GREENWICH — The low frequency and loud buzzing of gas-powered leaf blowers may be the reason why the town of Greenwich further restricts their use.
The town currently restricts use to certain times of day, but a new push to regulate blowers takes aim at the noise they emit.
Leaf blowers have stirred up hot debate in the past, in part because switching to the environmentally cleaner, quieter electric versions some people and groups champion means losing the power that gas-powered blowers offer to professionals.
The latest push to ban gas-powered leaf blowers comes from Quiet Yards Greenwich, a nonprofit formed in 2021. Quiet Yards first took its concerns to the Board of Selectmen last year and their request has since been moved to the Greenwich Board of Health for consideration. The Board of Health has formed a subcommittee to look at gasoline-operated leaf blowers and is debating using the town’s noise ordinance to further limit their use.
Quiet Yards presented to the Board of Health in February and while not asking for a total ban, outlined a plan for a four-year phased reduction of gas blowers in town.
The subcommittee gave an interim update on Monday during the health board’s regular meeting, but has not made a formal recommendation and, thus, the board of health has not voted on any ordinance changes.
Other groups are also pushing to restrict leaf blowers in Fairfield County. Westport enacted new restrictions on them earlier this year and Stamford’s Board of Representatives has been mulling a gas-blower ban for months with a public hearing scheduled for April 25.
In Greenwich, gas-powered leaf blowers can only be used from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, Sunday and holidays.
The Greenwich Board of Health subcommittee on leaf blowers is led by Dr. Sarah Gamble, a member of the town’s board of health. On Monday, Gamble said the subcommittee was originally organized to look at the noise generated by leaf blowers, but Quiet Yards Greenwich had also flagged air pollution as a reason to restrict use.
“The information provided included data on both noise and air pollutants. The subcommittee had, until this point, been concentrating on the matter of noise and not air pollutants,” Gamble said. “Air pollutants from the use of gasoline-operated leaf blowers requires further investigation by the subcommittee prior to our making our recommendation to the board.”
The subcommittee also said that landscapers and people who use leaf blowers to make a living deserve a chance to weigh in.
“This group has a right to be heard just as Quiet Yards Greenwich was (been) heard,” Gamble said.
The board’s next meeting is scheduled for May 22 and board chair Joel Muhlbaum asked Director of Health Caroline Calderone Baisley to invite landscapes to come and make their case.
Gamble said in general, the subcommittee foresees three potential outcomes: No change is made to the noise ordinance; a change is made based on medical evidence of health risks presented by gas-powered leaf blowers; or a change is made to reduce noise levels in the community. The details of the alternatives have yet to be fleshed out, Gamble said.
Quiet Yards Greenwich wants to reduce the use of gas-powered blowers and replace them with quieter, electric alternatives that don’t burn fossil fuels, the group says. Members submitted a lengthy white paper to the town with their reasoning last year.
Quiet Yards Greenwich is the successor to CALM (Citizens Against Leafblower Mania) which took up the fight in 2011. The push was covered in the New York Times, but their effort to get gas-powered leaf blowers banned ultimately failed. While the group's requested ban on gas-powered leaf blowers made it to the Representative Town Meeting in June 2012, it failed on a vote of 76 to 93.
There was a temporary restriction on leaf blower use at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic to accommodate people working from home, but that restriction expired in 2021.
Members of the public who want to comment on leaf blowers can contact the Health Department at ehealth@greenwichct.org.
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April 26, 2023 at 04:04PM
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Greenwich mulls sound restrictions to leaf blower usage - Greenwich Time
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