"Paging Dr. Bonner...."
Posted on 10/03/2007 6:45:26 AM PDT by racing fan
FAIRFAX, Calif., Oct. 1, 2007 (KGO) - For all the big debates about the environment and global warming, there are small ones, as well. Consider the town of Fairfax in Marin County. Residents are looking hard at a proposal some say violates a basic right -- to wash your car in your front yard.
It is the kind of environmental debate you're likely to find only in a mostly affluent community.
One resident asks, "do you save the fish or wash your car?"
It's the debate du jour in Marin County's Fairfax. There's a town council proposal to ban residents from washing their cars in front of their houses, for fear of what the runoff may do to fish in their creeks, and downstream in the ocean.
"I think that the spirit of the ordinance is a good one," says Lew Tremaine with the Fairfax town council.
"Well we have a strategic plan that has been intended to make sure that we go green as fast as we can on a lot of levels. This is just another one of those levels," says Vice Mayor Mary-Ann Maggiore.
Fairfax has already banned pesticides, styrofoam and plastic bags. This ordinance would empower police to write tickets in extreme cases.
"They would probably just issue them a warning and that would be an opportunity to educate the person," says Lindy Kelly, town manager.
In reality, most parties expect some kind of compromise like biodegradable soaps, for instance. However, those would not spare the environment from all the all other stuff soap would remove, and the nearest full-service car wash is three miles down the road in San Rafael.
A car wash is a closed system. All the soap, all the grime, goes into a drain and then it's reused.
(Excerpt) Read more at abclocal.go.com ...
How. pray tell, do they reuse the grime?
Wow. You live there? Please tell me you are the town shrink and business is good.
How many members of the town council own car washes?
That being said, my local town just banned car-washing at home. We're in the midst of a pretty bad drought. They also banned lawn-watering, and some other stuff, too.
Very good question. And do they think that driving to the car wash and back represents the "green" approach? Let's see - 5 miles there, 5 back - that's 1/2 gallon of gas wasted for each weekly car wash. And the car wash uses water, and some fairly strong soap as well (especially the brushless version). Plus, it costs more to have it washed than it does to do it yourself.
>>This ordinance would empower police to write tickets in extreme cases. <<
Huh? Full contact car washing?
How. pray tell, do they reuse the grime?
:::::::
Sell it to Taco Bell?
I would be almost certain that in this era of environmental law suits the manufacturers of car washing detergents have thought of this problem and made the ingredients biodegradable and non toxic. I would also think the local police would have more important tasks to do than being environmental nannies. Is there no crime in this community or do they have so many cops on the street they need to give them something to do?
You left out the fact the water will end up in the same place as it does when they wash the car at home, in the streams and oceans, which is what they are bitching about.
Spoken like a true conmmunist dictator. Let's now set up education camps for car washers./SAR
Here's another idiot remark. The "other stuff" that is washed off of cars is road grime(dirt, road tar, etc), all this stuff washes down to the ocean when it rains, I guess we are going to have to ban rain except over ocean areas so that "other stuff" doesn't run off into it and kill the fish. The stupidity of leftists is amazing, but what is more amazing is the stupidity of the conservatives who vote them back into office year after year.
If women ruled the world we would be mothered to death.
That was my first thought as well. Someone is profiting from this on the council. Just like a zoning/sewer moratorium we are going through in trying to sell some land. Oddly, commmercial was not part of the issue for some inexplicable reason. I almost called the council on it in the most recent letter I wrote.
“They would probably just issue them a warning and that would be an opportunity to educate the person,” says Lindy Kelly, town manager.”
My goodness, do these people even realize that words have meaning. Now the cops will become green teachers and educate the ignorant soul who washed his/her car at home. If this does not represent the myopic thinking of the left, I don’t know what else could.
Actually, a sizeable portion of the water used to wash the car in the front yard ends up watering the lawn, while the rest goes down the storm sewer (assuming there are storm sewers in that area) and on to the river, lake, ocean, or whatever.
There's nothing uniquely wrong with this water - it just contains a portion of the airborne and road grime that will get washed down into the earth, streams, and oceans when it rains anyway.
This is probably one of those "property value" issues, like bans on outdoor clothslines and that kind of thing. We can't have the peasants looking like peasants now, can we?
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