City Council Announcements
May 7, 2013
Information Needed by Council Staff 9:03:04 PM
JJ. Proposed Ordinance Regulating Outdoor Fires in Residential Areas
Council Member Simonsen would like to investigate time, place and manner requirements for frequent or prolonged smoke from wood-burning fires in residential areas. In some instances, outdoor fires are occurring with such regularity and over extended periods of time, and are becoming a nuisance and potential health risk to neighbors. The Salt Lake City Code and the International Fire Code regulate “open burning” but do not require a permit for a “recreational fire.” The proposed ordinance may address when, where and how outdoor fires may occur in residential areas to mitigate adverse impacts.
Ø Does the Council support having the Council staff develop such an ordinance? In order to move this proposal forward under the Council’s recently amended rules, at least three Council Members must support it. Council Members Garrott and LaMalfa said they supported the proposal. Councilmember Simonsen said he saw two parts to this issue, 1) would be kind of a research component to see what specific impacts there might be, health or air quality related, and 2) trying to define whether or not there were regulatory issues that we could consider. He said this could be expanded to include broader air quality issues which were not initially part of the consideration.
Additional Item:
Cindy. Gust-Jenson, Executive Council Director, said Council Members looked at potential scheduling dates for budget meetings. She said there were two dates that had a majority of the Council available which were Friday, May 31st and Friday, May 17th. Councilmember Simonsen said he would not be available for anything in May, but potentially something in June. Ms. Gust-Jenson said additional meetings were needed to try and adopt the budget on June 11th. She said staff would get feedback to the Chair/Vice Chair.