Consider a smokeout of another sort
Thursday brings the annual Great American Smokeout, where the American Cancer Society encourages tobacco smokers to kick the habit for one day. We think these efforts to support smokers who want to quit and get healthier are worthwhile.
Also worthwhile might be a “smokeout” of another sort.
Perhaps Rock Falls residents who still have leaves to burn could give their neighbors a break on Thursday by ceasing and desisting – at least for one day.
During that day of clean, crisp air, people who are cleaning their yards of fallen leaves could consider alternatives to “lighting up.” They could investigate composting their leaves, bagging them to be set out for pickup, or simply mowing over them and letting the wind and nature take its course.
Our unofficial Great Rock Falls Smokeout won’t ever get the publicity of the Great American Smokeout, but it might help give residents a break from breathing smoky air.
For the record, the city ordinance allows the burning of yard waste all year long, but restricts the practice to the hours of 10 a.m. until sunset. No burning is allowed when wind speeds exceed 10 mph. Fires must be supervised, and police and firefighters can order that burning be stopped at their discretion. Sometimes the police chief asks residents to refrain from burning on Halloween.
Also, for the record, city officials reviewed the leaf-burning ordinance in March but decided to make no changes.
Sterling was the first large city in the Sauk Valley to ban leaf burning. Dixon followed suit earlier this decade. Sterling Township, which does not ban the practice, has encouraged residents not to burn leaves this fall – even to the point of offering to pick up and dispose of piles of leaves so that homeowners don’t consign them to the flames.
Just because Rock Falls still allows leaf burning doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t consider ways to refrain from doing so.
As the Great American Smokeout has proved, tobacco smokers who quit for a day sometimes end up quitting for a lifetime.
The same principle might apply to leaf burners.
Why not give the Great Rock Falls Smokeout a try?
