An ordinance originally designed to curb noise and air pollution from gas and propane-powered leaf blowers in Evanston has unveiled an array of unintended consequences for the Hispanic landscaping business community.
Evanston City Council Monday voted to approve a handful of changes to the three-year-old ordinance but there remain concerns in the community surrounding the impact of the ordinance.
Evanston City Council approved an ordinance in November 2021 to ban gas leaf blowers beginning on April 1, 2023 and only permitting electric or battery-powered leaf blowers. The move was designed to limit noise pollution along with the relatively small air pollution gas and propane that leaf blowers create.
Once enacted, landscapers spoke out against the ban, arguing costs were too high to make the switch for many small businesses and pointing to the fact that many of the landscapers operating in Evanston are members of the Latino community and didn’t feel as if they were included in the forming of the ordinance.
The city’s Human Services Committee requested on March 11 that City Council suspend enforcement of the ban for three weeks to give landscapers more time to comply with the ordinance and for the city to better flesh out its enforcement practices. Council voted against halting enforcement of the ban with those voting to continue enforcement arguing they don’t want to go backwards.
Landscapers explained that because batteries on electric leaf blowers die faster and work with less power than gas or propane blowers, their jobs take longer. This increases the cost to customers, causing disputes between landscapers and their clients.
Adriana Gomez has been an outspoken voice for her family who runs Al Gomez Landscaping, a small landscaping company. She has spoken at several City Council meetings on the subject, arguing the penalty is discriminatory based on economic status and telling the council it is pushing her community out of the city.
“My cousin is now teetering between investing in the change or getting his oldest daughter into college,” she said on March 11. “Please protect small landscaping companies. We need more time and more resources to transition in a realistic timeframe.”
At the March 25 City Council meeting, Gomez spoke through tears saying the white majority of Evanston doesn’t understand the severity the issue has brought upon the Hispanic landscaping community.
“He (her father) has considered selling the house, the trucks and moving out of Evanston,” she said. “I’m trying to help my dad work with the system so we don’t lose the place I’ve called home for 20 years.”
Councilmember Juan Geracaris agreed that landscapers weren’t involved enough in the process, saying during the March 11 meeting that he went back and watched old City Council footage and only saw one representative from Canal Shores Golf Course, now The Evans at Canal Shores, who spoke of the issue during public comment.
“This problem is not straight forward and it’s complicated,” he said. “I urge us to think about who we listen to and engage with on first crack.”
Geracaris further stated the city has had trouble engaging with the Latino community, despite continued efforts to do so by providing interpretation and language access services for Spanish-speaking Evanstonians.
“We need to meet people where they are and have meaningful discussions about what the impact is,” he said.
Councilmember Jonathan Nieuwsma said the city “did the best we could” but believes if Geracaris was on council back then to help with outreach, results may have been different.
However, he argued a majority of Evanstonians have been in support of continuing the ban. Nieuwsma did push back against those who have been more fervently against the leaf blowers, over 600 of which signed a petition against halting enforcement of the ordinance.
“Please, chill out a little bit,” he said. “Please take a deep breath, put in some ear plugs and don’t vent your ire on the laborers themselves. They’re just trying to earn a living.”
Exemptions for the ban have been permitted for the city to allow for drying athletic fields and large scale paving construction projects along with another exemption for The Evans at Canal Shores.
The vote Monday defined the term athletic field within the ordinance while also adding a registration requirement for landscapers who use leaf blowers. A fine structure was also fleshed out for those companies found in violation of the registration requirement.
Acting Director of Evanston Public Works Edgar Cano said electric leaf blowers simply aren’t powerful enough to properly dry baseball fields and remove all the dust to allow for large paving projects to properly dry.
The exemptions have been a sticking point for the council with members like Krissie Harris who said there are inequities in allowing the golf course to continue using gas leaf blowers.
“If we’re saying no gas, then we’re saying no gas,” she said. “We understand the racial implications to then say this one entity is exempt because it’s expensive. Our community members told us it was expensive and that’s how we came up with the first set of money.”
Gomez also argued exemptions should be removed so the city can be an example by doing a full transition to electric blowers.
Enforcement of the ordinance has been another issue, with the process beginning with a complaint from residents. Previous enforcement policies required photo or video evidence but after reports of landscapers being harassed, this was walked back.
Hector Hernandez of Hector’s Landscaping said his workers have been subject to harassment by white residents jeering and driving by in attempts to get the best video evidence of ordinance infractions. He also said the ban should have been relayed in Spanish but never was.
“I am worried now that when I say goodbye to my dad in the mornings I might not see him again because of how this world can be and how you can upset somebody,” said Tania Padilla. “Who is going to tell me that my father will come home?”
Landscapers are first given a written warning if found in violation. From there, a $100 fine is given which increases by $50 with each infraction, capping out at $250. Those found in violation of the registration portion of the ordinance will first be given a written warning, then a $150 fine and a $250 fine for an subsequent violations.
In the future, the city plans to handle such disputes with its CARE Responders team, a group trained in mitigation and de-escalation tactics to handle non-emergency calls to 911.
City Council approved up to $80,000 in funding from the city’s Sustainability Fund for bulk purchases of electric leaf blowers to be given to Evanston-based landscapers as a subsidy. According to a memo included in the March 25 City Council meeting, the funding would cover approximately 24 electric leaf blowers, 44 batteries, 24 chargers and 16 backpack battery kits.
The city has also provided up to $25,000 in grant funding as part of the city’s Sustain Evanston Incentive Program for Evanston-based businesses to purchase electric leaf blowers. However, the application process was lengthy and proved to be a burden for some businesses. The deadline for this funding closed on June 30.
Gomez stated at the June 24 City Council meeting that receiving this funding is what helped keep her family in Evanston. She credited City Clerk Stephanie Mendoza and Sustainability and Resilience Manager Cara Pratt’s translation abilities in getting businesses owners the help they needed to apply and said the city should hire a bilingual educator to fill this role.
Other Chicagoland communities including Glencoe have adjusted their ordinances around gas powered leaf blowers – whether that be outright bans like Evanston or, more commonly, restricted hours and seasons like that in Winnetka. A study on North Shore leaf blower ordinances released in Dec. 2022 promoted the idea of banning gas leaf blowers except during peak cleanup times in spring and fall.
Michael Braiman, Wilmette village manager and co-chair of the working group that handled the study, said all-out gas leaf blower bans were “not a practical solution at this time in our communities” and that incremental regulation is the best way to go.
Evanston was not part of the working group.
