A group of landscapers have created an online petition to fight Quiet Yards Greenwich ordinance, a proposal before the town’s Representative Town Meeting (RTM) that would limit the use of gas-power leaf blowers to summertime.
The petition’s creators, who call themselves Greenwich Ground Keepers, argue that the switch from gas-powered blowers to electric blowers is not economically feasible. In their petition, they call attention to the higher costs of the electric blowers, the lack of local maintenance options for the machines, the absence of charging infrastructure for the electric blowers, and the environmental impact of lithium-ion (LIO) batteries used by these blowers. They also stated they would be forced to pass on the increased costs of these machines to their customers.
“I am a landscaper/tree worker in town,” wrote Paul Sudell on the Change.org page for the petition. “Have been for over 30 years. It’s hard enough now to make a living. But if this ban goes through it will be impossible to work and make a living. It is so easy to just say stop using the tools we need for our livelihood when you have millions of dollars in your bank account. I agree with a no noise ordinance on Sunday. But at least during the week we need to work. People just don’t realize things unless they live the life of others.”
The petition gained 350 signatures when it went live yesterday. As of 9:00 a.m. this morning, it had 415 signatures – its goal is 500 signatures.
On Monday, the RTM voted to postpone the proposal to limit the use of gas-powered leaf blowers until it meets again in January. This follows last week’s decision by the Greenwich Board of Health to repeal the town’s noise ordinance, which resulted in the ordinance created by the state’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection to become the town’s governing standard.
Photo: Chris Yarzab / Flickr Creative Commons
It has been proven that Gas Powered Leaf Blowers cause significant pollution by blowing dirt and particles into that air that we breathe. Give your lazy landscapers rakes, because all Landscaper Owners care about is how fast that can use undocumented workers to blow dirt around quickly adding to environmental injustice. Greenwich get your heads out of arse and ban these nasty machines