The area we live in has 5-10-20 acre home sites. The one thing that I've learned is when people move out here they think that they can do anything they want. One guy upwind cleared his 25 acre tract and burned huge piles of downed trees; the smoke was so thick that we couldn't see our property line so the first burn day we all stayed indoors. And the second. And the third. By that time I had things I needed to do; I don't mind a minor sacrifice but this was becoming ridiculous, so several of us complained and he developed a more manageable burn plan. Bottom line, IMHO: What you do on your property is your business, but when it comes onto my property it's my business. RAH, my first offer was to pay for the materials and help provide the labor---that is as low cost/no cost as it gets, and he refused. "What we have here is failure to communicate----some men, you just can't reach."
