Retired Chicago teacher and environmentalist Kathy Cummings moved into her West Town three-flat in 1999, and began transforming the postage-stamp front yard into the kind of natural landscape she knows is best for the world.
Cummings, a two-time Green Party candidate, says she took a look at the weed law and became convinced she hadn’t violated it. The ordinance specifies that the average height of weeds must not exceed ten inches, but doesn’t define what a weed is; a supplementary rule identifies them only as “vegetation that is not managed or maintained” by the property owner. She requested a hearing.
In his case, says Dunn, the judge fingered a plant in a photograph and said, “That weed is over 18 inches tall.” When Dunn replied, “No, that’s a native plant, milkweed,” the judge declared, “There you go! Weed, over 18 inches tall. Guilty.”
Besides all that, the suit claims that the ordinance violates a state law setting a maximum municipal fine of $750 for a single offense. And by promoting native vegetation for conservation and then citing it as weeds, the “City in a Garden” is engaging in a “a game of entrapment.”
