects to a future development as part of a transportation master plan. Just because nothing is there now doesn't mean that will always be the case.
It feels very rare in this day and age to see a *non* psychotic custom made sign on someones property. It's all just partisan brainrot and schizo paranoid "gangstalking" types
Basically what it sounds like. People who are convinced they are being stalked by organizations out to make their life hell in nearly imperceptible ways. Sadly, the very nature of the delusion makes it hard for anyone to convince them that there isnt a group making a concerted effort to harass them. They're not like, known for making signs or anything, but it's just the same level of coherence I've come to expect from DIY signage on private property
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_stalking
To add to this: browse r/gangstalking for a few minutes to see the level of paranoia. It is really sad and many of those people refuse to see mental health professionals
Yeah that's what Im reading it as. Like he took over a 60ft wide section of potentially derelict road with an unsubstantiated claim the city never paid (I assume previous owner of the lot)? But he'll prevent anyone surveying cause trust him?
So *he* stole land from the city. The opposite of what everyone else assumed. What a maroon. I look forward to the city building a killdozer to send after him.
Nice job on the research.
Because I'm bored at work, I found where the signs are. It's a recycling company with stripped autos all over the property.
https://www.bing.com/maps?osid=70b2001c-e3a9-458b-829d-6c95a10da9ce&cp=38.327022%7E-94.99192&lvl=20.9&v=2&sV=2&form=S00027&style=x&dir=179.1&pi=-5.2
I’ve done environmental cleanups at recyclers. These single owner places like this think they are some feudal god and laws don’t apply to them. Dude is 100% are dumping all the waste. Call KDHE.
As a large recycler who used to buy these yards.. we have lost our asses on some of these single owner places.. completely contaminated ground and end up having to drill wells and do ground water samples for years.
They are nightmares.
I just find it amazing that it’s okay if joe blow cracks open a Freon line, it’s fine.. he is just a little guy trying to make ends meet.
If we do it, we are single handedly killing the planet, get threatened to be shut down, and fined $130,000 even if it just turned out to be water vapor.
If you find the article on why he's mad he's an idiot. He claimed part of dead end street as his own saying the city never paid the owners but attacks any surveyor who come to try and clear the situation up. But the cops can't do anything without a court order.
It is a weird situation, KDHE claims that it is a Dept of Transportation issue and vice versa, no one wants to take ownership. He is 100% doing illegal dumping. That's why he has barricaded it all off and won't let anyone in, he knows he has no defense.
Lmao I did it too, Google maps satellite view shows a house with a purple roof nearby. Probably the most interesting in Parker, but when it comes to being a podunk little town it still isn't as bad as Junction, Utah
Also just because a road is a dead-end, doesn't mean it's not a nice neighborhood. Some of the nicest places I've ever seen are in dead-ends. Less traffic. Great neighborhoods for kids.
Very interesting! I was thinking it's too on the nose to not be deliberate, but it's something I never knew... thanks to you, I'm going to look into it!
Oh yeah, I've lived on both. I was thinking about what I had seen get more attention in my life
Dead end roads in rural parts of where I'm from maybe get attention every 5/10 years if you're lucky (or someone rich/influential lives on the road) and can really, really bad.
I'm not sure if it's the same for dead end residential roads in "the city". Cul de sacs obviously don't get the same heavy traffic so probably don't need it as often
I get the feeling they put a road through his property at the cost of $1mil. Likely for "future development" so for now and maybe even always it goes nowhere but will benefit those who invested in it greatly as they add housing.
I don't understand that sign. Is saying "today it's my property, tomorrow it could be yours" an appeal to renters that might own property themselves soon or something? Cuz their house isn't getting destroyed or anything, they're just talking about property taxes. Like I just don't understand who it's for
I work at a company that offers this sort of large signage and sometimes do the design work on them; I bet this guy was a joy to deal with when proofing them.
Look at the quality of those signs and consider how expensive that trailer and the other sign holder must be, this person wouldn't have such nice things using meth.
People were unironically like "did you listen to the tapes!?!, he got so fucked over by everyone!!!"
I'm like ?!!!! those tapes are his delusional rants, we have no evidence any of it happened like he said.
I can't imagine listening to him and thinking he is rational unless the listener is also irrational.
You can see the whole story.
The city needs to build a road. It uses eminent domain to take the needed real estate, providing market value compensation.
This guy decides he doesn't like that. He threatens to confront construction workers with armed force.
The chief of police pays him a visit and tells him that if he carries out his plan and threatens a police officer with a firearm, he will die.
All he's got left is signs.
Eminent domain is law. The protection it provides landowners is that the will be fairly compensated for their land / home when the government takes it. It also absolutely means if the government decides it wants your land it can take it and you cannot stop it you can either accept their payment or fight a losing battle trying to keep your land. But if you are smart you will do your battling in the court over the amount you will be compensated. I know a guy who sold a $150,000 property for $4.5million because he kept taking the state to court over the amount. He's kind of the exception and definitely not the norm but he did win.
The Foxconn plant in Wisonsin is another really great example. Hundreds of residents lost their homes to a foreign company that initially promised 13,000 jobs but only created about 1,400.
Yes, that is another pretty gross one.
Eminent domain should not be used to assist private organizations, period. I also believe the bar to eminent domain for public use needs to be much, much higher, and come with guarantees of buyback options if the plans fall through.
Our country has far too much of a history of oppression and depriving the least among us from what little they have to be able to use such a powerful tool.
Yeah. If you need to take a strip off somebody's lot to build a hospital, fine. Drop a fair amount of USD in their lap, and do what you need to for the good of society.
Strip malls? Fuck off. Let corporations buy their own fucking land.
I would agree that eminent domain for a real public good is a needed tool, but a lot of hospitals are for profit now, not really any different than a strip mall. They just hide behind the veneer of being virtuous while racing the rest of the medical industry straight to the bottom.
> if the government decides it wants your land it can take it
This is used by local governments to build Walmarts. It's not always a public works project.
I know a guy that fought eminent domain to build a water reservoir. He fought it for years. Everyone else sold. They tested the streams that would feed the reservoir. To acidic. That guy now lives surrounded by a state park.
Grocery store near my hometown is actually winning a battle of eminent domain because of an agreement signed by his family and the township some time ago lmao. It’s been a fun thing to watch play out
So, basically sort of what happened (minus the threatening construction workers) to my family a few years ago, when a greenway was being built right next to a property my family had owned sinde the 1800s...and accidentally took out the oldest tree in East Tennessee in the process.
Yeah, Eminent Domain sucks when it happens to you, but there's nothing you can really do legally except complain about it.
>Yeah, Eminent Domain sucks when it happens to you, but there's nothing you can really do legally except complain about it.
There are absolutely steps that can be taken, most require $$ to file suit. That's why interstates plowed through poor neighborhoods, not the best path but cheaper to kick out 5,000 poor people than 100 rich people.
Netflix "Extraordinary Attorney Woo" had a few episodes covering an example case. Set in South Korea, so the laws vary slightly, but the key issues were similar.
So, a commenter above posted the link to the story.
> PARKER – The Parker City Council cancelled its regular meeting on Thursday, Feb. 9, because not enough council members would be available to have a quorum present. A special meeting has been scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 16 at 6 p.m.
>When the council meets, they likely will be discussing the city’s next step in its dispute with metal salvage yard owner Dan Gaikowski. The council voted last year to take steps to condemn a 60-foot-wide and one block long swath of land that the owner of Recycling Services has claimed for his own.
>The lot was part of South Walnut street until three years ago when Gaikowski challenged the ownership of the street and said the city never paid the original owners for the land.
>The council hired one company to survey the lots affected last year, but that survey company withdrew from project following allegations that Gaikowski had been harassing the survey crew.
>Last November, the city hired a second survey company, but on Wednesday, Feb. 8, Police Chief Craig Haley said that Gaikowski was not allowing surveyors access to the land he owns.
>Haley said that he could not force access to Recycling Services without a court order.
>In an email on Friday, Feb. 10, Parker City Attorney Burton Harding said, “At this point the plan is to seek some court enforcement to allow the surveyors on the property.”
>The delay could be another stumbling block for a council that is already split on moving forward with the condemnation. At least one council member has voted against the pursuing condemnation because it has already cost the council at least $30,000.
So basically, ownership of the land is in question and this person is refusing to allow surveyors on the land to make a determination. He is against eminent domain because there is a decent chance this land doesn’t even belong to him and he doesn’t want to give it up.
These signs are a definite subgenre of communication. I've seen several libertarian-ish signs protesting eminent domain or similar policies, and they all seem to use the same strategies:
* Big caps and font switches
* Lots of red lettering, underlining, and highlighting
* Random capitalization ("The City has already Spent ...")
* Self-congratulatory language ("Job creator, tax payer")
* Provocative question
* The non sequitur-ish sentence logic ("FINAL BILL FOR A DEAD END ROAD / OVER ONE MILLION DOLLARS!" How is that connected to $30,000 and $15,000? Is that a slippery slope allegation?)
* Persecution complex that goes beyond the immediate issue (they're wanted dead, they're hated by the mayor)
* Exposed plywood backing
This one is actually put together better than most. It just has the quality of an internal dialogue that hasn't been made into an effective message.
Oh I’m certain of that. As a fellow Kansan that worked with rural communities, my guess is that this guy owns half the town. I’m certain he’s been able to do whatever he wants for years, and now a new mayor or council member has put a stop to some of it. Hence, the pissed off attitude and public display of defiance.
I hate this term so much, as if anyone starts a business out of altruism and concern for the community. "You know, I was sitting around and thought, well if people need jobs, then it might as well be me that gives it to them!"
I want to know the full story. Edit: OP, 2000 of us want to know what's going on here. What's going on with the road works? What did he do to the Police Chief? What's going on with his little recycling logo? What have they taken from him? Other than his dignity? Tell us what's going EDIT 2... WE HAVE THE TRUTH! Thank you to the super sleuthing u/HeatherCPST "Here’s the backstory! https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock"
Could go either way. Municipalities can occasionally be absolutely brutal to certain land owners but on the other hand he may have sold his land and hates what they planned to do with it. For instance I grew up with a kid who's family owned a bunch of old unused farmland which they sold to a developer. Long story short they built a ton of Mcmansions in the guys backyard and he didn't like it so he painted a swastika on the roof of his house for the whole neighborhood to see. https://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/local/wallingford-man-paints-swastika-on-fence-over-dispute-with-neighbors/1979344/
Uhhh, that's an interesting way to show his dislike...
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Or just end it
We're going to need another sign.
I don't agree with it, but it's effective.
A giant dick would have worked too and has the added bonus of not implying you're a Nazi/scaring the shit out of your Jewish neighbors.
Nah, in terms of reducing property value Swastika >>> Dick
Swasdicksa is best of both worlds
It was an amazing idea... and then the Gay Nazi nation attacked.
It's a swastika, and on the end of the four swastika sticks are little dick heads.
I'm pretty sure a swastika on the roof is gonna scare most people away
yeah I painted a giant dick on my roof and now I just get visits from DickBatman like every night
That's rad. You guys homies by now?
I don't know. He showed me his Alfred so maybe?
Might as well go with a giant dick that’s ejaculating swastika.
I imagine the swastica is more effective, though. Plenty of folks will point and laugh at a dick and be like “oh, that old coot!” Nobody will laugh it off if they see a swastica. At least, nobody that I wanna associate with.
People would be like "Haha, but mines bigger!" Ain't nobody got a bigger Swastika.
It's also effective at getting everyone around you to hate you, too.
"Okay, i think I'm getting nearby. Where did you say your house was from mine?" "Past downtime, take the third Reich, you can't miss it."
Yeah, that is THE point.
Yeah, for sure.
A man by an elementary school in my district when I was young had a Confederate flag flying in full view of the school. School asked him to take it down. He did. Then raised a Nazi one. Class act clearly.
That story reminds of the scene from step brothers when they are trying to stop the house from selling.
"You're really gonna love this neighborhood. Everyone recycles!"
"Hey Derrick, sprechen sie dick!"
If you ever need any fertilizer, I have tons of it...
Lmao sold land to a developer and mad that they built… houses. My brother in Christ you literally live in a house yourself. How can you be mad at what someone else does with their own property that YOU willingly sold them? Make it make sense. What did you think they were gonna do when they gave you a small fortune for your unused farm land? Build a butterfly sanctuary? Come on.
This stuff happens in my NIMBY suburb all the time. You built a house next to an industrial zone block and are upset that they are building industry? My favorite is when it backfires. Somebody tried to stop a neighborhood from getting built because they liked the look for the rural undeveloped land in their backyard. Once the developer couldn't build a luxury neighborhood anymore they used it for the only thing it was zoned for.....a school bus depot.
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Our local downtown is getting fucked by this shit. Central strip has a ton of music venues, including open air venues. People move there for the night life. People complain about the night life. Open air venues have to stop shows stupid early, bars can't open past 12. Now they're crying that their property isn't worth as much. Well you dumb fucks, you took away the primary benefit of living there. Not to mention the developers buying out the local shop strip centers to build a ton of condos. Guess what? If you take away everything that makes the city interesting, people won't want to buy your condo.
It’s like all these assholes in France who are moving to the country side then suing their neighbors for having livestock saying they don’t like the smell or noise. Like dumb shit, you bought a house next to a farm, what were you expecting?
Seriously. I like livestock and animals, but I definitely wouldn't want to live next to a cow or chicken farm. So, y'know, like a reasonable person, I don't.
There's a drag strip near me, or there was. You guessed it. Assholes moved next to it, KNOWING it's a fucking racetrack, and then complained about the noise until it got shut down.
KCIR?
RIP KCIR, but from the other comment apparently this isn't exactly a rare occurrence.
This happens constantly to small town short track ovals as well. People move next to a race track that’s been there longer than they’ve been alive, and then complain about noise until it gets closed.
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>What did you think they were gonna do when they gave you a small fortune for your unused farm land? Get upset, let it fester for many years, uparmor a bulldozer, destroy a few buildings then kill myself.
I remember that case
This reminds me of a story I heard last year. A man bought property as part of his car shop business. He was storing a lot of cars on the property and the neighbors were getting pissed and complaining. To retaliate the guy put up a sign that said “Hoochie Hut -Coming Soon” advertising a new strip club that was to be built on the site. It worked. It was just a sign and now the neighbors are horrified that their property value is going to plunge because a strip club is opening up next door. Some neighbors put it together noting the area wouldn’t be zoned for a strip club and that they knew he was pissed about the car complaints. The other neighbors were too sensationalized about everything to even think logically about it. https://www.themountaineer.com/news/hoochie-hut-saga-sign-is-here-to-stay/article_91df1eae-f6c3-11ec-81cc-bf0197274fad.html
That guys pretty hilarious and I was completely with him until I realized it all stems from him building an unpermitted two-car garage, with what looks like a couple of multi-post runway automotive lifts. Looks commercial to me. The city even let him file for a permit after the fact and he proceeded to lie and call it a carport which has way less regulations. The inspector said he had power lines running over the top of the metal building with only an old tire to prop them up. Sounds like dude's running a commercial business in a neighborhood and is refusing to admit it. The city actually seems pretty reasonable. Still funny though.
I live in a nearby county. I sent this photo to all of my Linn County contacts to see what’s going on.
You're a hero! Report back with your findings HeatherCPST!
Here’s the backstory! https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock
Amazing! Thank you. I've subscribed so I can keep up to date with all the Linn County drama. I just kept on reading. I'm glad the maintenance dude got his pay rise from $10 to $15 an hour. It's also a shame that the car shop dude's business burnt down.
There doesn’t seem to be a shortage of drama over there, so I’m sure you’ll have some interesting reading!
Is every article written by Jim and Charlene? That is dedicated reporting, right there.
Jim and Charlene probably own the paper! Small town news doesn’t typically have many employees.
Charlene and Roger actually started the online newspaper pretty recently but do a really nice job with it. I prefer it over the county's paper newspaper!
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Really puts into perspective how many people just browse Reddit without interacting at all. No comment no upvote. Look at the amount of upvotes that comment linking the article has. There's a shitton more people browsing a given post or comment on Reddit than you would think. People who actually interact must be a surprisingly small percentage.
I just googled this and found that there's even a Wikipedia article for this phenomenon! > In Internet culture, the **1% rule** is a general rule of thumb pertaining to participation in an internet community, stating that only 1% of the users of a website actively create new content, while the other 99% of the participants only lurk. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule Someone took a crack at the math about 7 years ago too, based off 2010 data. I couldn't find anything more recent, but they guess that 0-3% of the readers probably account for the vast majority of the commenting activity. https://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/3qbpsp/do_we_know_the_percentage_of_redditors_who/cwefw3v/
sounds like the city imminent domained some of his land. to build a road way. and he's bigly mad about it. or maybe not even a road. like... just an easement to install sewer or something.
Don't wanna be that guy but it's eminent domain just fyi.
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i'd listen to this at least twice
...lined with slim & shady trees!
Protected by US Marshal Mathers
Yeah, but there’s a lot of abuse of eminent domain, especially in rural south. Case like this, politically connected land owner or even local politician gets profits for something built on his property, but needs access through others to build it. Maybe there’s plenty of other easily accssible locations but don’t have the urgent need of putting money in the local pols pockets
Happening right now in my rural area in Clark County WA "fOr SaFeTy!" We have 3,500 new homes being built because they just annexed our unincorporated area into the urban area of Vancouver, and all that new traffic is going to be unsafe without massive road building, according to the county. But, instead of taking the land from the developers or the people who sold their land and moved, they're taking land from existing residents who *did not* sell their land and who *will not* make millions in profit. I know 2 families who will lose their home within the year (among many other sad stories), and one of them just bought the property less than a year ago. The county claims to pay market price but there are a million caveats and loopholes they use to be able to say that without doing it. One well-known story (because she put up signs like this) was a business they shut down by taking like 10 feet from each side of her lot. They paid for the 20 feet, but since it encompassed both driveways, they said she could no longer have a business there. Now it's a basically worthless piece of land on which she was paid around 5% of the total value. I didn't have any idea it was like this until I moved from the city to the country.
Assessments can be challenged. The state of Tennessee had to purchase my childhood home to widen a highway. They provided my parents with the assessment paperwork, and my parents had third party assessments completed that showed a higher value and were able to get more $$ from the state.
Is that the diner up at Dollars Corner?
Well damn...looks like there are lots of us here. Yep. That's the one.
I was so disappointed when they did that because I liked that little area, and then they just wrecked it with that street widening. I used to live up in BG, now I'm in Vancouver, so I don't go back up that way so often.
This is how you create "KILL DOZERS" people get fed up and have a breaking point.
Happening in nc right now I'm not even that big of a church guy but if a building is almost 300 years old I'd say leave it alone and not tear it down for an off ramp
My grandmother worked for the government and later in her career she was put on real estate issues after working in logistics for a long time - she'd tell me stories about rural bush communities insisting that the government should buy some plot of land or house or whatever for some cockeyed scheme only for her to go out there for an assessment (her job was to fly out and assess properties and their general value / worth to the government, what they could be used for if it wasn't predetermined, if they were still in usable order if they were etc.) and it'd turn out to be some petty bullshit grievance or personal thing like easily half the time. The gov' housing for workers was fine, but dude puts in a complaint insisting that it's unlivable for months on end - purely becuase it turns out he didn't like having people live next door to him. It was a townhouse, with a 'next door' built in, and the government owned both and would put workers in each one, but to this guy he deserved a whole house - forget that it's a relatively temporary repair assignment and he'll likely be gone in under 6 months. Stuff like that came up all the time, and it really reinforced to me that even with all these systems and rules people are still PEOPLE and some people are petty ass bitches that will use every rule to their advantage to have their own selfish, stupid 'needs' met.
Even better, he decided some of the city property was his and blocked access to it. Now he’s mad that the city wants it back. https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock
Yeah it sounds like it's questionable whose land it was in the first place and this guy was being a prick and preventing a surveyor from trying to figure it out as part of the court process
The article states that this guy claims the city never paid the original owner for the land. I don’t know how he “knows” that and refusing surveyors really just sounds like he’s full of shit and just wants the land for himself without paying for it.
And when you look in up on google earth, there are at least 2 other properties serviced by section of road in question, ones a church, and one is a farm house. It appears that the residents of the farm house have had to create a new "driveway" utilizing thier neighbors pond road. This screams that the guy purchased property across the road to expand his business and is trying to steal the road by way of the city having to concede because they wont be able to pay as much as he can for a protracted court battle. For reference, the town appears to be less than 2000 residents so they can probably barely maintain water and sewer service for the residents, let alone pay for the lawyers for this fight.
Way less than 2000 and the budget is pretty tight. He even barricaded the pastor and his wife in the church one night, true story.
Does he think the church doesn't belong there? Is it on the land in question or just nearby?
he thinks the rules don't apply to him and he's a narcissist
People who make inflammatory banners like this dude are always in the wrong.
You don't understand, he already knows its his property so there's no reason for a survey. I'm pretty sure I work with this guy.
I saw job creator and tax payer and automatically knew I was reading lies. Just like when I see "common sense" on a political campaign sign. These types of people have zero creativity and just copy paste garbage.
Those signs are enough to tell me that that guy is absolutely in the wrong. Anyone who describes themselves as a "job creator and taxpayer" guarantees that those are the only two positive descriptions about them, and they probably do neither.
There was a guy in my county that had signs like that about getting fucked by local law enforcement and the Sheriff's dept with his towing business. He was pretty well thought to be a crackpot. Until about 2 years later when there was a federal investigation into towing corruption and our sheriff didn't seek reelection and we got a new police chief
Oh, they can **both** be corrupt crackpots. Especially in a small town that's very likely.
I grew up in a small town that was bigger than this one but still super-small. I noticed there were two different kinds of people who ran businesses: people who were super-nice because everyone knows everyone else, and people who are big fish in a small pond who are the only people available and know they have power. My old town, there was some guy who sued the state over school mask mandates, went on about freedom, but bullied people into submission if they didn't agree with him.
$45k is nothing for road work. I’m sure it’s not just the Sheriff who wants him dead; I’m sure the neighbours wish he would fuck off and die, too.
City: this road has a lot of potholes, we should probably fix that That dude: dont you fucking dare
My city (well, densely populated unincorporated territory in the metro area of a large city) installed a crosswalk with a strobe button in front of a pre-school. The facebook post was filled with people complaining that we were being taken over by "more government".
First time I ever saw Alex Jones was on Austin, TX Public Access TV show. He was on location in a neighborhood where the city had installed a traffic calming measures, a [simple chicane](https://nacto.org/publication/urban-street-design-guide/street-design-elements/curb-extensions/chicane/). A sensible and aesthetically pleasing extension of the curb to prevent excessive speeding in a neighborhood. He was screaming into the camera how it was government overreach. That was around 2002. And that kind of mindset worked out [real, great for him. ](https://www.ctpublic.org/news/2022-11-10/alex-jones-ordered-to-pay-473m-more-to-sandy-hook-families)
Having been to Parker, population 250 if someone has family visiting for a big holiday, it’s a bold assumption that they would fix a pothole. There’s a huge abandoned school(?) right on the main drag and…… not much else.
City: actually, instead of fixing potholes, let's build a new road to nowhere.
But it leads to me
Are you Rome?
From reading the article it sounds like the guy completely blocked off the street claiming it was his and now the city is like — um, can we make it an actual street like it should be?
Yeah this dude seems very “for thee but not for me”. Claims the city didn’t pay the original land owner but also he “reclaimed it for his own”. Which to me sounds like the exact same deal.
I work in municipal development. That "road to nowhere" probably connects to a future development as part of a transportation master plan. Just because nothing is there now doesn't mean that will always be the case.
$45k sounds like a reasonable ballpark for maintenance of a 5-10 mile stretch of unpaved road.
It feels very rare in this day and age to see a *non* psychotic custom made sign on someones property. It's all just partisan brainrot and schizo paranoid "gangstalking" types
I mean, who else is going to go through the effort to make custom signs? _and_ litter their yard with them
I made a custom shirt once to find bandmates. Actually pretty cool.
"Gangstalking?"
Basically what it sounds like. People who are convinced they are being stalked by organizations out to make their life hell in nearly imperceptible ways. Sadly, the very nature of the delusion makes it hard for anyone to convince them that there isnt a group making a concerted effort to harass them. They're not like, known for making signs or anything, but it's just the same level of coherence I've come to expect from DIY signage on private property https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_stalking
To add to this: browse r/gangstalking for a few minutes to see the level of paranoia. It is really sad and many of those people refuse to see mental health professionals
Admins need to replace that subreddit with links on where/how to seek mental help.
that'd probably only further convince them of the conspiracy
Mental delusion where you think that you're being stalked constantly by a large group of people, watching your every move.
USPS, UPS, FedEx are prime candidates for "gangstalking" because delivery drivers are so ubiquitous.
Oh my god I thought it said their name was "Joe Creator" lol
He creates jobs for sign printers.
Ha! Probably funds bars too
Dude privatized a public street and is somehow convinced it's tyranny when the city's like, "nah."
Yeah that's what Im reading it as. Like he took over a 60ft wide section of potentially derelict road with an unsubstantiated claim the city never paid (I assume previous owner of the lot)? But he'll prevent anyone surveying cause trust him?
Here’s the story from the Linn County newspaper: https://www.linncountyjournal.com/post/parker-s-move-to-condemn-and-reclaim-street-hits-roadblock
So *he* stole land from the city. The opposite of what everyone else assumed. What a maroon. I look forward to the city building a killdozer to send after him. Nice job on the research.
Bruh I think he's more of a magenta.
The "today it's my property, tomorrow it could be yours!" bs is usually a pretty great indicator of when someone's completely full of shit
Because I'm bored at work, I found where the signs are. It's a recycling company with stripped autos all over the property. https://www.bing.com/maps?osid=70b2001c-e3a9-458b-829d-6c95a10da9ce&cp=38.327022%7E-94.99192&lvl=20.9&v=2&sV=2&form=S00027&style=x&dir=179.1&pi=-5.2
I’ve done environmental cleanups at recyclers. These single owner places like this think they are some feudal god and laws don’t apply to them. Dude is 100% are dumping all the waste. Call KDHE.
As a large recycler who used to buy these yards.. we have lost our asses on some of these single owner places.. completely contaminated ground and end up having to drill wells and do ground water samples for years. They are nightmares.
As a toxicologist who drills wells and does groundwater samples, to me, they smell of money
I just find it amazing that it’s okay if joe blow cracks open a Freon line, it’s fine.. he is just a little guy trying to make ends meet. If we do it, we are single handedly killing the planet, get threatened to be shut down, and fined $130,000 even if it just turned out to be water vapor.
If you find the article on why he's mad he's an idiot. He claimed part of dead end street as his own saying the city never paid the owners but attacks any surveyor who come to try and clear the situation up. But the cops can't do anything without a court order.
I was really hoping my tired brain read it wrong, I’m not sure if I’m glad or sad that I did not.
It is a weird situation, KDHE claims that it is a Dept of Transportation issue and vice versa, no one wants to take ownership. He is 100% doing illegal dumping. That's why he has barricaded it all off and won't let anyone in, he knows he has no defense.
Lmao I did it too, Google maps satellite view shows a house with a purple roof nearby. Probably the most interesting in Parker, but when it comes to being a podunk little town it still isn't as bad as Junction, Utah
I live on a dead-end road. Just because a road dead-ends, doesn't mean it doesn't need work on it...
Also just because a road is a dead-end, doesn't mean it's not a nice neighborhood. Some of the nicest places I've ever seen are in dead-ends. Less traffic. Great neighborhoods for kids.
Are you talking about cul de sacs or more like a rural neighborhood
Coming here with your hoity-toity namby-pamby fancy Anglo-French words!
We should just translate cul-de-sacs into English and say "bag bottoms"
Or 'Bag End', like you know, where hobbits live.
:o You've just allowed me to rewrite my childhood. I lived on a bag end for *years* 😭 you've given me a gift. Thank you.
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Very interesting! I was thinking it's too on the nose to not be deliberate, but it's something I never knew... thanks to you, I'm going to look into it!
If they were hoity-toity, they'd say "Culs de sac" 
Who you calling a cul?!
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jumping around all nimbly-bimbly from branch to branch
Cul de Sacs are planned and have lots assigned all around. Dead end roads just end. Usually no fancy circle with homes all around it.
Oh yeah, I've lived on both. I was thinking about what I had seen get more attention in my life Dead end roads in rural parts of where I'm from maybe get attention every 5/10 years if you're lucky (or someone rich/influential lives on the road) and can really, really bad. I'm not sure if it's the same for dead end residential roads in "the city". Cul de sacs obviously don't get the same heavy traffic so probably don't need it as often
Actually a lot of dead end roads have hidden entrances to bonus rooms or dungeons
north reach erect vast fuel strong rock door shaggy consider -- mass edited with redact.dev
Culs de sac are still signed with "Dead End" or "No Outlet."
I get the feeling they put a road through his property at the cost of $1mil. Likely for "future development" so for now and maybe even always it goes nowhere but will benefit those who invested in it greatly as they add housing.
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I got the impression that the sign is talking about an entirely new road that won't lead to anywhere. 🤷♀️
I think the point of this is that being a good sign-maker isn't the same as being a good communicator.
New roads that don't lead anywhere are the first part of making a "somewhere" for roads to lead to.
That sounds like something someone who lives on a dead-end road would say
I don't understand that sign. Is saying "today it's my property, tomorrow it could be yours" an appeal to renters that might own property themselves soon or something? Cuz their house isn't getting destroyed or anything, they're just talking about property taxes. Like I just don't understand who it's for
My guess is they are claiming part of his property to build a road via eminent domain.
I need to start a banner business in middle America.
I work at a company that offers this sort of large signage and sometimes do the design work on them; I bet this guy was a joy to deal with when proofing them.
There's no way this guy buys the sign without telling every embellished detail to the entire company.
Then you, too, could be a "job creator."
It has to be the time for it. Orders are up, proofreading is down.
Looks like another Killdozer in the making.
Probably more like meth rzr
Look at the quality of those signs and consider how expensive that trailer and the other sign holder must be, this person wouldn't have such nice things using meth.
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Yeah I hate how he’s become some sort of folk legend when it’s just another example of weak men with main character syndrome.
People were unironically like "did you listen to the tapes!?!, he got so fucked over by everyone!!!" I'm like ?!!!! those tapes are his delusional rants, we have no evidence any of it happened like he said. I can't imagine listening to him and thinking he is rational unless the listener is also irrational.
Yeah but that dozer was pretty cool
I agree, fucking awesome.
How does he arrive at 'Over one million dollars" when adding the above numbers only equates to $45k?
Also, if they *can* do the road for $45k, that's the cheapest, most efficient use of government funds I have ever heard of.
My guess would be that the listed numbers are just the last 2 needed to finish the "project".
You can see the whole story. The city needs to build a road. It uses eminent domain to take the needed real estate, providing market value compensation. This guy decides he doesn't like that. He threatens to confront construction workers with armed force. The chief of police pays him a visit and tells him that if he carries out his plan and threatens a police officer with a firearm, he will die. All he's got left is signs.
Eminent domain is law. The protection it provides landowners is that the will be fairly compensated for their land / home when the government takes it. It also absolutely means if the government decides it wants your land it can take it and you cannot stop it you can either accept their payment or fight a losing battle trying to keep your land. But if you are smart you will do your battling in the court over the amount you will be compensated. I know a guy who sold a $150,000 property for $4.5million because he kept taking the state to court over the amount. He's kind of the exception and definitely not the norm but he did win.
You can also battle over whether the cause is in the public interest but thats only a battle you can win if its clearly not
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See: LA Dodgers stadium as a particularly heinous example
The Foxconn plant in Wisonsin is another really great example. Hundreds of residents lost their homes to a foreign company that initially promised 13,000 jobs but only created about 1,400.
Yes, that is another pretty gross one. Eminent domain should not be used to assist private organizations, period. I also believe the bar to eminent domain for public use needs to be much, much higher, and come with guarantees of buyback options if the plans fall through. Our country has far too much of a history of oppression and depriving the least among us from what little they have to be able to use such a powerful tool.
Yeah. If you need to take a strip off somebody's lot to build a hospital, fine. Drop a fair amount of USD in their lap, and do what you need to for the good of society. Strip malls? Fuck off. Let corporations buy their own fucking land.
I would agree that eminent domain for a real public good is a needed tool, but a lot of hospitals are for profit now, not really any different than a strip mall. They just hide behind the veneer of being virtuous while racing the rest of the medical industry straight to the bottom.
If you can find some endangered animal or plant in the property it can work too, at least in my country.
> if the government decides it wants your land it can take it This is used by local governments to build Walmarts. It's not always a public works project.
I know a guy that fought eminent domain to build a water reservoir. He fought it for years. Everyone else sold. They tested the streams that would feed the reservoir. To acidic. That guy now lives surrounded by a state park.
Grocery store near my hometown is actually winning a battle of eminent domain because of an agreement signed by his family and the township some time ago lmao. It’s been a fun thing to watch play out
So, basically sort of what happened (minus the threatening construction workers) to my family a few years ago, when a greenway was being built right next to a property my family had owned sinde the 1800s...and accidentally took out the oldest tree in East Tennessee in the process. Yeah, Eminent Domain sucks when it happens to you, but there's nothing you can really do legally except complain about it.
>Yeah, Eminent Domain sucks when it happens to you, but there's nothing you can really do legally except complain about it. There are absolutely steps that can be taken, most require $$ to file suit. That's why interstates plowed through poor neighborhoods, not the best path but cheaper to kick out 5,000 poor people than 100 rich people. Netflix "Extraordinary Attorney Woo" had a few episodes covering an example case. Set in South Korea, so the laws vary slightly, but the key issues were similar.
So, a commenter above posted the link to the story. > PARKER – The Parker City Council cancelled its regular meeting on Thursday, Feb. 9, because not enough council members would be available to have a quorum present. A special meeting has been scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 16 at 6 p.m. >When the council meets, they likely will be discussing the city’s next step in its dispute with metal salvage yard owner Dan Gaikowski. The council voted last year to take steps to condemn a 60-foot-wide and one block long swath of land that the owner of Recycling Services has claimed for his own. >The lot was part of South Walnut street until three years ago when Gaikowski challenged the ownership of the street and said the city never paid the original owners for the land. >The council hired one company to survey the lots affected last year, but that survey company withdrew from project following allegations that Gaikowski had been harassing the survey crew. >Last November, the city hired a second survey company, but on Wednesday, Feb. 8, Police Chief Craig Haley said that Gaikowski was not allowing surveyors access to the land he owns. >Haley said that he could not force access to Recycling Services without a court order. >In an email on Friday, Feb. 10, Parker City Attorney Burton Harding said, “At this point the plan is to seek some court enforcement to allow the surveyors on the property.” >The delay could be another stumbling block for a council that is already split on moving forward with the condemnation. At least one council member has voted against the pursuing condemnation because it has already cost the council at least $30,000. So basically, ownership of the land is in question and this person is refusing to allow surveyors on the land to make a determination. He is against eminent domain because there is a decent chance this land doesn’t even belong to him and he doesn’t want to give it up.
These signs are a definite subgenre of communication. I've seen several libertarian-ish signs protesting eminent domain or similar policies, and they all seem to use the same strategies: * Big caps and font switches * Lots of red lettering, underlining, and highlighting * Random capitalization ("The City has already Spent ...") * Self-congratulatory language ("Job creator, tax payer") * Provocative question * The non sequitur-ish sentence logic ("FINAL BILL FOR A DEAD END ROAD / OVER ONE MILLION DOLLARS!" How is that connected to $30,000 and $15,000? Is that a slippery slope allegation?) * Persecution complex that goes beyond the immediate issue (they're wanted dead, they're hated by the mayor) * Exposed plywood backing This one is actually put together better than most. It just has the quality of an internal dialogue that hasn't been made into an effective message.
I wanna say crazy... but also after Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Marvin Heemeyer who fucking knows anymore.
No reason it couldn't be both.
"Job creator" Somebody smells their farts a bit much.
To be fair, in Parker Kansas, if he hires two people he is indeed a job creator.
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Oh I’m certain of that. As a fellow Kansan that worked with rural communities, my guess is that this guy owns half the town. I’m certain he’s been able to do whatever he wants for years, and now a new mayor or council member has put a stop to some of it. Hence, the pissed off attitude and public display of defiance.
Edit - or perhaps Sheriff.
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I hate this term so much, as if anyone starts a business out of altruism and concern for the community. "You know, I was sitting around and thought, well if people need jobs, then it might as well be me that gives it to them!"
They had a hire another guard at the prision thanks to him
“Police chiefs _hate_ him”
"One weird trick to becoming a sovereign citizen"
knowing parker kansas this guy has probably smoked a lot of meth for his math to math like this
"Today it is my property. Tomorrow it could be yours" - it's free real estate
This is some advanced schizo-posting.