Burning is an option.... Breathing is not!

Burning is an option.... Breathing is not!

By Shirley Brandie (Canada)

With all the information that is now available to everyone, via the press and the Internet, regarding the health and environmental effects of wood burning in residential areas, one has to wonder when the powers that be will step in and create the laws needed to end this nightmare that so many are living through.

Municipalities rarely step in to help when a complaint is sent to them and prefer to regard it as a 'civil matter' in an attempt to avoid dealing with the problem, for reasons known only to them. There is no reason why a bylaw cannot be created and enforced so that those that are having their homes and properties deluged in smoke from a neighbor's wood burning can finally breathe in their own homes.

I would think that the municipalities would want to keep their residents safe and not put this on the back burner... pun intended.

I have a web site at: http://WoodBurnerSmoke.net and also publish monthly newsletters regarding wood smoke. I no longer worry about wood smoke as I did take the legal route to obtain an injunction. But, what about those that do not have the monies to do the same? My web site was created in an attempt to give some guidance, suggestions and most of all empathy for those who so badly need it. I receive emails daily from people all over the US and Canada with stories and photos that would break your heart. What are they to do when there is no help, not matter where they turn?

It is the usual case that, when the neighbor is told that the smoke is getting into their house, the burner increases the burning. This leads to further distress and the burner knows that the only recourse for the victim is to seek lengthy and expensive legal help. This is just not right!

Breathing wood smoke is a very real danger and one that the victims cannot escape. They try everything they can to attempt to keep out the smoke but nothing works as the particles are so very tiny that they seep in through any minute space available. Headaches, nausea, heart rhythm problems, sinus infections, nosebleeds and other physical symptoms are what these people are forced to live with.

Burners, on the other hand, carry on with the burning and tell them that it is their 'right' to burn. What about the rights of the neighbors to breathe clean air in their own homes?

Burners will not stop burning unless forced to. For those that have never experienced living next door to a burner, imagine yourself in your house with smoke so thick that you can see it. What would you do? Who would you turn to? And, believe me, it could happen to you almost overnight as it did to us!

We need municipalities to pull up their socks and get bylaws created for the sake of all that are suffering with wood smoke invasion. We also need governmental agencies to help to put some pressure on all municipalities to get this issue moving before another winter begins and the wood burning increases even more than it is at present.


Shirley Brandie
Amherstburg, Ontario, Canada

Burning is an option....Breathing is not!

See---http://WoodBurnerSmoke.net