Considering that Sonoma is supposed to be one of the friendliest cities in the U.S., there sure seem to be a lot of upset people here.
Whether it’s the film festival’s “Sonomawood” sign, too many tasting rooms, Pete’s Coffee, or a group of hotel owners trying to ban competition, there seems to be no limit to the number of small groups that want to enforce their ideas on the rest of us.
The latest effort by one such group is to ban leaf blowers. It is being championed by Darryl Ponicsan and has the support of the editor of this newspaper, David Bolling.
In Tuesday’s Index-Tribune, there were two letters to the editor about the evils of leaf blowing, and a large section of an article about the activities of the City Council was devoted to the subject. Allow me to offer a few observations on the subject.
First, a leaf-blower ban will significantly increase landscaper fees as a result of the additional time required to rake rather than blow leaves. As the Index-Tribune article pointed out, the city did a test on the Fryer Creek bike path and found that it took 10 times as long to rake leaves compared to blowing them. Landscapers will obviously have to pass those additional hours on to their clients.
Ray Schuster’s letter to the editor (“Los Altos leaf blower ban – no problem”) tries to deny this by citing a ban by Los Altos. “As far as we could tell,” he writes, “no gardening fees increased because of the ban.” He neglects to tell us who “we” are. How big was their sample?
If Mr. Schuster is so certain of this, is he willing to pay any cost increase that the rest of us will incur?
Second, as the Index-Tribune article points out, there already exist noise ordinances that limit the time of operation and noise levels of leaf blowers. Mr. Ponicsan’s point is that they are not enforced, so a total ban is required. It is interesting to consider how a total ban would be enforced if it is not possible to enforce a partial one. Perhaps the city could hire an additional enforcement person to drive around town citing criminal leaf blowers. Or maybe Mr. Ponicsan could form a network of leaf blower informants.
Third, in another letter to the editor (“Ban leaf blowers once and for all”) Georgia Kelly asserts that leaf blowers create hearing loss and aggravate allergies. Existing regulations limit noise levels to 70 db at 50 feet. Seventy db is considered the baseline for acceptable noise levels and is equivalent to normal speech at 3 feet or a vacuum cleaner at 10 feet.
As for increased pollen distribution, winds average between 10 and 20 mph in Sonoma, so there will be little relief for allergy sufferers.
Let me conclude by offering a few suggestions. Perhaps people who feel bothered by leaf blowers might speak to their neighbors and ask them to limit blowing to specific days and times. As the police department has a decibel meter, they might offer to meet with landscapers and gardeners to test the noise levels of their blowers. From a quick search on the web, it appears there is such a thing as a silencer for leaf blowers.
So, before we pass a hard-to-enforce leaf blower ban and significantly increase landscaper bills for the city and households, let’s try to work this out in a less hysterical manner.
Full disclosure: I own an electric leaf blower and use it as little as possible. We employ a landscaper to blow the front yard once a week. This takes approximately 15 minutes. We may expand his services to include the back yard.
• • •
Skip Olinger is a Sonoma resident and investment manager, as well as president of the Geraldine and Emory Ford Foundation, which funds projects in secondary education and the arts.
UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy: