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How did Bob Dylan upset his neighbours? (The answer is blowin' in the wind)

By Guy Adams in Los Angeles

Bob Dylan's Malibu estate has a portable lavatory which is causing his neighbours to complain

AP Photo/Victoria's Secret

Bob Dylan's Malibu estate has a portable lavatory which is causing his neighbours to complain

He may be the voice of a generation. But if you're unfortunate enough to live next door to Bob Dylan, stirring protest songs and shrill mouth organ music aren't the only things that might be – to paraphrase his most famous lyric – blowin' in the wind.

The star has become embroiled in a gloriously petty dispute involving the allegedly noxious smell emanating from a portable lavatory sited in the grounds of his sprawling cliff-top home overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Malibu.

Neighbours of the reclusive Dylan – who has owned an estate at Point Dune, a famous beauty spot north-west of Los Angeles, for more than two decades – went public this week with complaints that night-time sea breezes are sending the odour of raw sewage wafting into their homes.

One family, who news crews have described as being "tangled up in poo", complained this week to police that the stench has made their child ill and forced them to abandon the upstairs bedrooms of their house on warm nights. "Mr Civil Rights is killing our civil rights!" David Emminger told reporters, while pointing out the controversial, blue portable lavatory, which is behind a storage container next to a wire fence that marks the border of Dylan's property.

Since it was installed six months ago, apparently to cater for security staff who patrol Dylan's grounds at night, Mr Emminger claims the lavatory has made portions of his family home uninhabitable. He is unable to sleep on some nights, he alleges, and his eight-year-old son, David junior, has fallen ill from the fumes.

"It started in September. I'd go into the front yard and get nauseous," Mr Emminger's wife, Cindy, told the Los Angeles Times. "I couldn't figure out at first where the smell was coming from, until I finally noticed that they had moved the porta-potty directly in front of my front door. We both have allergies and are sensitive to chemicals. It's worse when it's misty outside at night. We turn on the five fans, but it still gets inside our house. We're not even using the upstairs now. We sleep downstairs."

Malibu City public health officials are investigating the complaint by the couple, who have installed five industrial-sized outdoor fans in their front yard to blow noxious fumes back on to Dylan's property.

The city apparently tried to send an officer to inspect the contentious lavatory in January, but he was turned away by Dylan's security staff and accused of trespassing. "[The guard] said they were going to sue the city," an inspector told the LA Times.

Dylan has yet to comment on the affair, and neither his spokesman nor his New York-based attorney was returning calls on what headline-writers billed "outhouse blues" yesterday. Local bylaws prohibit homeowners from producing excessive odours.

It isn't the first time that Dylan's Malibu property, on one of the most expensive portions of real estate in California, has been at the centre of controversy. A guardhouse that Dylan built to accommodate his 24-hour security detail sparked a planning row in 1989, when Los Angeles County building and safety inspectors refused it a permit for being inaccessible to the disabled. The singer bypassed legal accessibility requirements by promising, in writing, that he "would not hire any handicapped persons" to work in his security staff.

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Comments

Slow News Day?
[info]cm999 wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 08:35 am (UTC)
Come Indy. Is there really nothing else more important or interesting going on anywhere in the world than this?
AAAAH
[info]mowfalmighty wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 09:13 am (UTC)
Aaah So thats what he meant by subterranean homesick blues
opinionated non subscriber
[info]immmmmm wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 10:57 am (UTC)
cm999 wrote "...." --Clearly nothing better going on in your world than feeling the need to read through an article and then become a self appointed "subby". When oh when will the press limit "Have your say" postings to people who actually pay for the content they are so quick to comment on.
Re: opinionated non subscriber
[info]tominlondon wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 11:24 am (UTC)
Was that post really necessary? Think.
[info]alphonsus123 wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 12:15 pm (UTC)


No S**t.

Alphonsus123
bangdon
[info]mogo12 wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 06:03 pm (UTC)
yeah ... and shoud we give a f... about dylan's toilet
blowin' in wind
[info]missreddin wrote:
Wednesday, 18 March 2009 at 08:20 pm (UTC)
Is this really Bob's property, still? I thought it was sold over a year ago. If its his property, was the concern taken to the Department Services in that county, or simply a complaint mode with neighbors?
Why does it make since to you to mention the guard house? How many times have you seen a security guard in a wheelchair chase off at hi speed to confront intruders in hillside retreats??
Does England ever confirm their press sources and facts, or just print any good **it.
The answer
[info]tallbendyman wrote:
Thursday, 19 March 2009 at 01:18 pm (UTC)
my friends, is blowing in the wind...
dyladan barby
[info]dyladan wrote:
Sunday, 5 April 2009 at 04:28 pm (UTC)
First, we clarify who is this close to home. The lady in question is Cindy Emminger (just enter his name on google here and there) I discovered that part of the "House Center for Children - Research and treatment for children and adults with autism." So we know that are always campaigns to recruit funds and in time of crisis have thought to use for good or evil 's enviable proximity to home. Bob Dylan in the past has already been the subject of similar scandals, we think the campaign of garbage from a ..... perpretata elusive character to defame Mr. Dylan. So definitely have had some problem with the exhaust going into all the houses in the world, but he certainly is, but rather the heads of the health service to Malibu .... or worse yet a vengeance to the request for funds from charities Part of the negative and never granted by Dylan. Bravo Bob sbattetene and fregatene infamous of these people who do not party and it will never part. W Blowin 'in the Wind!

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