Village Delays Decision on Landscaping Law

The about a that would require to take bags filled with lawn waste with them instead of leaving them at the curb of the homes they service in Lindenhurst drew quite a crowd on Tuesday night.

The room on the second floor of was buzzing with opinions for and against the law, whose purpose is to keep the streets of Lindy cleaner, and with questions and concerns for Mayor Tom Brennan and the Board of Trustees.

In the end, they voted to table the for a future date while it digested the public's concerns - possibly the next meeting, the mayor said, which is at Village Hall at 7:30 p.m.

But the date wasn't concrete yet.

The public's concerns ranged from the proposed law being unenforceable and penalizing homeowners - who are ultimately responsible for bringing any garbage at their homes to the curb at the proper time - to it causing landscapers to raise rates and penalizing landscapers.

"For now this matter has been tabled while we take another look at it," said Brennan, who spoke with several landscapers in attendance following the hearing - including Christine Reyes of Ray's Landscaping, Ed Mikusek of Ed Mikusek's Landscaping and Keith Ficken of Ficken's Landscaping.

They were concerned that this new law, if passed, would negatively affect their businesses, penalize them unfairly for landscapers who might be violating laws already on the books, cause their costs to go up, and force them to raise rates and possibly lose business as a result.

The mayor assured that the law would be looked at again, following this hearing.

"We will re-evaluate the law based on what we heard tonight," he said. "We do want the Village to be like to sign says out in front of Village Hall: clean."

To that end he asked each of the landscapers to submit their ideas. "I asked them to come up with ways we could get to the same thing - without penalizing landscapers or residents," he said.

At the hearing there were also residents who questioned why the Village wanted to create another law, they felt, it cannot enforce. Pattey Lambrecht was one of them.

She also said that if the Village is so worried about bags filled with lawn waste being left out at the curb for days until the regular Wednesday pick-up by either landscapers or even homeowners disregarding the current law that prohibits residents from putting out garbage before 7 p.m. the night before a pick-up, then why wouldn't it change the pick-up day?

Her friend and fellow resident Lori Weisbrod agreed: "Change it to Friday or Saturday."

Lambrecht also doubted how the Village would be able to tell the difference between bags left at the curb by a homeowner and those left by a landscaper.

She maintained: "The law is unenforceable...what are they going to do, give us different-colored bags?"

It was a sentiment shared by several other residents at the hearing. Others worried about having to move bags to the curb if the law was passed.

They said they could have their landscapers leave the bags at the least eight feet from the curb - which the Village already requires - but wondered what the Village would have them do if they couldn't move them to the curb for pick-up.

"I've done my own lawn up until the last few years. Now I pay a landscaper to do my lawn because I can't," said Tom Clark, a 25-year Lindy resident and disabled veteran who said he couldn't move any bags left by his landscaper.

If he could, then, he said, he'd still be doing his own lawn.

"My landscaper could also charge me more for removing waste that I already pay for through my taxes," he added.

He wasn't the only one concerned about having the cost of removal passed along to them by landscapers.

George Nelson, another resident, said he received a note from a landscaper in his mailbox about the hearing and proposal which said it could spark a rise in rates for homeowners.

Nelson, who does his own lawn, expressed concern for disabled veterans like Clark, and other seniors in the community, who could be adversely affected by the change in the law.

"You could leave bags at the fence on, say, Saturday, then move them to the curb on Tuesday night," Brennan answered. "But I know a lot of seniors can't do that. This is why we're having this hearing, to hear from everyone."

And, as a result of the hearing, the board decided to hold off on the proposed change to the law until it digests the public's input.