This Community Was Outraged When A Neighbor Close To The School Installed An Electric Fence To Keep Kids Off Of His Lawn

His lawn was more precious than the children.

Elana

• Published in Funny
• January 24, 2019

For some people, the health and appearance of their lawn is pretty much everything to them. To some degree, it makes sense. Maintaining a lawn to near-perfection is no small feat. It can be expensive and time consuming and it's understandable that when it turns out great the person who has poured their time and money into it is going to be quite proud of their hard work paying off.

Unfortunately, this sense of pride can lead to some obsessiveness as well as lead the owner of the perfect lawn to going totally overboard in protecting it. Living near a school is not easy most of the time, at least twice a day during the school year, cold or warm weather irrelevant, there is bound to be hoards of children walking by and a lot of them are liable to step off the sidewalk and onto your lawn.

The 'ol "get off my lawn" bit is almost understandable when you really care about your lawn and put a lot into it, but how far is too far?

For the residents of Henrico County, Virginia, the line was drawn when one neighbor appeared to install an electric fence.

At first, the fence itself looked harmless, but the panel nearby suggested the more ominous obvious: it was electrified.

Parents were shocked!

Haha, but seriously. He set his electric fence up really close to a bus stop for both middle school and high school students. That is shocking.

According to WRIC, the fence stood only inches away from where the kids were waiting, making it easy for one to fall on it and injure themselves.

Potential injuries aside, what really upset the parents in the community was that Bryan Tucker, owner of the fence in question, had not put up any warning signs. No indication that was blatantly obvious the fence was electrified and could hurt a child, on accident or otherwise.

The lack of warning was what pushed the parents over the edge and they decided the right thing to do... was call the police.

Bryan claims he installed the fence to keep kids from trespassing on his property and to prevent them from leaving trash everywhere. As he told WRIC:

I'm not in charge of other people's children. I'm not directing other people's children what to do. All I can do is protect myself and that's why I've got a fence up.

Beep-beep, here's the police.

The police arrived and called Henrico County's Public Works Department to inquire whether or not the fence extended to "public easement."

Ultimately, the county did in fact conclude the fence encroached on the easement. This meant it was illegal and Tucker had to take it down.

Don't get too excited.

The fence existing, however, is not illegal. So if Tucker wants to keep it on his property line, he can reinstall it.

And WRIC reported that Tucker fully intends to keep the fence up, completely regardless to what his neighbors think about it!

The neighbors have been vocal about their opinion, too. Wayne Milby said:

What you don't like kids? Me, I'm a parent and I don't want any children to get electrocuted.

Tucker rationalizes his decision by suggesting that "No Tresspassing" signs are largely ineffective.

This begs one question: what on earth is wrong with a normal, non-electric fence!?

So, Bryan's fence will stay up. But on his property line... will it be an issue? Reportedly, his property line is far enough away from the bus stop that any kids would have to wander away from the stop and towards it to make contact with it.

The story quickly gained a lot of attention on social media, but surprisingly... a lot of people were on board with Tucker's choice and right to defend his property.

Even more astonishing, some people didn't just agree with his right but they thought his idea was brilliant.

Tucker is even inspiring other people who now would like an electric fence of their own.

Thankfully, on the other side of the fence some people were definitely not on board Tucker's idea. Raising valid points about how even a small shock can be very dangerous for the wrong person and that a normal freaking fence would have worked just as well in keeping teenagers off of the lawn.

So let's say you agree with Tucker's choice, because kids shouldn't be on his lawn anyway. What happens when a culture that doesn't properly handle bullying leads to kids pushing other kids into the electric fence? Who will be held accountable when the worst happens?

Do you think Tucker could just install a normal fence or do you fully support his choice of an electrified one? Let us know.

Elana