So I live next to this real tree hugging whiner who has for whatever reason made it his main goal in life to shut my wood burning down. I'm in a suburban environment, but there are other wood burners near us, all within a 100 foot area of each other. It's New England, Near Boston, right on the ocean. It gets very cold and wood burning here is an American tradition going back hundreds of years to the founding of our nation. This guy claims that, even though there is another wood burner the same exact distance from his home, only my stove affects him. He also just so happens to not like my father and is friends with the closest other wood burner, who he's never complained about. Go figure. I always burn clean dry wood, and there's never an unusual amount of excess smoke. This guy is so hellbent on shutting me down, here's a list of things he's done thus far:
-Visited the town building department numerous(10+) times, forcing them to visit our home and make sure the install is to code and inspected. It of course was, and they've now labeled him a nutcase.
-Visited the fire department, prompting the fire marshal to visit. The marshal said this nut actually took a picture of my stack one day when it was a "smokey" fire, which probably stopped smoking seconds after he took the pic. The fire marshal turned out to be a good guy who said he had driven by the house several other times and couldn't even see any smoke. He also said that he even allowed outdoor fire pits, and had no problem with burning clean wood(showed him my clean wood pile). Now we have another town official labeling him a nut.
-Contacted board of health. I got a letter from the board of health(ridiculous, I know). The nut must have portrayed me as someone who burned trash in my stove, as I'm sure he did with the other two officials, because the clown at the board of health included what looks like a google copy and paste of 'tips for clean burning', which I've been fully aware of and followed since I was a kid. "Only burn clean dry wood, if your insert is old replace it(it's not, it's new), etc.
The last sentence of the letter from the director of public health reads "...I request that the wood burning unit not be used when the wind is coming from North Westernly direction toward the property..."
When it's coming from that direction? Are you kidding? Yeah sure, I'll just monitor the wind direction constantly and when it shifts, pour a bucket of water on it. How can such a thing even be enforced? This is a legal install with other wood burners in the immediate area, and they want to impose such a restriction on me? My guess is they'd open up a bag of worms if they tried to enforce it, and I don't plan to stop burning, ever.
Anyway, bounce your ideas back, let me know if anyone's experienced similar situation.
-Visited the town building department numerous(10+) times, forcing them to visit our home and make sure the install is to code and inspected. It of course was, and they've now labeled him a nutcase.
-Visited the fire department, prompting the fire marshal to visit. The marshal said this nut actually took a picture of my stack one day when it was a "smokey" fire, which probably stopped smoking seconds after he took the pic. The fire marshal turned out to be a good guy who said he had driven by the house several other times and couldn't even see any smoke. He also said that he even allowed outdoor fire pits, and had no problem with burning clean wood(showed him my clean wood pile). Now we have another town official labeling him a nut.
-Contacted board of health. I got a letter from the board of health(ridiculous, I know). The nut must have portrayed me as someone who burned trash in my stove, as I'm sure he did with the other two officials, because the clown at the board of health included what looks like a google copy and paste of 'tips for clean burning', which I've been fully aware of and followed since I was a kid. "Only burn clean dry wood, if your insert is old replace it(it's not, it's new), etc.
The last sentence of the letter from the director of public health reads "...I request that the wood burning unit not be used when the wind is coming from North Westernly direction toward the property..."
When it's coming from that direction? Are you kidding? Yeah sure, I'll just monitor the wind direction constantly and when it shifts, pour a bucket of water on it. How can such a thing even be enforced? This is a legal install with other wood burners in the immediate area, and they want to impose such a restriction on me? My guess is they'd open up a bag of worms if they tried to enforce it, and I don't plan to stop burning, ever.
Anyway, bounce your ideas back, let me know if anyone's experienced similar situation.
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