The Pasadena City Council will send a potential ban on two stroke leaf blowers to a City Council committee.
The discussion could also include an outreach program and efforts to help lessen the impacts on landscape workers that could be forced to buy new equipment.
“People are concerned about noise pollution we heard from them during the safer at home order when people were working from home,” said City Manager Steve Mermell. “People are also concerned about air pollution because the two stroke engines typically burn dirty.”
Mayor Victor Gordo said the item will go to the Public Safety Committee or the Municipal Services Committee.
Previously the city recommended no action be taken on the matter but changes to technology have now made electric leaf blowers viable.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1346 which bans the sale of gas-powered landscaping equipment, including but not limited to leaf blowers, in 2024.
Mermell said he thought many gardeners would continue to use two stroke leaf blowers until they no longer worked if the city just adopted the state law.
Two-stroke engines lack an independent lubrication system so the fuel has to be mixed with oil. It takes about four ounces of oil per every gallon of gas to run the engine, but all of that oil does not combust properly resulting in the release of air pollutants escaping from the engine in large quantities.
A two-stroke engine in a regular car would burn a gallon of oil every 1,000 miles according to science.com.
Pasadena must join other California cities in taking action against two-stroke leaf blowers, according to a report to the City Council by an ad hoc committee of the city’s Environmental Advisory Commission.
Vice Mayor Andy Wilson said it was important to consider the ban not just for the noise but for the impact on the carbon footprint.
“I suspect like most electrical equipment the cost to the units have come down,” Wilson said.
Councilman John Kennedy called for a program that would see people turn in their gas powered leaf blower in exchange for some type of assistance that would help them purchase climate friendly blowers.
Earlier this year, the city of South Pasadena voted to prohibit gas-powered leaf blowers effective Oct. 1, 2022. The citywide prohibition also bans that city’s use of leaf blowers and places the onus on the property owner who authorized the work.
Several beach cities have also enacted bans, Violations include penalties of up to $500, and adds new maximum sound standards for leaf blowers (65 decibels measured from 50 feet away).
According to the Two-Stroke Engine Ad Hoc Committee of the Pasadena Environmental Advisory Commission approximately 20% of California counties have enacted at least a partial ban on two-stroke engines.
Unfortunately, until now, Pasadena has acted neither as a leader nor a fast follower. But we can catch up,” the commission said.
The City Council was scheduled to take up the matter earlier this month, but it was tabled due to a heavy agenda.
Of the 359 total complaints in the last six years, the majority (275, or 77%) concerned the use of a leaf blower outside the allowed hours. Local residents also complained gardeners exceeding the allowed length of use, noise level, and blowing debris over a property line, received 52 (14%), 23 (6%), and 9 (3%) complaints, respectively.
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3 thoughts on “Potential Leaf Blower Ban Headed to Committee”
I think the ban is good, but modern people do without these devices with burners because they are unwieldy and loud.
For many years I have only had electric garden tools, because they are inexpensive, quiet and easy to store and there are no petrol and oil vapors.
However, you have to note that the batteries have to be charged very often and they are defective after 5 years. Replacement must of course be possible, because otherwise garden tools with burners are more durable! By the way, my lawn mower was already defective after 5 years and technically outdated because the engine and batteries were too weak! You also have to consider that you will have more electrical scrap. Everything always has two sides of logic.
Hello from Germany, Regensburg to California, Pasadena.
not only are they loud and ineffective, but the people who operate them seem to be either clueless or mean-spirited. rarely do they yield to pedestrians (instead they pretend to not see humans passing through while they obnoxiously continue to blow debris and fumes in our direction), and they seem to enjoy stepping backwards into oncoming traffic on city streets. they are a true public nuisance in every sense of the term.
So lets get this straight, leaf blowers are some huge issue to the city of pasadena? That residents who want to keep up their properties are the problem. I suggest the city of pasadena might consider a way to improve the community is to ban homeless and drug addicts who have moved into and create a blight on our streets. Between crime and trash that threaten the public health and safety, I would think the city has more pressing issues than leaf blowers and could use their time more effectively.
The whole global warming and pollution argument is weak at best, why not make owning a gas powered car illegal too! Prohibit trucks and cars and make every road a bike path. Goods can be transported by mule train, after all they did that in the 1800s before the invention of cars etc.
More laws written by the few who never picked up a rake or owned a blower. I have used blowers both gas and electric for 35 years. Electric are under powered and require more labor cost to achieve the same results They are poorly designed ergonomically as my chronic tennis elbow proved prior to getting a gas blower. And electric blowers still raise dust just like a gas blower. So really when you get down to it the only argument anyone has is over noise, and as the article states there were about 46 noise complaints a year re blowers in a city of over 140,000 people and 61,000 homes and over 20,000 businesses .. Meaning complaints are about .0006 or 6 one-hundredths of one percent.
This proves leaf blower bans and those that promote them are creating a solution in search of a problem. They should spend more time looking over the back fence and informing on their neighbors. They are no more no less than the crabby nosy neighbor that wants to control everyone else.