Fire permits?

[cowman]

My local municipality, in all its wisdom, has now decided you need a fire permit for just about everything!
Even burning barrels and firepits in the back yard!
Of course you require a visit by some little beurocrat to inspect the site as well as take a little course on fire safety! Well that sure sounds like a good make work project for some college boy who is too dumb to make it in the real world?
I don't think there is a fee for all this, at least not yet, but I guess we'll need a few more tax dollars added on to pay for this useless beurocratic expansion. I wonder where all this stupidity will end?

[grassfarmer]

Oh you've quite a ways to go yet Cowman! I was showing some Scottish visitors round last week and they were asking where my silage pit was. They were confused when I showed them my empty bale yard. In the UK you need a concrete pit with 100% secure effluent collection and storage facilities, subject to rigorous unannounced inspections and very serious fines. It has been an offense for many years to cause a fire that gives off black smoke (burning old silage sheets, plastic etc) and now it is illegal to burn waste paper or other garbage on your farm. It's not that the UK has a highly developed recycling industry - most of this is going into landfill! It's no longer possible to collect waste tyres from a tyre shop to weigh your silage sheet down with either - as they are an environmental risk.
Lot's of stupid make work projects and half-assed attemts at environmental control - luckily Canada is about 20 years behind Europe on this front.. but it's coming.

[grassfarmer]

In our municipality when I was on council we amended the fire by-law, the only requirement for burning barrels or firepits were that they had to be covered with a screen to prevent sparks from igniting the entire farmstead !
Site visits are necessary to get burning permits for brush piles etc. I was the one that made the motion to disallow any burning barrels or incinerators within the hamlets due to the smoke.

There is a liability that rests with your county cowman when they issue a burning permit, I was a fire guardian throughout my entire term on council but I did not issue a permit. There is personal liablity attached to it.

I do feel that some farmers are a bit careless with burning. My neighbour usually waits until its been dry for at least a month and the wind is blowing up a gale then he lights his dry grass and garbage.

Another neighbour usually put his brush piles right on the property line with his elderly acreage owner neighbour then would wait until it was Easter Sunday or Thanksgiving and light his brushpiles. Had the fire department out on a couple of occasions when they got away and nearly burned out the neighbour.

[cakadu]

Cowman, I for one would like to see some people learn what is appropriate/not appropriate to burn and when to burn. Our respective neighbors must be related emrald because they do the exact same things - plus we get the added bonus of having them burn plastic and all kinds of other foul things that produce lots of black smoke generally on weekends and/or when the weather is nice and you're trying to get something done outside.

It is frustrating when there is absolutely zero consideration given to others, the weather etc. Maybe a little education could go a long way.

[cakadu]

The other thing that occurred to me cowman is the fact that if you cause the fire department to have to go out, it is an extremely hefty bill that you have to pay. Granted, you would only do it once.

It may be a good thing that they get a little pro-active and let people know from the get-go what the sensible things to do are. An ounce of prevention can oftentimes go a long way.

[cakadu]

Our county included a No Plastic burning clause in our Fire By-Law when I was on council. Anyone with respiratory problems that lives adjacent or close by burning brush piles can experience real problems.
Linda during my time on council one farmer was charged with allowing a fire to get out of control.
His case was thrown out of court because he had a valid burning permit which was issued by the fire guardian without her having inspected the property. She drove by the field where he wanted to burn and issued the permit and had her teenaged son deliver it.

The fire department could have contained the fire on the property but sat at the road waiting for it to leave his property so they could lay charges for the fire getting away. The result was that two families had to be evacuated by helicopter, one fellow had his woodlot burned and there was a huge bill to the county for water bombers, cats etc.

Council was powerless to do anything after the fact but it was a learning experience.

[cowman]

Well common sense might go a long way in avoiding most problems? However I guess a few bad apples spoil the mix?
The point I was trying to get across is this is just one more "rule" to make our lives more complicated? There are so many darned rules anymore you need a darned lawyer to keep up with them all!
Grassfarmer talked about all the rules in Scotland and I know my Dutch neighbor says it is insane in Holland...to the point where it is almost impossible to operate!
How soon until we get to that state?
The road to the nanny state is long but steady, and we are sure getting there?
The seatbelt thing is typical? If you don't wear it who are you hurting but yourself? Well the government contends if you hurt yourself they will have to pick up the healthcare bill and maybe pay to keep your dependents! Thus, through their little commie programs they can now dictate that you MUST wear a seatbelt or they will fine you! Now if they never had socialized medicine or welfare, they would have no leg to stand on in regards to controlling you!
Government costs us a lot of money and what do we get for it? Stupid rules and lots of dumbies running around enforcing them!
Maybe they should forget about social engineering and concentrate on the roads and trade and commerce!

[cowman]

okay cowman, picture this. A province with no rules about anything. You can drive like a maniac anywhere you wish, including school zones. You can pass school busses unloading and loading. You can haul hazardous goods with trucks that have no safety requirements. 10 year old kids can drive on our highways because they shouldn't need a license because that is a RULE !

And you can build a hog barn within twenty feet of your neighbours house and spread manure beside the neighbourhood church five minutes before somebody's nice summer wedding....I could go on and on.

We do need some rules, and I agree that there seem to be far too many but without rules it would be mayhem.
When we all lived in our little corner of the world, farmers lived in rural areas, city people lived in towns and cities and the main industry was agriculture likely we didn't need too many rules. Things have changed, we have all sorts of land uses and industries in our province and in order for everyone and every industry to cohabit with some resemblance of order some rules and regulations are necessary.