Two years in the making, Oak Park’s gas leaf blower ban is set to go into full effect on June 1.
The village is all but done issuing warnings to property owners and landscaping contractors found using gas powered leaf blowers, as Oak Park moves to “strict enforcement” of the ban its village board approved in 2023. The village had banned use of the tools during the summers of 2023 and 2024 but only issued two tickets during that time, Neighborhood Services Director Jonathan Burch told Oak Park’s village trustees at Tuesday, May 20’s board meeting.
“Beginning June 1 of this year, there will be a full ban on gas powered leaf blowers,” he said. “It applies certainly to landscapers, it applies to business owners and the ordinance was written in such a way that it applies to property owners who are using a landscaping firm that is doing the work on the property. So, it gives the village the ability to do enforcement on both the property owner and the landscaper if they’re found using that gas powered leaf blower.”
The ordinance was approved in support of the village’s Climate Ready Oak Park Plan, which aims to cut carbon emissions by 60% by 2030 in a bid for carbon neutrality by 2050. Using a gas-powered leaf blower for 1 hour of work emits as many pollutants as 15 cars driving for one hour, according to research published by Environment America’s Research and Policy Center.
The ban also comes with restrictions on how and when electric leaf blowers can be used in Oak Park. Electric leaf blowers, a much greener alternative to gas powered options, can only be used between the hours of 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. on weekdays and between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. on weekends. The noise from their use is not allowed to exceed 65 decibels.
The ordinance goes into full effect after a two year public information campaign led by Neighborhood Services that involved holding landscaper listening sessions, publishing online communication and flyers in English and Spanish. Neighborhood services staff had also been tasked with distributing information about the ban to any landscapers they saw working in the community.
“The village did outreach in 2023 and 2024 and it continues to do it now to a variety of different groups,” he said. “There’s a carry-over benefit from the engagement activities from the previous two years but I also want to be clear that we did do an additional round of surveying this spring. We also held a landscaper open house back in April as well as doing a lot of direct engagement of landscaping firms.”
Property Maintenance Inspectors in the Village’s Neighborhood Services Department will write any tickets, according to the village.
Trustee Cory Wesley said it was important that the village consistently issue tickets to both property owners and contractors who violate the ordinance, to encourage contact between noncompliant property owners and their neighbors that report them and so that an inordinate burden doesn’t fall onto landscapers.
“I don’t think we should ever issue one ticket without the other,” Wesley said. “I think the only way to keep this contained and reasonable is if there’s some kind of interpersonal accountability among neighbors.”
“Most of the landscaper contractors in our village are going to be Hispanic, and calling authorities on people here to do a service feels icky, too. So there needs to be a consequence for the person that’s paying them to be here,” said Wesley.