I could be wrong, but they likely asked because vinyl/PVC is generally toxic to the environment so it was probably a means of asking whether your neighbor replaced the foliage in their yard with a fixture that poisons the ground. I wouldn’t be surprised if the strips in the chain link were vinyl, as that’s a pretty common outdoor filler material.

I’m not the person you replied to, but pretty sure the question was whether the neighbor in your story replaced their hedge with a vinyl fence specifically.