Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Before getting to my main point, I'd like to thank Travis County District Attorney candidate Gary Cobb for replying to my complaint with an apology. I'm definitely willing to consider him now, although a candidate for District Attorney who doesn't follow local ordinances confuses me a bit (see below).

Well the producer of the door-to-door flyer left a comment on the last post. This is my response (completely in addition to my wife's):

1) A No Solicitation sign doesn't meet our needs. We'd be happy to talk to solicitors and even peddlers, certainly campaign workers. What we don't want is trash left on our property. I appreciate the offer, but if you haven't sent the sign, please keep it.
2) I believe you have quality control in place to avoid No Soliciting signs, but you say you use "the best companies in the business" for distribution, yet your website invites fundraising groups to do the distribution. I'd hardly call them companies, much less evaluated ones.
3) I'm with you on the billboards. Not a big fan myself, although I know some great people in the business.
4) I have a business degree and understand that businesses have to be creative to have their voice heard in the marketplace. I understand if it wasn't intended to be, but the last part of your letter sounds fairly condescending.
5) In all fairness, those are all minor points with your letter. Here's the core of my issue. Those other methods that are more expensive cost more because they are using someone's property - a billboard, airwaves, ad real estate. This is cheaper because you are using MY PROPERTY to advertise to me with no compensation and, quite frankly, no consideration at all. There is nothing in the purest capitalist system that would allow you to advertise on my property without my permission, whether to others or to me. Bring your flyers around and offer one to whoever answers the door - that's great and I'll answer the door and refuse but without any bad feeling. I've checked and as near as I can tell, leaving the flyers on my property falls under the Pflugerville city ordinance against littering as opposed to the peddling that is coming to my door to sell me something. The peddling is controlled by the No Solicitors sign (although also all individuals engaged in such are supposed to have specific permits), but the littering is forbidden to all but the owner.

So I repeat my request: please ensure that your representatives do not litter on my property again. In general, I'd prefer it if you focused on what is by all accounts a good business at What's For Dinner than littering on people's property, but I'll drop my individual complaints if you will respect my property rights.

To anyone who might happen on this blog, does anyone know if the businesses mentioned in the last post as using this service have No Soliciting signs on their stores? That would seem to cross to the hypocritical.

Oh, also, to add to my Littering Hall of Fame, I'd like to nominate precinct captain David Taylor of the Ron Paul campaign, who believes government should stay out of our lives and property, but apparently political campaigns should not have to obey littering notices. Thank you, David, for leaving contact information - if anyone would like to share their thoughts on this matter with him, you can reach him at 762-5066. Amazing how the communication can undermine the message.
posted by Unknown 5:45 PM | 3 comments