Oak Park leaders considered scrapping an ordinance that a trustee said sits at a bone of contention between two of the village’s progressive values — prioritizing environmental sustainability and being welcoming to immigrants.
Oak Park village trustees questioned the appropriateness of the village’s ban on gas powered leaf blowers in response to the widespread fear that’s taken hold of the local Hispanic community as result of intense federal immigration enforcement seen throughout Chicagoland in recent months. The federal government says it’s arrested more than 1,000 undocumented immigrants in its so-called Operation Midway Blitz, which has also led to chaotic scenes across the region and allegations that federal agents are illegally violating residents’ rights and racially profiling Latino people.
The village board in a meeting Oct. 14 considered suspending the gas-powered leaf blower ban, which only went into full effect over the summer, before settling on a change in enforcement strategy.
The village will now only issue tickets to the owners of properties where gas-powered leaf blowers are used, rather than also issuing citations to landscapers. Village staffers will also no longer take photos of landscapers using leaf blowers, said Village President Vicki Scaman.
“You’re still communicating fairly firmly to the homeowner,” she said of the new strategy.
Scaman said she expects that the fall is going to be a “rough season” for landscapers because of ICE’s operations in Chicagoland, whether Oak Park has a gas-powered leaf blower ban on the books or not.
Trustee Cory Wesley withdrew his motion to suspend the ban after trustees reached the compromise. He said the village needed to reconsider what it was doing as the local Latino landscaping workforce is targeted by federal immigration enforcement.
“I get that this all sounds very innocent, until you’ve been racially profiled and it’s someone walking up to you and telling you ‘this isn’t how we do things here’,” Wesley said. “When you’re in a situation where people are actively being racially profiled, as is the situation we find ourselves in now, any kind of official capacity that meets you causes that level of anxiety.”
“It’s not so much about the actions we take as it is about the fear that this other organization has spent a huge amount of resources and a large amount of people to gin up.”
Wesley had brought up the potential for the ordinance to unfairly burden landscapers when the board discussed the ban at a meeting in May.
“I don’t think we should ever issue one ticket without the other,” Wesley said in May. “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.”
Trustees had originally approved the ordinance in 2023 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 village had banned use of the tools during the summers of 2023 and 2024 but only issued two tickets during that time. The village had issued more than 50 such citations since Oak Park’s gas leaf blower ban went into full effect on June 1, Neighborhood Services Director Jonathan Burch told Oak Park’s village trustees at the board meeting.
Oak Park’s neighborhood services staff had a two year long public information campaign 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 see working in the community.
Trustee Brian Straw said the issue put the village in a difficult spot as it worked to balance two different progressive values.
“This is one of those difficult places of conflicting priorities,” he said.
Trustee Jenna Leving-Jacobson said that the village board should consider adopting an ICE-free zone ordinance similar to ones recently adopted by Chicago and Evanston. Oak Park already has a sanctuary ordinance that bars any village employee from aiding civil immigration enforcement investigations, but an ICE-free zone ordinance would also seek to bar federal agents from being on village-owned property, she said.
“I think we need to do a whole lot more,” she said. “The violence is escalating.”
“I want to make sure we’re thinking wholistically about how we’re protecting each other and the people who visit our community.”
