This is Quiet Clean San Mateo’s letter to District 2 Candidate Nicole Fernandez.

Candidate Fernandez, 

Quiet Clean San Mateo is an advocacy organization working to eliminate fossil-fuel powered lawn maintenance equipment from the City of San Mateo. We are focusing on the most destructive of these tools: gas-powered leaf blowers. We are writing to you to offer context for this crucial project and offer support for the changes ahead. 

Eliminating fossil-fuel powered lawn equipment emissions in San Mateo is part of a broader state- and nationwide-effort to combat global warming. According to a 2023 Environment America report, California is 5th in the nation for fossil-fuel powered lawn maintenance equipment emissions. San Mateo County ranks 62nd in the nation among all US counties for lawn maintenance equipment emissions. Especially for forward-thinking San Mateo citizens, this is embarrassing! 

However, the San Mateo City Council has for years shamelessly defended gas-powered leaf blowers. It has not listened to the San Mateo community’s needs. Its decision-making has been opaque and unresponsive to community demands for a gas-powered leaf blower ban. Your pledge to restore good governance to City Hall gives us hope that greater peace and safety in San Mateo is at hand. 

One of your priorities is addressing global warming. Rising seas will bring rising insurance rates, along with severe storms, such as the one that recently caused severe flooding in San Mateo. You fought hard to pass Flood Free San Mateo, so our community’s infrastructure will be more resilient to severe weather events. However, the flooding we have seen so far is likely tied to global warming, and we can expect greater impacts from severe weather events in the future. Our effort to ban gas-powered leaf blowers is about reducing those severe weather impacts and further protecting our homes. 

Two of your endorsers are Senator Josh Becker and Sustainability and Infrastructure Commissioner Cliff Robbins. Both of them have supported impactful environmental protection measures. Senator Becker, whom you currently work for, has been a leader in California’s fight against global warming, sponsoring innovative climate bills, such as SB 49. Commissioner Robbins has been a rare, defiant voice in the San Mateo government supporting a gas-powered leaf blower ban. One of our founders worked with Burlingame City Council member Michael Brownrigg, another of your endorsers, on Burlingame’s gas-powered leaf blower ban last year, and Brownrigg enthusiastically received that founder’s help. We’re sure all of these leaders would applaud support for a gas-powered leaf blower ban in San Mateo. 

Candidate Fernandez, we’re glad to see you are prioritizing public safety, but that goes beyond law enforcement. San Mateo is an extremely dangerous community due to heavy use of gas-powered leaf blowers throughout the city. People with disabilities are severely impacted, and that can limit access to parks, community centers and even housing. Our greatest concern, however, is about City of San Mateo maintenance workers and employees of private landscaping contractors, who are often recent immigrants. They are most directly exposed to fine particulates, unburned gas and oil, benzene, and other toxic substances all day each work day. We must point out that the OSHA guidance on safety hazards indicates safety hazards should be removed wherever possible, and dangerous lawn equipment can certainly be replaced with superior, zero-emission alternatives. The American Green Zone Alliance specifically works with city maintenance operations to ease the transition to the new, lower-operating cost, superior electric-powered tools. 

San Mateo has 35 parks, six recreation/community centers, two pools, community gardens, the Marina Lagoon and the Poplar Creek Golf Course. So, the maintenance task is significant. However, other cities and facilities have proven zero-emission tools are tough enough for the job. Some might say that San Mateo’s Poplar Golf Course, at 105 acres,

is too large to maintain with zero-emission tools. However, Alameda’s Corica Park is 300 acres and maintained without gas-powered leaf blowers. In addition, The Cities of San Francisco and Oakland use only zero-emission tools.  

A gas-powered leaf blower ban is a simple, low-cost initiative that benefits everyone in the community. The opportunity is to lead San Mateo toward a brighter, cleaner, zero-emission future.