Peacetown Jonathan
05-16-2011, 11:48 PM
<!--> <style> v\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} o\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} w\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} .shape {behavior:url(#default#VML);} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" LatentStyleCount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if !mso]><object classid="clsid:38481807-CA0E-42D2-BF39-B33AF135CC4D" id=ieooui></object> <style> st1\:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0pt 5.4pt 0pt 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0pt; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--> On Tuesday evening starting about 6:30 in the Youth Annex next to the community Center, Sebastopol's City Council will hear public comment and debate whether or not to restrict leaf blowers in the city limits. Our group, the Sebastopol Peaceful Air Effort, has listened to a number of our neighbors who were concerned that their personal use of leaf blowers to actually blow leaves and clear roof gutters would be banned. so we developed a compromise solution, which I am pasting below, allowing residents to continue using their leaf blowers, while providing notice to neighbors who request to know what hours the blowers will be used.
The compromise also calls for the city to lead the way by example and replace blowers with rakes, brooks, vacuums and sweepers whenever possible.
Under the compromise, the only entities that will be banned from using blowers are those properties with over 2,000 square feet of hardscape parking lots and walkways. Most of these commercial and multi-unit housing complexes are owned by a few large corporations, multimillionaires, and real estate trusts. Some of them have angrily complained to the City Council that their landscaping bills will rise when they have to switch to vacuums and brooms to gather the toxic dust that they currently blow into our air, typically every single week, leaves or no leaves.
Meanwhile, Sebastopol senior Jim Stoops polled 22 of his neighbors at the Burbank Homes senior housing, and found that 21 of the 22 wanted the building management to stop using leaf blowers, due to the incessant weekly noise and respiratory ailments the blowers caused. He was told by the management that it would only switch to brooms if a city ordinance forced it to. Every one of the more than one dozen residents of Petaluma Homes that I spoke to also said they wanted the insanely disruptive and unhealthy twice weekly blowing of their walkways to stop, but their management refused. The residents felt that less frequent sweeping of walkways would achieve the same results, at the same cost.
It is true that some landscapers who service large parking lot accounts might raise their rates because they need to switch to vacuums. But the owners of these large multi-million dollar properties, have, in essence, benefited from pollution tat the blowers cause, just as dirty coal plants benefited from not investing in cleaner plants, while the rest of us paid for the costs of respiratory illness and global warming. These millionaires are not going to roll up their properties and take them elsewhere. Like other businesses in the history of environmental politics, they can, and should, be forced to pay for less polluting methods.
Given the compromise that allows individuals to keep their blowers, I hope that all the members of our city council can place the needs of our community’s seniors, children and residents, ahead of the so called "right" of a handful of multimillionaires and real estate trusts and managers (few of whom are actually people living in Sebastopol) to profit from the lowest cost, highest polluting methods available to clean their hardscape lots.
Please join us at the City Council hearing and express your opinion on this hotly contested environmental issue.
:yinyang:
Sebastopol Peaceful Air Effort
Leaf Blower Regulation Compromise Solution
To members of the Sebastopol City Council, May 2011
[I]After much debate, members of the Sebastopol Peaceful Air Effort (SPARE) propose that our City Council use this compromise solution as the basis for a local ordinance regulating leaf blowers. We believe that an ordinance based on this compromise will reduce leaf blower usage in our city by more than 90% while preserving the ability of individuals to use leaf blowers for their own homes.
1) City Use of Leaf Blowers
The City of Sebastopol will lead by example in curtailing its use of leaf blowers for walkways and hardscape by replacing gas-powered leaf blowers with leaf vacuums, push sweepers (like those by Haaga), and rakes and brooms whenever possible. The city will make a special effort to do this for city properties containing playgrounds and schools.
2) Private Individual Use of Leaf Blowers
Homeowners are encouraged (but not required)to use electric leaf blowers rather than gas-powered ones. They may not use gas-powered leaf blowers manufactured before 2005. They are free to use their personal leaf blowers on their own property from Monday through Saturday, except legal holidays, between the hours of 10 am and 4 pm.
3) Leaf Blower Use on Large Hardscape Surfaces
The weekly blowing of hardscape (cement or asphalt) parking lots and walkways with leaf blowers is responsible for a majority of blower air and noise pollution in Sebastopol. Vacuuming of larger hardscape areas is recognized as the environmentally appropriate means of clearing hardscape. Accordingly, the use of leaf blowers on hardscape greater than 2000 square feet should be prohibited effective January 1, 2012. This restriction shall not apply to single unit residential property (e.g., residential driveways and walkways).
4) Resident Request System
If a resident is bothered by a neighbor’s leaf blower use, he or she may request of the user that the blowing take place during the same scheduled two-hour period on the same day each week and that he or she be notified of when this time will be, in advance. In this way, concerned residents will be able to schedule their time – business appointments, naps, phone calls, and time outdoors – around scheduled leaf blowing.
The compromise also calls for the city to lead the way by example and replace blowers with rakes, brooks, vacuums and sweepers whenever possible.
Under the compromise, the only entities that will be banned from using blowers are those properties with over 2,000 square feet of hardscape parking lots and walkways. Most of these commercial and multi-unit housing complexes are owned by a few large corporations, multimillionaires, and real estate trusts. Some of them have angrily complained to the City Council that their landscaping bills will rise when they have to switch to vacuums and brooms to gather the toxic dust that they currently blow into our air, typically every single week, leaves or no leaves.
Meanwhile, Sebastopol senior Jim Stoops polled 22 of his neighbors at the Burbank Homes senior housing, and found that 21 of the 22 wanted the building management to stop using leaf blowers, due to the incessant weekly noise and respiratory ailments the blowers caused. He was told by the management that it would only switch to brooms if a city ordinance forced it to. Every one of the more than one dozen residents of Petaluma Homes that I spoke to also said they wanted the insanely disruptive and unhealthy twice weekly blowing of their walkways to stop, but their management refused. The residents felt that less frequent sweeping of walkways would achieve the same results, at the same cost.
It is true that some landscapers who service large parking lot accounts might raise their rates because they need to switch to vacuums. But the owners of these large multi-million dollar properties, have, in essence, benefited from pollution tat the blowers cause, just as dirty coal plants benefited from not investing in cleaner plants, while the rest of us paid for the costs of respiratory illness and global warming. These millionaires are not going to roll up their properties and take them elsewhere. Like other businesses in the history of environmental politics, they can, and should, be forced to pay for less polluting methods.
Given the compromise that allows individuals to keep their blowers, I hope that all the members of our city council can place the needs of our community’s seniors, children and residents, ahead of the so called "right" of a handful of multimillionaires and real estate trusts and managers (few of whom are actually people living in Sebastopol) to profit from the lowest cost, highest polluting methods available to clean their hardscape lots.
Please join us at the City Council hearing and express your opinion on this hotly contested environmental issue.
:yinyang:
Sebastopol Peaceful Air Effort
Leaf Blower Regulation Compromise Solution
To members of the Sebastopol City Council, May 2011
[I]After much debate, members of the Sebastopol Peaceful Air Effort (SPARE) propose that our City Council use this compromise solution as the basis for a local ordinance regulating leaf blowers. We believe that an ordinance based on this compromise will reduce leaf blower usage in our city by more than 90% while preserving the ability of individuals to use leaf blowers for their own homes.
1) City Use of Leaf Blowers
The City of Sebastopol will lead by example in curtailing its use of leaf blowers for walkways and hardscape by replacing gas-powered leaf blowers with leaf vacuums, push sweepers (like those by Haaga), and rakes and brooms whenever possible. The city will make a special effort to do this for city properties containing playgrounds and schools.
2) Private Individual Use of Leaf Blowers
Homeowners are encouraged (but not required)to use electric leaf blowers rather than gas-powered ones. They may not use gas-powered leaf blowers manufactured before 2005. They are free to use their personal leaf blowers on their own property from Monday through Saturday, except legal holidays, between the hours of 10 am and 4 pm.
3) Leaf Blower Use on Large Hardscape Surfaces
The weekly blowing of hardscape (cement or asphalt) parking lots and walkways with leaf blowers is responsible for a majority of blower air and noise pollution in Sebastopol. Vacuuming of larger hardscape areas is recognized as the environmentally appropriate means of clearing hardscape. Accordingly, the use of leaf blowers on hardscape greater than 2000 square feet should be prohibited effective January 1, 2012. This restriction shall not apply to single unit residential property (e.g., residential driveways and walkways).
4) Resident Request System
If a resident is bothered by a neighbor’s leaf blower use, he or she may request of the user that the blowing take place during the same scheduled two-hour period on the same day each week and that he or she be notified of when this time will be, in advance. In this way, concerned residents will be able to schedule their time – business appointments, naps, phone calls, and time outdoors – around scheduled leaf blowing.