By Jonathan Friedman
Lookout Staff

January 20, 2010 -- In an attempt to tighten enforcement of the ban on leaf blowers in Santa Monica, the City Council will soon consider an amendment to the 19-year-old law. The City Council voted 4 to 1 on Tuesday to have staff return with a proposed amendment.

Council members were presented with a staff report outlining potential changes. They include placing the City’s Office of Sustainability and the Environment (OSE) in charge of enforcement, rather than the Police Department, and shifting the responsibility of following the law from the leaf blower user to the property owner.

Those changes would place the leaf blower law in line with the City’s regulation on water usage, which is also enforced by the OSE.

Council member Kevin McKeown supports the proposed adjustments to a law he said has not been followed.

“I see this as really changing the assumption that you can get away with using a leaf blower in Santa Monica,” McKeown said. "We’ve let that happen for too long. And that’s not good for a City to have a law on the books and not be able to enforce it.”

He continued, “After 19 years, I think I am prepared to accept that what we have been doing hasn’t worked. And doing the same thing and expecting a different result is at least some people’s definition of insanity.”

“If we’re just moving from one unlawful activity to another equally environmentally damaging and unlawful activity, I’m not sure we’ve really moved the ball forward,” Davis said.

Council member Richard Bloom said he would like more information on how the City’s enforcement of water usage limits is working before deciding it is a template that should be used for leaf blower ban enforcement.

“I’m not convinced this dramatic shift in the law and shift in responsibility … is necessarily the right way to go.”

Council member Robert Holbrook, who cast the dissenting vote, said he did not support shifting the responsibility to the property owner because the person might not know what the gardener is doing.

“I see my gardener about twice a year … and I can’t guarantee that he’s following the law or not because I rarely see him,” Holbrook said. “Somebody who’s doing something with their equipment on your property ought to be responsible for what they’re doing.”

McKeown said a property owner would receive a series of warnings before actually suffering the consequences of violating the law. He said most people would probably get a new gardener after being informed of this. McKeown said this was a better option than punishing those using the leaf blowers.

“That’s usually a minimum wage worker whose been told to do that … and for whom English may be a second language,” McKeown said. “He may not know the ordinance.”