
HN: need advice/help - scaredhacker
I&#x27;m a young hacker who&#x27;s in a bit of trouble.<p>Without getting too long winded, I&#x27;m recently out of college and living in a home I inherited after my mother passed. I was lax about maintenance while in school (and take full responsibility for that.)<p>The city health department sent me a letter about my house&#x27;s paint-job and I tried to comply.<p>Apparently my paint-job was insufficient, so they brought legal charges against me which resulted in 2 years of probation and 30 days of jail if I&#x27;m unable to fix it in 60 days. The obvious thing to do is hire a professional, but I&#x27;m completely out of money now. The court tacks on hundreds in fees, which has drained my account.<p>I&#x27;ve never run afoul of the law and this whole experience has made me terribly afraid. I never set out to hurt or bother anyone in the world - all I do is solve math problems and write software for fun.<p>My request is that if anyone has any sort of little programming work that I could do for some small amount of money, then I will do it. Posting this is extremely embarrassing for me, but I have very little options left and I&#x27;m really struggling.<p>I can be reached at scaredhacker@gmail.com. If this post is stupid or bothers anyone feel free to remove it, I&#x27;m sorry.
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jnbiche
If it's the city health department, then it's probably a matter of some lead
paint ordinance you're (accidentally) violating. Was your house built before
1980?

If it's lead paint issue, then probably the paint is flaking off somewhere in
copious amounts. Or it was flaking off, and it was improperly encapsulated
(ie, wasn't adequately scraped off, and/or the paint you used to cover it up
wasn't approved for that purpose by your jurisdiction).

Assuming this is the issue, were you able to reach all the painted areas of
your home that are flaking? Have you read your city's lead paint ordinances
and/or health department guides to find out how to properly
remediate/encapsulate lead paint? This could help you discover what you did
wrong, if anything.

By the way, whatever you do, _never_ sand or heat lead paint, or scrape it
without wetting it first with water and wearing a proper respirator. And never
do any lead paint work with young children anywhere nearby (they're very
susceptible to lead paint poisoning).

source: worked as a house painter back in college. (None of my comments are
medical, legal, or professional advice, obviously)

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PaulHoule
Can you get a home equity line? You can get credit on very good terms this way
and I think it is reasonable to use it to fund improvements to the house.

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scaredhacker
I will look into this, thank you very much.

I'm not well versed in finance, etc. so this will be a good real-world crash
course :P

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ChuckMcM
A home equity loan is exactly what people usually do. Depending on your credit
rating you might be able to get a line of credit on the home which works
something like an "on demand" loan.

But this is very important, if you get a loan secured by equity in your house,
you can lose your house if you don't pay it back. So check the loan terms
carefully. Given that professional painters will generally paint the place for
much less than $10,000 you should be able to do this. Also you should be able
to talk to the city and show them proof that you're in the process of getting
the house painted and they should be willing to give you extra time.

Welcome to adulthood, parts of it really suck.

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jnbiche
> professional painters will generally paint the place for much less than
> $10,000 you should be able to do this

Unfortunately, lead paint remediation will almost certainly cost more than
$10,000 unless it's a tiny house. You can find unlicensed operations that will
charge less, but then you risk the very large fines for hiring an unlicensed
operation for hazardous lead paint remediation. I wouldn't risk it since the
city is already looking into the situation.

But I do agree that you should be able to get an extension if you can show a
good faith effort at addressing the problem, unless your city health
department is totally unreasonable (always possible, I suppose).

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bbcbasic
I have no advice except to wish you good luck with this. You are being bullied
by big brother. Keep up the fight. Keep it legal. Some good advice in this
thread about getting a lawyer etc. Keep up your studies and remember you have
a good life ahead doing what you love, and this is a hickup.

I really hate these stories of "the system" needlessly causing stress and
suffering to people who have not done anything wrong. I see a lot of these
stories from the USA which give me the impression it is quite risky to live
there with respect to rubbing 'the law' up the wrong way even if you are
morally or literally innocent.

Personally I'd look into getting a visa to work in UK/Europe/Australia. There
isn't as much love for needless suing and incarceration. Controversial. Happy
to be downvoted :-)

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MalcolmDiggs
I'm not an lawyer, but I think you need one. If they're bringing criminal
charges against you, then you may be entitled to a public defender (if it's
civil charges, then you may not be). Either way, a fact-finding mission to the
courthouse may be in order.

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scaredhacker
Thanks, I'll see about a public defender. Edit: unfortunately, I believe it's
a civil matter so I don't think I can get a public defender.

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increduloushulk
Civil matters don't usually end with either probation or jail time. If you
can't afford counsel, I suppose you might be able to find an attorney who
would trade you representation for some development or technical services.
Other options might be legal clinics at nearby law schools, or pro bono
programs. You can also call the local bar association and see whether they
have a referral program.

I know you weren't really asking for information, as such, but you might get
some useful tidbits if you include the city (and possibly the ordinance you
ran into). Maybe there some advocacy groups in your city that can help you
out.

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scaredhacker
I was able to find a local legal aid society through my state's bar
association, so thank you. Looks like they accept volunteers as well, perhaps
they could use some tech service as you suggested.

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srdev
Have they said why your paint job is insufficient? Its hard to imagine that it
would require a professional.

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scaredhacker
I've received practically no information from them aside from the legal
letters.

They seem unwilling to send a person to walk around the exterior with me to
point out what I've specifically done wrong, preferring instead to just
mysteriously drive by at a time of their choosing. (they're worse than the
cable company :P)

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Akarnani
Check out Upstart, LendingClub, and Prosper for a quick, reasonably priced
loan.

