Anti-idling bylaw stalls out
Council opts to put decision over for one year to educate public
BY GORDON KENT, THE EDMONTON JOURNALJANUARY 22, 2009 7:18 AM
The push for an anti-idling bylaw has been held up for another year while the city tries another public education campaign to convince people to turn off their engines.
The compromise suggestion was approved Wednesday after a proposed law appeared headed for defeat. That bylaw would have seen drivers fined $250 for idling more than three minutes when the temperature was above -10 C .
"My concern right now is that we have nothing but a divided council. Even though a bylaw might be good, we have no consensus here to do something," Mayor Stephen Mandel said.
"I don't believe we're at a point where we can put something together that's going to be a quality piece of legislation, that's going to work."
Instead, staff will bring back a proposal in March for a multi-year campaign to reduce idling. It will focus on such high priority areas as schools and hospitals.
Once it has been in force for a year, they'll report back on the results and the details of a possible bylaw, potentially making it a 2010 election issue.
Councillors turned down a motion to introduce an idling bylaw in 2007. Edmonton instead spent $140,000 on an anti-idling campaign last spring and fall, which a city report says only one in three people surveyed could recall. Mandel characterized it as a failure.
Coun. Linda Sloan said the delay might allow for some improvements in the bylaw, which contains 14 exemptions for activities by commercial, emergency and passenger vehicles. "It's unfair to characterize this (bylaw) as in any way heavy-handed. This is about the air quality in our city." Several councillors stressed that information campaigns need the possibility of legal action to change people's habits.
David Aitken, manager of the community standards branch, said most of their work combines public relations with law.
"An education campaign has benefits, but I don't think to the same extent as if you have enforcement. I think you need both to be successful."
The issue provoked a strong reaction from council members, who said a bylaw would be hard to enforce, unpopular with the public and force people to complain about their neighbours.
"I know everybody gets upset about these things, but you have to take the time and you have to educate people," Coun. Ron Hayter said, adding it took about 25 years from when he pushed to stop smoking in council chambers until the city-wide smoking bylaw was put in place.
"You have the gang of councilors who say 'put it in right now, shove it down people's throats.'
"If we drop the hammer, there will be a lot of people who protest."
gkent@thejournal.canwest.com
© Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal
BY GORDON KENT, THE EDMONTON JOURNALJANUARY 22, 2009 7:18 AM
The push for an anti-idling bylaw has been held up for another year while the city tries another public education campaign to convince people to turn off their engines.
The compromise suggestion was approved Wednesday after a proposed law appeared headed for defeat. That bylaw would have seen drivers fined $250 for idling more than three minutes when the temperature was above -10 C .
"My concern right now is that we have nothing but a divided council. Even though a bylaw might be good, we have no consensus here to do something," Mayor Stephen Mandel said.
"I don't believe we're at a point where we can put something together that's going to be a quality piece of legislation, that's going to work."
Instead, staff will bring back a proposal in March for a multi-year campaign to reduce idling. It will focus on such high priority areas as schools and hospitals.
Once it has been in force for a year, they'll report back on the results and the details of a possible bylaw, potentially making it a 2010 election issue.
Councillors turned down a motion to introduce an idling bylaw in 2007. Edmonton instead spent $140,000 on an anti-idling campaign last spring and fall, which a city report says only one in three people surveyed could recall. Mandel characterized it as a failure.
Coun. Linda Sloan said the delay might allow for some improvements in the bylaw, which contains 14 exemptions for activities by commercial, emergency and passenger vehicles. "It's unfair to characterize this (bylaw) as in any way heavy-handed. This is about the air quality in our city." Several councillors stressed that information campaigns need the possibility of legal action to change people's habits.
David Aitken, manager of the community standards branch, said most of their work combines public relations with law.
"An education campaign has benefits, but I don't think to the same extent as if you have enforcement. I think you need both to be successful."
The issue provoked a strong reaction from council members, who said a bylaw would be hard to enforce, unpopular with the public and force people to complain about their neighbours.
"I know everybody gets upset about these things, but you have to take the time and you have to educate people," Coun. Ron Hayter said, adding it took about 25 years from when he pushed to stop smoking in council chambers until the city-wide smoking bylaw was put in place.
"You have the gang of councilors who say 'put it in right now, shove it down people's throats.'
"If we drop the hammer, there will be a lot of people who protest."
gkent@thejournal.canwest.com
© Copyright (c) The Edmonton Journal