Forest Knolls resident William 'Chicken Bill' Machmuller shows off a building he outfitted with solar panels to provide electricity to his house and property. (photo by Lori Eppstein)
Forest Knolls resident William 'Chicken Bill' Machmuller shows off a building he outfitted with solar panels to provide electricity to his house and property. (photo by Lori Eppstein)
By Lori Eppstein
After living in his home for more than 23 years, a Forest Knolls man last month was ordered to leave his property after county inspectors called it "uninhabitable and a threat to surrounding properties."
William "Chicken Bill" Machmuller has been living the life of a homeless man since his eviction from 42 Juarez Ave., his mother Rita Lamb told The Light last week.
Because of a head injury from a motorcycle accident, Machmuller is unable to hold a job, and he can't sell his property if he wants to keep his only source of income -- a monthly government disability check for $630. Moved his flock
He appeared before Marin Superior Court last Tuesday to report repairs on 28 property violations.
"Chicken Bill," so nicknamed by neighborhood kids, told Judge Peter Allen Smith he had re moved his chickens, ducks, and geese from the property and had trans ferred combustible chemicals to storage lockers.
Judge Smith referred the case to the Community Development Agency for further review.
Machmuller left behind on the property his inventions and self-tooled devices, a house in a state of ongoing construction, and his research on psychology and futuristic buildings.
"I'm glad they condemned the house" said his mother Rita Lamb of Dallas, Oregon. "He will lose his Taj Mahal but I don't want my son living like that anymore."
Mrs. Lamb recalled visiting her son in the dead of winter. He was huddling close to the pot-belly stove wearing "socks upon socks" and the wind blowing through wall-less corridors, she said.
Machmuller removed the pot-belly stove last month because the county called it a fire hazard.
Belden had difficulty starting construction, and 20 neighborhood children wrote letters protesting his plans. The kids had long used the lot's rocky slopes for "cardboard sliding," and they surveyed the Valley from a tree fort built there by Chicken Bill.
The county merged Belden's lot with an adjacent one to compensate for the house's size. Later he was required to legalize an in-law apartment on the house's first floor.
He told The Light last week he is preparing to sell his house and believes Machmuller's cluttered yard devalues his property.
"I believe in 'live and let live' but I became fearful of the brush and debris that was piling up [on Chicken Bill's property] and not being cleared away. All it would take is one spark...," Belden said.
Belden more than a year ago sent the county a formal complaint against Machmuller, who is also known for sewing up neighborhood pets who have been attacked by raccoons. Five neighbors signed the complaint.
The county in August sent a team of five inspectors to Machmuller's house. They found his home to be in "imminent danger" of collapse, his sewage disposal inadequate, his yard cluttered, his construction operation illegal, and his roosters and geese too noisy for a residential area.
Michael Singleton of the County Counsel's office said Machmuller's property was surrounded by open space when he bought his property 23 years ago. He fancied his small four-lot parcel to be a ranch or an Indian reservation, Singleton said.
When neighbors bought the surrounding lots and built them up, Machmuller told Singleton they took the spirit of the ranch.
"The neighbors expect him to live a cer tain way, (but) he has some very eccentric ideas," Singleton said.
"To live next to Chicken Bill was a nightmare. He made my life miserable. But I felt sorry for him at the same time," the neighbor said.
The neighbor recalled Machmuller killing and tanning sheep, and his goats giving off an unbearable stench.
"He wasn't a quiet, reclusive eccentric. He was cantankerous and ornery. He would yell at me with fury," the neighbor said.
Neighbor troubles and eviction added insult to injury for Machmuller who 27 years ago survived a bad motorcycle accident that "knocked his brain clear back to his neck," his mother said.
Machmuller used part of his insurance settlement from the accident to put a down payment on the Forest Knolls property.
Marin planners have encouraged Machmuller to submit engineering plans and a permit application to upgrade his house. Machmuller has since sent various pages of a plan for a self-designed futuristic house to five different county agencies. Page five got sent to the Fire Marshal. Page 12 went to county planners. And so on.
He said he didn't want the plans cross-referenced and the technology "used as a weapon by third world countries."
Even with conventionally engineered plans, it is doubtful Machmuller would have the money to make the repairs mandated by the county.
Singleton said Machmuller would lose his disability income if he sold the property. For now, he continues to live in exile from his home in order to support himself.
Singleton said there are no living accommodations for Machmuller other than homeless shelters.
"He doesn't want to talk about that," Singleton said. "I think he needs somebody who can help him make a plan."
After his court appearance last Tuesday, Mrs. Lamb said her son for the first time acknowledged his accident, and now has a lump developing on the back of his head. Machmuller told his mother he plans to get a CATSCAN.
