Recreational Fires Must Be Eliminated

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WELCOME TO HELL ON EARTH

The air is smoky from burning wood in North St. Paul, MN, almost every evening. It is a nightmare. What used to be a nice place to live has become a living hell.

WARNING: If you buy a house in North St. Paul, MN, you will regret it! It may be the biggest, most expensive mistake you ever make. You will breathe smoky air almost every day of your life in this town. This is not an exaggeration. The wood smoke in this town gets heavy and gets heavy often. When you want to get out of this dump of a town, how many people do you think are going to want to buy a house in a city where heavy air pollution every night is normal and clean air is rare? This blog gets thousands of visitors every year. The word is out: North St. Paul is a horrible place to live!

Fresh air is very rare around here. If you are considering moving to North St. Paul or buying a home here, I strongly recommend that you do not do it no matter how good of a price you get. The only way you will be happy in this town is if you love breathing smoky air almost every day. North St. Paul, MN, is a horrible place to live because of the smoky air!

Burning wood, grass, leaves, paper, cardboard, and sometimes plastic, construction materials, and chemicals, if it is combustible it gets burned in North St. Paul and you are going to breathe it.

The air was smoky 25 out of 31 evenings in July 2009. We had 37 hours of continuous wood smoke in the air Aug. 29th - 31st. There was wood smoke in the air 19 consecutive evenings from Aug. 21st to Sept. 8th. It rained heavily on Aug. 20th, providing the only relief we got from wood smoke for almost three weeks.

Is this a good way to live? No. It is a horrible way to live. Take it from someone who knows. Breathing smoky, polluted air every day is misery.

Every day in this city several people are having recreational fires. Every evening the air is filled with the stench of burning wood. I am one person sick and tired of breathing smoky air every day. Is it too much to ask to be able to breathe fresh air in your own home?

Who is responsible for this wood smoke nightmare? The four city council members are responsible. Council members Jan Walczak, Bob Bruton, Terry Furlong, and Dave Zick have refused to do anything about this wood smoke problem. They don't care if you have a child with asthma. They don't care if you have to live like a shut-in because the air is so polluted. They don't care if your sinuses burn because the wood smoke is so heavy.

Our four Council members have defended the rights of a small percentage of households to burn wood daily over the rights of all the rest of us to breathe.

You have no right to breathe under Walczak, Bruton, Furlong, and Zick. Burners have the right to burn wood 49 hours a week recreationally. The rest of us have no rights at all.

If you are considering purchasing real estate in the city of North Saint Paul, Minnesota (55109), factor this blog carefully into your decision. Buying a home in this city means that your kids will breathe smoky air while playing in the yard almost every day. Your baby will breathe smoky air in her crib should you leave the windows open around your house. If you leave your windows open you will wake up in the middle of the night choking on smoky air.

Perhaps worst of all, your utility rates will be high because you will have to run the air conditioner instead of leaving the windows open on a cool summer evening. You have no other choice because almost every night the air is too smoky to breathe in this city. Consider this blog your warning.

North St. Paul, Minnesota, is a wonderful community other than the wood smoke. If we could restore fresh air like we used to enjoy, life would be happy again. But that is not going to happen any time soon.

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Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Wednesday 07/28/2010 Air Pollution

We have smoke from burning paper early.

1:15 PM: A faint burning paper smell is in the air. It varies with the breeze. It did not last long.

3:50 PM: A faint burning paper smell is again in the air. It smells like burning paper. I believe that is what it is. It does not smell like wood. It could be some jackass burning waste. People burn a lot more of everything in this town than they used to because of the city's recreational burning ordinance.

4:00 PM: Light paper smoke is in the air. I do not know what else it could be other than paper. It is stronger now than before.

4:10 PM: Faint burning paper smell.

5:10 PM: A very faint burning paper smell lingers in the air. 81 degrees.

6:00 PM: A very faint trace of smoke of some type is still in the air. It could be paper smoke.

7:45 PM: Very faint to faint wood smoke. Somebody upwind is burning wood.

8:15 PM: A very faint trace of what could be paper smoke remains in the air.

9:00 PM: Fresh air. There is no trace of anything in it. Will it last? It is 75 degrees at this time. It is tempting to shut off the air conditioning and open the windows tonight. But we know all too well that wood smoke is present almost every night. The air conditioning will stay on tonight.

It is a beautiful, cool evening. I spent some time outside enjoying the little fresh air we get in this nightmare town.

9:30 PM: Light wood smoke. I HATE THIS ******* CITY!

10:00 PM: Light to moderate wood smoke. It has gotten smokier the past half hour. It is 73 degrees measured at North High School. This would be a perfect night to turn off the air conditioning BUT WE CAN'T BECAUSE THE AIR IS SO DAMN SMOKY!

11:00 PM: Light to moderate wood smoke.

Midnight: Very faint to faint wood smoke.