SARATOGA, CA – Michael Ballard was fined for more than $120,000 because his county discovered an employee, Marcelino Martinez, was living in an RV on Ballard’s property, according to an Associated Press report.
Ballard, owner of the 2.6 million square foot Savannah-Chanelle Vineyards, asserts he received a fine based on the county’s local zoning law that “bans anyone from living in an RV on public or private property,” noted The Mercury News, the article states.
Martinez, manager/employee of Ballard, had fallen victim to limited options for affordable housing after his family lost their lease on a trailer.
The AP story notes, “The Ballard family agreed to allow them to live in an RV at the vineyards. Martinez, his wife and children have lived there for free since 2013, according to The Mercury News.”
Ballard disclosed, “I couldn’t make a family homeless for arbitrary reasons,” adding, “The human impact exceeded any damage or nuisance that their continued living in the trailer was going to create,” the article states.
In July 2019, the county started fining the Ballards. The article states they were being fined “$1,000 daily for the RV, then they lowered the penalty to $250 a day, the vineyard owner said.”
As stated by the article, “The county disputed that it fined Ballard $120,000 and said he refused to agree to deadlines to reduce the violations, according to the newspaper.”
The county was imposing “excessive fines” and violating the U.S. Constitution with its actions against Ballard, his attorney Paul Avelar told The Mercury News.
The article states, “Ballard doesn’t agree with the county spending so much time penalizing him when it is facing greater issues.”
“Just drive anywhere in the county, there are mobile homes parked all over the place. There are encampments everywhere you go,” he told the newspaper.
“The problem is obvious and overt, yet they’re choosing to prosecute us in probably the least intrusive example of this, where we are letting someone live on private property in a private location and we’re not bothering anyone,” AP wrote.
